head to head · open source
mall vs q
mall has 84,792 GitHub stars, 29,827 forks, 15 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. q has 10,360 stars, 425 forks, 132 open issues and last shipped 7 months ago. mall leads on adoption by 718% (84,792 vs 10,360 stars). mall is written in Java under Apache-2.0; q is written in Python under GPL-3.0. mall has attracted 35% as many forks as stars, q 4%. mall was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| mall | q | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 85K | ★ 10K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Java | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-15 | 2026-02-06 |
| Forks | ⑂ 30K | ⑂ 425 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick mall if
- You weight community size — 85K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick q if
- You want the q feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and q fits your workflow better
About mall
mall is a complete e commerce system built on Spring Boot and MyBatis, distributed as a Java project under the Apache 2.0 license. It ships two applications in one repository: a storefront system for shoppers and an administrative back office for operators. The storefront covers the home portal, product recommendation, product search, product display, shopping cart, order flow, member center, customer service, and help center. The back office covers product management, order management, member management, promotion management, operations management, content management, statistics reports, finance management, perm…
About q
q is a Python command line tool, licensed under GPL 3.0, that runs SQL statements directly against delimited text files and multi file SQLite databases without importing the data into a database server first.
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Frequently asked questions
Is mall or q more popular?
mall has 84,792 GitHub stars and q has 10,360. mall has the larger community by that measure.
Are mall and q free?
Both are open source. mall is licensed under Apache-2.0 and q under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between mall and q?
mall is written in Java and q in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, mall or q?
Choose mall if you want the larger community (84,792 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose q if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.