head to head · open source
manim vs auto-animate
manim has 96,184 GitHub stars, 7,903 forks, 500 open issues and last shipped 2 months ago. auto-animate has 13,958 stars, 268 forks, 44 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. manim leads on adoption by 589% (96,184 vs 13,958 stars). manim is written in Python under MIT; auto-animate is written in TypeScript under MIT. manim has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, auto-animate 2%. auto-animate was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (animation), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
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
| manim | auto-animate | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 96K | ★ 14K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | Python | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-09 | 2026-11-05 |
| Forks | ⑂ 7.9K | ⑂ 268 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick manim if
- You weight community size — 96K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick auto-animate if
- You want the auto-animate feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and auto-animate fits your workflow better
About manim
Manim is an engine for precise programmatic animations, designed for creating explanatory math videos. Note, there are two versions of manim. This repository began as a personal project by the author of 3Blue1Brown for the purpose of animating those videos, with video specific code available here. In 2020 a group of developers forked it into what is now the community edition, with a goal of being more stable, better tested, quicker to respond to community contributions, and all around friendlier to get started with. See this page for more details. Installation [!Warning] WARNING: These instructions are for…
read the full manim overview →
About auto-animate
Add motion to your apps with a single line of code. AutoAnimate is a zero config, drop in animation utility that adds smooth transitions to your web app. You can use it with Vue, React, Solid or any other JavaScript application. With one line of code, you can improve your interfaces, for example: Installation Install using your package manager of choice. Boom! Done. That was fast! 🐇 Usage 📖 View the documentation site for usage instructions. Examples 📖 View the documentation site for examples. Plugins 📖 View the documentation site for plugin instructions. Support us Is AutoAnimate saving you time? Please…
read the full auto-animate overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is manim or auto-animate more popular?
manim has 96,184 GitHub stars and auto-animate has 13,958. manim has the larger community by that measure.
Are manim and auto-animate free?
Both are open source. manim is licensed under MIT and auto-animate under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between manim and auto-animate?
manim is written in Python and auto-animate in TypeScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, manim or auto-animate?
Choose manim if you want the larger community (96,184 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose auto-animate if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.