head to head · open source
Mastodon vs annict
Mastodon has 50,465 GitHub stars, 7,536 forks, 4,525 open issues and last shipped yesterday. annict has 784 stars, 98 forks, 203 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Mastodon leads on adoption by 6,337% (50,465 vs 784 stars). Mastodon is written in Ruby under AGPL-3.0; annict is written in Go under AGPL-3.0. Mastodon has attracted 15% as many forks as stars, annict 13%. annict was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (social-network), 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
| Mastodon | annict | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 50K | ★ 784 |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Ruby | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 7.5K | ⑂ 98 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Mastodon if
- You weight community size — 50K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Ruby
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick annict if
- You want the annict feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and annict fits your workflow better
About Mastodon
[!NOTE] Want to learn more about Mastodon? Click below to find out more in a video. Mastodon is a free, open source social network server based on ActivityPub where users can follow friends and discover new ones. On Mastodon, users can publish anything they want: links, pictures, text, and video. All Mastodon servers are interoperable as a federated network (users on one server can seamlessly communicate with users from another one, including non Mastodon software that implements ActivityPub!) Navigation Project homepage 🐘 Donate to support development 🎁 View sponsors Blog 📰 Documentation 📚 Official…
read the full Mastodon overview →
About annict
Annict (アニクト) 日本語 English 次に観たい作品が見つかるアニメ視聴記録サービス » annict.com コミュニティ コントリビューションについて セキュリティに関する報告
read the full annict overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Mastodon or annict more popular?
Mastodon has 50,465 GitHub stars and annict has 784. Mastodon has the larger community by that measure.
Are Mastodon and annict free?
Both are open source. Mastodon is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and annict under AGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Mastodon and annict?
Mastodon is written in Ruby and annict in Go. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Mastodon or annict?
Choose Mastodon if you want the larger community (50,465 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose annict if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.