head to head · open source
nanobot vs MaxKB
nanobot has 49,766 GitHub stars, 8,713 forks, 775 open issues and last shipped yesterday. MaxKB has 23,095 stars, 3,210 forks, 18 open issues and last shipped yesterday. nanobot leads on adoption by 115% (49,766 vs 23,095 stars). nanobot is written in Python under MIT; MaxKB is written in Python under GPL-3.0. nanobot has attracted 18% as many forks as stars, MaxKB 14%. MaxKB was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (chatbot), 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
| nanobot | MaxKB | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 50K | ★ 23K |
| License | MIT | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Python | Python |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 8.7K | ⑂ 3.2K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick nanobot if
- You weight community size — 50K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick MaxKB if
- You want the MaxKB 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 MaxKB fits your workflow better
About nanobot
English 简体中文 繁體中文 Español Français Bahasa Indonesia 日本語 한국어 Русский Tiếng Việt Discord · X · WeChat / Feishu nanobot 🐈 nanobot is an ultra lightweight, open source, self hosted personal AI agent framework written in Python. It runs in a WebUI, terminal, or chat apps and combines tools, long term memory, MCP integrations, model routing, multi agent delegation, scheduled automation, and an OpenAI compatible API in a small, readable core. Start Here What can nanobot do? nanobot is a self hosted personal AI agent runtime. It can: run in a browser WebUI or terminal connect to Telegram, Discord, Slack, WeChat, Email…
read the full nanobot overview →
About MaxKB
Open source platform for building enterprise grade agents 强大易用的企业级智能体平台 [ 中文(简体) ] [ English ] MaxKB = Max Knowledge Brain, it is an open source platform for building enterprise grade agents. MaxKB integrates Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) pipelines, supports robust workflows, and provides advanced MCP tool use capabilities. MaxKB is widely applied in scenarios such as intelligent customer service, corporate internal knowledge bases, academic research, and education. RAG Pipeline : Supports direct uploading of documents / automatic crawling of online documents, with features for automatic text splitting…
read the full MaxKB overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is nanobot or MaxKB more popular?
nanobot has 49,766 GitHub stars and MaxKB has 23,095. nanobot has the larger community by that measure.
Are nanobot and MaxKB free?
Both are open source. nanobot is licensed under MIT and MaxKB under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between nanobot and MaxKB?
nanobot is written in Python and MaxKB 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, nanobot or MaxKB?
Choose nanobot if you want the larger community (49,766 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose MaxKB if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.