head to head · open source
Memos vs Notesnook
Memos has 64,235 GitHub stars, 4,935 forks, 67 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Notesnook has 14,875 stars, 1,042 forks, 1,012 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Memos leads on adoption by 332% (64,235 vs 14,875 stars). Memos is written in Go under MIT; Notesnook is written in TypeScript under GPL-3.0. Memos has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, Notesnook 7%. Memos was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 4 topic tags (foss, note-taking, notes, open-source), 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
| Memos | Notesnook | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 64K | ★ 15K |
| License | MIT | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Go | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 4.9K | ⑂ 1.0K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Memos if
- You weight community size — 64K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Notesnook if
- You want the Notesnook feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and Notesnook fits your workflow better
About Memos
✨ Featured sponsor: CodeRabbit — Industry leading AI code reviews. Memos Fast enough for every thought. Private enough for all of them. Memos is an open source, self hosted home for short form thinking. Daily notes, links, work logs, and snippets flow into a chronological Markdown timeline—on infrastructure you control, without the overhead of an all in one workspace. Run with Docker · Try the live demo · Read the docs Why Memos? Capture quickly — Write in Markdown, attach media, and save without choosing a title, folder, or template. Organize lightly — Revisit notes through the timeline, search, tags, and pins…
read the full Memos overview →
About Notesnook
Notesnook An end to end encrypted note taking alternative to Evernote. Website About us Roadmap Downloads Twitter Discord Overview Notesnook is a free (as in speech) & open source note taking app focused on user privacy & ease of use. To ensure zero knowledge principles, Notesnook encrypts everything on your device using XChaCha20 Poly1305 & Argon2 . Notesnook is our proof that privacy does not (always) have to come at the cost of convenience. We aim to provide users peace of mind & 100% confidence that their notes are safe and secure. The decision to go fully open source is one of the most crucial steps towards…
read the full Notesnook overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Memos or Notesnook more popular?
Memos has 64,235 GitHub stars and Notesnook has 14,875. Memos has the larger community by that measure.
Are Memos and Notesnook free?
Both are open source. Memos is licensed under MIT and Notesnook under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Memos and Notesnook?
Memos is written in Go and Notesnook 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, Memos or Notesnook?
Choose Memos if you want the larger community (64,235 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose Notesnook if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.