head to head · open source
NetData vs metrics
NetData has 80,561 GitHub stars, 6,630 forks, 393 open issues and last shipped yesterday. metrics has 17,202 stars, 2,275 forks, 68 open issues and last shipped 4 months ago. NetData leads on adoption by 368% (80,561 vs 17,202 stars). NetData is written in Go under GPL-3.0; metrics is written in JavaScript under MIT. NetData has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, metrics 13%. NetData 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
| NetData | metrics | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 81K | ★ 17K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Go | JavaScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-05-29 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.6K | ⑂ 2.3K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick NetData if
- You weight community size — 81K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick metrics if
- You want the metrics feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You evaluated both and metrics fits your workflow better
About NetData
Netdata is an open source, real time infrastructure monitoring platform written in Go and released under GPL 3.0, built for operators and lean teams who need per second visibility across Linux, macOS, FreeBSD, and Windows systems.
read the full NetData overview →
About metrics
Metrics is an infographics generator for GitHub accounts, published under the MIT license and written in JavaScript. It lives in the GitHub ecosystem as a GitHub Action and as a hosted web service, and it produces statistics about a user, an organization, or a repository. The output is rendered as SVG, Markdown, PDF, or JSON, which means the same generated figures can be embedded in a profile readme, attached to a blog post, or consumed by another tool.
read the full metrics overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is NetData or metrics more popular?
NetData has 80,561 GitHub stars and metrics has 17,202. NetData has the larger community by that measure.
Are NetData and metrics free?
Both are open source. NetData is licensed under GPL-3.0 and metrics under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between NetData and metrics?
NetData is written in Go and metrics in JavaScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, NetData or metrics?
Choose NetData if you want the larger community (80,561 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose metrics if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.