head to head · open source
docusaurus vs mkdocs-material
docusaurus has 66,471 GitHub stars, 10,071 forks, 430 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. mkdocs-material has 27,561 stars, 4,145 forks, 1 open issues and last shipped 10 days ago. docusaurus leads on adoption by 141% (66,471 vs 27,561 stars). docusaurus is written in TypeScript under MIT; mkdocs-material is written in Python under MIT. docusaurus has attracted 15% as many forks as stars, mkdocs-material 15%. docusaurus was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (documentation), 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.
← all 20902 open source comparisons
Side by side
| docusaurus | mkdocs-material | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 66K | ★ 28K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Python |
| Last push | 2026-10-10 | 2026-10-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 10K | ⑂ 4.1K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick docusaurus if
- You weight community size — 66K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick mkdocs-material if
- You want the mkdocs-material feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and mkdocs-material fits your workflow better
About docusaurus
Docusaurus is an open source static site generator from Meta for maintainers who need a documentation, blog, and project website that is easy to keep up to date.
read the full docusaurus overview →
About mkdocs-material
Material for MkDocs is a documentation framework built on top of MkDocs, the static site generator for project documentation. It lives in the Python ecosystem and is distributed as a theme plus an accompanying set of plugins, so authors write documentation in Markdown and MkDocs builds it into a static site that the theme renders. The project is licensed under MIT, has existed for eleven years, and is maintained as an open source project with more than 27,000 stars and over 4,000 forks on GitHub.
read the full mkdocs-material overview →
More in Content & Publishing
Related comparisons
More Documentation & Knowledge Base projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the Documentation & Knowledge Base field.
Frequently asked questions
Is docusaurus or mkdocs-material more popular?
docusaurus has 66,471 GitHub stars and mkdocs-material has 27,561. docusaurus has the larger community by that measure.
Are docusaurus and mkdocs-material free?
Both are open source. docusaurus is licensed under MIT and mkdocs-material under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between docusaurus and mkdocs-material?
docusaurus is written in TypeScript and mkdocs-material 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, docusaurus or mkdocs-material?
Choose docusaurus if you want the larger community (66,471 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose mkdocs-material if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.