head to head · open source
monaco-editor vs web-ext
monaco-editor has 46,944 GitHub stars, 4,167 forks, 859 open issues and last shipped yesterday. web-ext has 3,152 stars, 392 forks, 223 open issues and last shipped yesterday. monaco-editor leads on adoption by 1,389% (46,944 vs 3,152 stars). monaco-editor is written in JavaScript under MIT; web-ext is written in JavaScript under MPL-2.0. monaco-editor has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, web-ext 12%. monaco-editor 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
| monaco-editor | web-ext | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 47K | ★ 3.2K |
| License | MIT | MPL-2.0 |
| Written in | JavaScript | JavaScript |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 4.2K | ⑂ 392 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick monaco-editor if
- You weight community size — 47K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick web-ext if
- You want the web-ext feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You evaluated both and web-ext fits your workflow better
About monaco-editor
Monaco Editor The Monaco Editor is the fully featured code editor from VS Code. Check out the VS Code docs to see some of the supported features. Try it out Try out the editor and see various examples in our interactive playground. The playground is the best way to learn about how to use the editor, which features is supports, to try out different versions and to create minimal reproducible examples for bug reports. Installing You will get: inside /esm : ESM version of the editor (compatible with e.g. webpack) monaco.d.ts : this specifies the API of the editor (this is what is actually versioned, everything else…
read the full monaco-editor overview →
About web-ext
Web ext This is a command line tool to help build, run, and test WebExtensions. Ultimately, it aims to support browser extensions in a standard, portable, cross platform way. Initially, it will provide a streamlined experience for developing Firefox Extensions. Documentation [Getting started with web ext][web ext user docs] Command reference Here are the commands you can run. Click on each one for detailed documentation or use help on the command line, such as web ext build help . run Run the extension lint Validate the extension source sign Sign the extension so it can be installed in Firefox build Create an…
read the full web-ext overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is monaco-editor or web-ext more popular?
monaco-editor has 46,944 GitHub stars and web-ext has 3,152. monaco-editor has the larger community by that measure.
Are monaco-editor and web-ext free?
Both are open source. monaco-editor is licensed under MIT and web-ext under MPL-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between monaco-editor and web-ext?
monaco-editor is written in JavaScript and web-ext 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, monaco-editor or web-ext?
Choose monaco-editor if you want the larger community (46,944 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose web-ext if its feature set, stack or MPL-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.