head to head · open source
Navidrome vs tvheadend
Navidrome has 23,632 GitHub stars, 1,708 forks, 275 open issues and last shipped yesterday. tvheadend has 3,521 stars, 975 forks, 107 open issues and last shipped 4 days ago. Navidrome leads on adoption by 571% (23,632 vs 3,521 stars). Navidrome is written in Go under GPL-3.0; tvheadend is written in C under GPL-3.0. Navidrome has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, tvheadend 28%. Navidrome 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
| Navidrome | tvheadend | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 24K | ★ 3.5K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Go | C |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-14 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.7K | ⑂ 975 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Navidrome if
- You weight community size — 24K 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 tvheadend if
- You want the tvheadend feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C
- You evaluated both and tvheadend fits your workflow better
About Navidrome
Navidrome is an open source, web based music collection server and streamer written in Go and released under the GPL 3.0 license. It lives in the self hosted media server ecosystem and is intended for users who want to listen to a personal music collection from a browser or mobile device.
read the full Navidrome overview →
About tvheadend
Tvheadend is an open source TV streaming server and digital video recorder for Linux. It lives in the Linux media and streaming ecosystem, and it is written in C under the GPL 3.0 license. The project provides a server that can receive television signals and streams from many input types, then make those channels available over the network.
read the full tvheadend overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Navidrome or tvheadend more popular?
Navidrome has 23,632 GitHub stars and tvheadend has 3,521. Navidrome has the larger community by that measure.
Are Navidrome and tvheadend free?
Both are open source. Navidrome is licensed under GPL-3.0 and tvheadend under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Navidrome and tvheadend?
Navidrome is written in Go and tvheadend in C. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Navidrome or tvheadend?
Choose Navidrome if you want the larger community (23,632 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose tvheadend if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.