head to head · open source
NetData vs kdash
NetData has 81,255 GitHub stars, 6,717 forks, 393 open issues and last shipped yesterday. kdash has 2,559 stars, 97 forks, 3 open issues and last shipped 20 days ago. NetData leads on adoption by 3,075% (81,255 vs 2,559 stars). NetData is written in Go under GPL-3.0; kdash is written in Rust under MIT. NetData has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, kdash 4%. NetData was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (kubernetes), 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
| NetData | kdash | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 81K | ★ 2.6K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Go | Rust |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-10-14 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.7K | ⑂ 97 |
| 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 kdash if
- You want the kdash feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You evaluated both and kdash fits your workflow better
About NetData
X Ray Vision for your infrastructure! Every Metric, Every Second. No BS. Visit our Home Page MENU: WHO WE ARE KEY FEATURES GETTING STARTED HOW IT WORKS FAQ DOCS COMMUNITY CONTRIBUTE LICENSE [!WARNING] People get addicted to Netdata. Once you use it on your systems, there's no going back. WHO WE ARE Netdata is an open source, real time infrastructure monitoring platform. Monitor, detect, and act across your entire infrastructure. Core Advantages: Instant Insights – With Netdata you can access per second metrics and visualizations. Zero Configuration – You can deploy immediately without complex setup. ML Powered –…
read the full NetData overview →
About kdash
KDash A fast and simple dashboard for Kubernetes A simple terminal dashboard for Kubernetes built with Rust Contents What's new in 2.0 Installation Usage Keybindings Configuration Flags Limitations / Known issues Features Screenshots What's new in 2.0 Resource management actions let you act on what you're watching without leaving KDash: delete any resource ( Ctrl d ), edit any resource in your $EDITOR ( e ), rollout restart workloads ( r ), view previous container logs ( p ), scale workloads, and cordon nodes or suspend/resume/trigger CronJobs from a new action menu ( m ). Impactful actions are guarded by a…
read the full kdash overview →
More in Infrastructure & Operations
Related comparisons
More Monitoring & Observability projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the Monitoring & Observability field.
Frequently asked questions
Is NetData or kdash more popular?
NetData has 81,255 GitHub stars and kdash has 2,559. NetData has the larger community by that measure.
Are NetData and kdash free?
Both are open source. NetData is licensed under GPL-3.0 and kdash under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between NetData and kdash?
NetData is written in Go and kdash in Rust. 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 kdash?
Choose NetData if you want the larger community (81,255 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose kdash if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.