head to head · open source
next.js vs jekyll
next.js has 142,343 GitHub stars, 32,220 forks, 3,358 open issues and last shipped yesterday. jekyll has 51,677 stars, 10,300 forks, 258 open issues and last shipped yesterday. next.js leads on adoption by 175% (142,343 vs 51,677 stars). next.js is written in JavaScript under MIT; jekyll is written in Ruby under MIT. next.js has attracted 23% as many forks as stars, jekyll 20%. next.js was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (static-site-generator), 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.
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Side by side
| next.js | jekyll | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 142K | ★ 52K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | JavaScript | Ruby |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 32K | ⑂ 10K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick next.js if
- You weight community size — 142K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick jekyll if
- You want the jekyll feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Ruby
- You evaluated both and jekyll fits your workflow better
About next.js
Next.js is a JavaScript framework for building web applications, distributed under the MIT license and described by its maintainers as "The React Framework." It extends the latest React features so that developers can build full stack web applications, and it integrates Rust based JavaScript tooling to produce fast builds. The project lives in the React and Node ecosystem, and its topic list places it among static site generators, server rendering tools, hybrid and universal rendering approaches, and compiler oriented front end tooling. The repository is ten years old and has been pushed as recently as September …
read the full next.js overview →
About jekyll
Jekyll is a blog aware static site generator written in Ruby and released under the MIT license. It takes content written in Markdown together with Liquid templates and renders a complete static website that can be served by Apache, Nginx, or any other web server. The project describes itself as a file based CMS without the complexity of a database backed one, and it is the engine behind GitHub Pages, which hosts sites directly from GitHub repositories. It lives in the Ruby ecosystem, is distributed as a gem, and has been developed for roughly eighteen years.
read the full jekyll overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is next.js or jekyll more popular?
next.js has 142,343 GitHub stars and jekyll has 51,677. next.js has the larger community by that measure.
Are next.js and jekyll free?
Both are open source. next.js is licensed under MIT and jekyll under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between next.js and jekyll?
next.js is written in JavaScript and jekyll in Ruby. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, next.js or jekyll?
Choose next.js if you want the larger community (142,343 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose jekyll if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.