head to head · open source
one-api vs hey-api
one-api has 36,932 GitHub stars, 6,867 forks, 1,036 open issues and last shipped 8 months ago. hey-api has 5,416 stars, 434 forks, 630 open issues and last shipped 25 days ago. one-api leads on adoption by 582% (36,932 vs 5,416 stars). one-api is written in JavaScript under MIT; hey-api is written in TypeScript under MIT. one-api has attracted 19% as many forks as stars, hey-api 8%. hey-api 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
| one-api | hey-api | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 37K | ★ 5.4K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | JavaScript | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-01-09 | 2026-08-24 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.9K | ⑂ 434 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick one-api if
- You weight community size — 37K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick hey-api if
- You want the hey-api feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and hey-api fits your workflow better
About one-api
One API is a self hosted LLM API management and key redistribution system that exposes many model providers through the standard OpenAI API format, aimed at developers, teams and operators who want a single endpoint, a single key model and a single quota surface across providers.
read the full one-api overview →
About hey-api
Hey API is an open source ecosystem for turning API specifications into production ready code. It is distributed as a monorepo containing all of the project's open source packages, with the two primary generators being openapi ts for TypeScript and openapi python for Python. The TypeScript generator ships with more than twenty plugins covering SDKs, Zod schemas, and TanStack Query hooks, while the Python generator produces SDKs and Pydantic models. A supporting library, spec types , provides TypeScript definitions for OpenAPI and JSON Schema specifications with complete inline documentation. The project lives in …
read the full hey-api overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is one-api or hey-api more popular?
one-api has 36,932 GitHub stars and hey-api has 5,416. one-api has the larger community by that measure.
Are one-api and hey-api free?
Both are open source. one-api is licensed under MIT and hey-api under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between one-api and hey-api?
one-api is written in JavaScript and hey-api in TypeScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, one-api or hey-api?
Choose one-api if you want the larger community (36,932 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose hey-api if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.