head to head · open source
Open WebUI vs hob
Open WebUI has 158,025 GitHub stars, 22,972 forks, 294 open issues and last shipped yesterday. hob has 516 stars, 42 forks, 2 open issues and last shipped 9 days ago. Open WebUI leads on adoption by 30,525% (158,025 vs 516 stars). Open WebUI is written in Svelte under a custom or non-standard licence; hob is written in TypeScript under MIT. Open WebUI has attracted 15% as many forks as stars, hob 8%. Open WebUI was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (llm), 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
| Open WebUI | hob | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 158K | ★ 516 |
| License | Custom / other | MIT |
| Written in | Svelte | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-11-07 | 2026-10-30 |
| Forks | ⑂ 23K | ⑂ 42 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Open WebUI if
- You weight community size — 158K stars and counting
- You want the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches Svelte
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick hob if
- You want the hob feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and hob fits your workflow better
About Open WebUI
Open WebUI 👋 Open WebUI is a home for AI , a self hosted AI platform that's extensible , feature rich , user friendly, and built to run entirely offline . With support for Ollama and OpenAI compatible APIs , it gives you a powerful, provider agnostic interface for both local and cloud based models. Passionate about open source AI? Join our team → [!TIP] Looking for an Enterprise Plan? – Speak with Our Sales Team Today! For more information, be sure to check out our Open WebUI Documentation. Key Features of Open WebUI ⭐ 🚀 Effortless Setup : Install seamlessly via pip, uv, Docker, or Kubernetes (kubectl…
read the full Open WebUI overview →
About hob
Hob An easier way to use AI on your own computer. A free, open source alternative to Claude and ChatGPT. Visit hob.chat → · Download for Mac · Windows · Linux Fill out PDFs, work through documents, and much more. Free, private, and works offline. Hob picks the best frontier open weight model that fits your computer and sets everything up for you. Help · Contributing · MIT license Made by Frigade .
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Frequently asked questions
Is Open WebUI or hob more popular?
Open WebUI has 158,025 GitHub stars and hob has 516. Open WebUI has the larger community by that measure.
Are Open WebUI and hob free?
Both are open source. Open WebUI has no licence declared in this registry, and hob is licensed under MIT. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Open WebUI and hob?
Open WebUI is written in Svelte and hob 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, Open WebUI or hob?
Choose Open WebUI if you want the larger community (158,025 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose hob if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.