head to head · open source
orm vs dbmate
orm has 47,640 GitHub stars, 2,538 forks, 2,627 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. dbmate has 7,393 stars, 379 forks, 34 open issues and last shipped yesterday. orm leads on adoption by 544% (47,640 vs 7,393 stars). orm is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; dbmate is written in Go under MIT. orm has attracted 5% as many forks as stars, dbmate 5%. dbmate was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 3 topic tags (database, mysql, nodejs), 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
| orm | dbmate | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 48K | ★ 7.4K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-19 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.5K | ⑂ 379 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick orm if
- You weight community size — 48K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick dbmate if
- You want the dbmate feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and dbmate fits your workflow better
About orm
Prisma ORM is a next generation TypeScript ORM for Node.js and TypeScript applications, supporting PostgreSQL, MySQL, MariaDB, SQL Server, SQLite, MongoDB, and CockroachDB, and it is aimed at developers and teams building data backed applications in that ecosystem.
About dbmate
Dbmate is a standalone, MIT licensed command line database migration tool written in Go that keeps database schema in sync across multiple developers and production servers, aimed at teams building database backed applications in any language or framework.
read the full dbmate overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is orm or dbmate more popular?
orm has 47,640 GitHub stars and dbmate has 7,393. orm has the larger community by that measure.
Are orm and dbmate free?
Both are open source. orm is licensed under Apache-2.0 and dbmate under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between orm and dbmate?
orm is written in TypeScript and dbmate in Go. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, orm or dbmate?
Choose orm if you want the larger community (47,640 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose dbmate if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.