head to head · open source
orm vs ibis
orm has 47,640 GitHub stars, 2,538 forks, 2,627 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. ibis has 6,661 stars, 767 forks, 544 open issues and last shipped yesterday. orm leads on adoption by 615% (47,640 vs 6,661 stars). orm is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; ibis is written in Python under Apache-2.0. orm has attracted 5% as many forks as stars, ibis 12%. ibis was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 3 topic tags (database, mssql, mysql), 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 | ibis | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 48K | ★ 6.7K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-19 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.5K | ⑂ 767 |
| 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 ibis if
- You want the ibis feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and ibis 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 ibis
Ibis is the portable Python dataframe library: an Apache 2.0 framework that lets data engineers, analysts, and Python developers write one lazy dataframe expression and run it against more than twenty SQL and analytical backends, from a local DuckDB file to Snowflake, BigQuery, or PySpark.
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Frequently asked questions
Is orm or ibis more popular?
orm has 47,640 GitHub stars and ibis has 6,661. orm has the larger community by that measure.
Are orm and ibis free?
Both are open source. orm is licensed under Apache-2.0 and ibis under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between orm and ibis?
orm is written in TypeScript and ibis in Python. 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 ibis?
Choose orm if you want the larger community (47,640 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose ibis if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.