head to head · open source
orm vs tbls
orm has 47,640 GitHub stars, 2,538 forks, 2,627 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. tbls has 4,345 stars, 210 forks, 55 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. orm leads on adoption by 996% (47,640 vs 4,345 stars). orm is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; tbls is written in Go under MIT. orm has attracted 5% as many forks as stars, tbls 5%. orm was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (mariadb), 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 | tbls | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 48K | ★ 4.3K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-18 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.5K | ⑂ 210 |
| 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 tbls if
- You want the tbls feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and tbls 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 tbls
tbls is an MIT licensed, Go written command line tool that automatically documents a database schema as Markdown and other formats, aimed at developers, data engineers, and platform teams who want schema documentation generated, diffed, and linted inside continuous integration instead of maintained by hand.
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Frequently asked questions
Is orm or tbls more popular?
orm has 47,640 GitHub stars and tbls has 4,345. orm has the larger community by that measure.
Are orm and tbls free?
Both are open source. orm is licensed under Apache-2.0 and tbls under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between orm and tbls?
orm is written in TypeScript and tbls 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 tbls?
Choose orm if you want the larger community (47,640 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose tbls if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.