head to head · open source
Penpot vs OpenPencil
Penpot has 60,106 GitHub stars, 4,111 forks, 777 open issues and last shipped yesterday. OpenPencil has 8,361 stars, 815 forks, 46 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Penpot leads on adoption by 619% (60,106 vs 8,361 stars). Penpot is written in Clojure under MPL-2.0; OpenPencil is written in TypeScript under MIT. Penpot has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, OpenPencil 10%. Penpot 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
| Penpot | OpenPencil | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 60K | ★ 8.4K |
| License | MPL-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Clojure | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 4.1K | ⑂ 815 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Penpot if
- You weight community size — 60K stars and counting
- You want the MPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Clojure
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick OpenPencil if
- You want the OpenPencil feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and OpenPencil fits your workflow better
About Penpot
Penpot is an open source design and prototyping platform for product teams that need scalable real time collaboration, self hosting, and full ownership of their design infrastructure.
read the full Penpot overview →
About OpenPencil
OpenPencil is an open source, AI native design editor that opens and writes native Figma .fig and Pencil .pen files, runs as a roughly 7 MB desktop app or in the browser, and is aimed at designers and developers who want a local, fully programmable alternative to Figma.
read the full OpenPencil overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Penpot or OpenPencil more popular?
Penpot has 60,106 GitHub stars and OpenPencil has 8,361. Penpot has the larger community by that measure.
Are Penpot and OpenPencil free?
Both are open source. Penpot is licensed under MPL-2.0 and OpenPencil under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Penpot and OpenPencil?
Penpot is written in Clojure and OpenPencil 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, Penpot or OpenPencil?
Choose Penpot if you want the larger community (60,106 stars) or its MPL-2.0 licence terms. Choose OpenPencil if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.