head to head · open source
Docs vs persepolis
Docs has 16,838 GitHub stars, 639 forks, 370 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. persepolis has 7,455 stars, 708 forks, 317 open issues and last shipped 12 months ago. Docs leads on adoption by 126% (16,838 vs 7,455 stars). Docs is written in Python under MIT; persepolis is written in Python under GPL-3.0. Docs has attracted 4% as many forks as stars, persepolis 9%. Docs 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
| Docs | persepolis | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 17K | ★ 7.5K |
| License | MIT | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Python | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2025-10-09 |
| Forks | ⑂ 639 | ⑂ 708 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Docs if
- You weight community size — 17K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick persepolis if
- You want the persepolis feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and persepolis fits your workflow better
About Docs
Docs is an open source collaborative text editor for creating, editing, and sharing documents in real time. It lives in the open source documentation and knowledge base ecosystem, and it is built with Django and React for web native use. The repository describes Docs as a web native editor made for teams that need clean documents and sub documents without surrendering data to a hosted service.
About persepolis
Persepolis is a download manager written in Python and released under the GPL 3.0 license. It ships a graphical interface built with PyQt5 or PySide6 and is developed for GNU/Linux distributions, the BSDs, macOS, and Microsoft Windows. The project has existed for roughly ten years, carries 7,449 stars and 709 forks on GitHub, and uses the Meson build system. It is packaged for Arch Linux through the persepolis git AUR package, and it belongs to the desktop application ecosystem of Python and Qt rather than to any single distribution.
read the full persepolis overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Docs or persepolis more popular?
Docs has 16,838 GitHub stars and persepolis has 7,455. Docs has the larger community by that measure.
Are Docs and persepolis free?
Both are open source. Docs is licensed under MIT and persepolis under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Docs and persepolis?
Docs is written in Python and persepolis 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, Docs or persepolis?
Choose Docs if you want the larger community (16,838 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose persepolis if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.