head to head · open source
photocraft vs RawTherapee
photocraft has 76,172 GitHub stars, 13,501 forks, 1,208 open issues and last shipped yesterday. RawTherapee has 4,265 stars, 428 forks, 1,028 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. photocraft leads on adoption by 1,686% (76,172 vs 4,265 stars). photocraft is written in Rust under Apache-2.0; RawTherapee is written in C++ under GPL-3.0. photocraft has attracted 18% as many forks as stars, RawTherapee 10%. photocraft 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
| photocraft | RawTherapee | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 76K | ★ 4.3K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Rust | C++ |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-01 |
| Forks | ⑂ 14K | ⑂ 428 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick photocraft if
- You weight community size — 76K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick RawTherapee if
- You want the RawTherapee feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You evaluated both and RawTherapee fits your workflow better
About photocraft
PhotoCraft Image editing; an open source, clean room reimplementation of Adobe Photoshop, rebuilt in pure Rust. Layers, masks, adjustment layers, layer styles, type, vectors, brushes and real PSD files, in a native app written entirely in Rust. Open source, offline, and yours. PhotoCraft on getartcraft.com · ArtCraft · All Crafting Apps A caption card with a drop shadow, live type, and Vibrance and Curves adjustment layers, with the Curves editor open. The Great Wave off Kanagawa , Katsushika Hokusai, c. 1831 [!NOTE] ArtCraft is a community of artists from all walks of life. Digital, generative, music, games…
read the full photocraft overview →
About RawTherapee
RawTherapee is a powerful, cross platform raw photo processing program, released as libre software under the GNU General Public License Version 3. It is written mostly in C++ using a GTK+ front end. It uses a patched version of dcraw for reading raw files, with an in house solution which adds the highest quality support for certain camera models unsupported by dcraw and enhances the accuracy of certain raw files already supported by dcraw. It is notable for the advanced control it gives the user over the demosaicing and development process. Target Audience RawTherapee is designed for developing raw files from a…
read the full RawTherapee overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is photocraft or RawTherapee more popular?
photocraft has 76,172 GitHub stars and RawTherapee has 4,265. photocraft has the larger community by that measure.
Are photocraft and RawTherapee free?
Both are open source. photocraft is licensed under Apache-2.0 and RawTherapee under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between photocraft and RawTherapee?
photocraft is written in Rust and RawTherapee in C++. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, photocraft or RawTherapee?
Choose photocraft if you want the larger community (76,172 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose RawTherapee if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.