head to head · open source
pi vs Continue
pi has 106,586 GitHub stars, 13,437 forks, 202 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Continue has 35,946 stars, 5,395 forks, 951 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. pi leads on adoption by 197% (106,586 vs 35,946 stars). pi is written in TypeScript under MIT; Continue is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0. pi has attracted 13% as many forks as stars, Continue 15%. pi 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
| pi | Continue | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 107K | ★ 36K |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-16 |
| Forks | ⑂ 13K | ⑂ 5.4K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick pi if
- You weight community size — 107K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Continue if
- You want the Continue feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and Continue fits your workflow better
About pi
Pi is a modular agent toolkit written in TypeScript for building and running terminal based AI coding agents. It lives in the developer tooling ecosystem and provides composable packages for LLM integration, agent orchestration, and terminal UI rendering. The project centers on @earendil works/pi coding agent , an interactive CLI agent, supported by core runtime, AI abstraction, and TUI libraries.
About Continue
Continue is an open source coding agent designed to assist developers directly within their IDE or terminal. It operates as a CLI tool, VS Code extension, and JetBrains plugin, enabling natural language interaction with codebases to generate, edit, and explain code. The project lives in the AI assisted developer tools ecosystem and is built with TypeScript under the Apache 2.0 license.
read the full Continue overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is pi or Continue more popular?
pi has 106,586 GitHub stars and Continue has 35,946. pi has the larger community by that measure.
Are pi and Continue free?
Both are open source. pi is licensed under MIT and Continue under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between pi and Continue?
pi is written in TypeScript and Continue 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, pi or Continue?
Choose pi if you want the larger community (106,586 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose Continue if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.