head to head · open source
pi vs Frontman
pi has 106,586 GitHub stars, 13,437 forks, 202 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Frontman has 698 stars, 51 forks, 236 open issues and last shipped yesterday. pi leads on adoption by 15,170% (106,586 vs 698 stars). pi is written in TypeScript under MIT; Frontman is written in ReScript under a custom or non-standard licence. pi has attracted 13% as many forks as stars, Frontman 7%. Frontman 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 | Frontman | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 107K | ★ 698 |
| License | MIT | Custom / other |
| Written in | TypeScript | ReScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 13K | ⑂ 51 |
| 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 Frontman if
- You want the Frontman feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches ReScript
- You evaluated both and Frontman 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 Frontman
Frontman is an open source AI coding agent that runs inside your browser and edits your project's real source files from a live view of the running application, built for product managers, designers, and frontend developers who need small frontend fixes without opening an IDE.
read the full Frontman overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is pi or Frontman more popular?
pi has 106,586 GitHub stars and Frontman has 698. pi has the larger community by that measure.
Are pi and Frontman free?
Both are open source. pi is licensed under MIT, and Frontman has no licence declared in this registry. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between pi and Frontman?
pi is written in TypeScript and Frontman in ReScript. 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 Frontman?
Choose pi if you want the larger community (106,586 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose Frontman if its feature set, stack or Custom / other licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.