head to head · open source
pixijs vs plot
pixijs has 48,178 GitHub stars, 5,071 forks, 344 open issues and last shipped yesterday. plot has 5,384 stars, 243 forks, 349 open issues and last shipped 17 days ago. pixijs leads on adoption by 795% (48,178 vs 5,384 stars). pixijs is written in TypeScript under MIT; plot is written in HTML under ISC. pixijs has attracted 11% as many forks as stars, plot 5%. pixijs was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (data-visualization), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
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
| pixijs | plot | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 48K | ★ 5.4K |
| License | MIT | ISC |
| Written in | TypeScript | HTML |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-01 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.1K | ⑂ 243 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick pixijs if
- You weight community size — 48K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick plot if
- You want the plot feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the ISC license terms
- Your stack matches HTML
- You evaluated both and plot fits your workflow better
About pixijs
PixiJS is an open source 2D rendering library for the web, described in its README as the HTML5 Creation Engine. It ships WebGL and WebGPU renderers and is written in TypeScript, distributed under the MIT license from the pixijs/pixijs repository, which has been developed for fourteen years and holds roughly 48,000 stars across about 5,000 forks. The project lives in the JavaScript and TypeScript ecosystem: it is installed through npm and driven from browser code, with GLSL shaders, canvas, canvas2d, and rendering engine listed among its topics. Its homepage is pixijs.com, and the repository carries the Data and …
read the full pixijs overview →
About plot
Observable Plot is a free, open source JavaScript library for visualizing tabular data, aimed at analysts and developers who need a concise, expressive API to accelerate exploratory data analysis.
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Frequently asked questions
Is pixijs or plot more popular?
pixijs has 48,178 GitHub stars and plot has 5,384. pixijs has the larger community by that measure.
Are pixijs and plot free?
Both are open source. pixijs is licensed under MIT and plot under ISC. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between pixijs and plot?
pixijs is written in TypeScript and plot in HTML. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, pixijs or plot?
Choose pixijs if you want the larger community (48,178 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose plot if its feature set, stack or ISC licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.