head to head · open source
ponytail vs ruoyi-ai
ponytail has 182,779 GitHub stars, 10,094 forks, 270 open issues and last shipped 5 days ago. ruoyi-ai has 5,805 stars, 1,429 forks, 7 open issues and last shipped 13 days ago. ponytail leads on adoption by 3,049% (182,779 vs 5,805 stars). ponytail is written in JavaScript under MIT; ruoyi-ai is written in Java under MIT. ponytail has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, ruoyi-ai 25%. ponytail 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
| ponytail | ruoyi-ai | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 183K | ★ 5.8K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | JavaScript | Java |
| Last push | 2026-10-29 | 2026-10-21 |
| Forks | ⑂ 10K | ⑂ 1.4K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick ponytail if
- You weight community size — 183K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick ruoyi-ai if
- You want the ruoyi-ai feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You evaluated both and ruoyi-ai fits your workflow better
About ponytail
Ponytail He says nothing. He writes one line. It works. 54% less code (up to 94%) · 20% cheaper · 27% faster · 100% safe Measured on real Claude Code sessions editing a real open source repo (FastAPI + React), against the same agent with no skill. 54% is the mean across 12 feature tasks (Haiku 4.5, n=4); it reaches 94% where an agent over builds (a date picker) and is near zero where the code is already minimal. ponytail keeps every safety guard while a bare "write one liners" prompt drops one. (The earlier single shot benchmark reported 80 94% as a flat figure; against a fair agentic…
read the full ponytail overview →
About ruoyi-ai
RuoYi AI [![Contributors][contributors shield]][contributors url] [![Forks][forks shield]][forks url] [![Stargazers][stars shield]][stars url] [![Issues][issues shield]][issues url] [![MIT License][license shield]][license url] Enterprise Grade AI Assistant Platform An out of the box full stack AI platform supporting multi agent collaboration, Supervisor mode orchestration, and multiple decision models, with advanced RAG technology and visual workflow orchestration capabilities 中文 📖 Documentation 🚀 Live Demo 🐛 Report Issues 💡 Feature Requests 🚀 Live Demo ✨ Core Features Project Repositories Partner Projects…
read the full ruoyi-ai overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is ponytail or ruoyi-ai more popular?
ponytail has 182,779 GitHub stars and ruoyi-ai has 5,805. ponytail has the larger community by that measure.
Are ponytail and ruoyi-ai free?
Both are open source. ponytail is licensed under MIT and ruoyi-ai under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between ponytail and ruoyi-ai?
ponytail is written in JavaScript and ruoyi-ai in Java. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, ponytail or ruoyi-ai?
Choose ponytail if you want the larger community (182,779 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose ruoyi-ai if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.