head to head · open source
portainer vs argo-cd
portainer has 38,523 GitHub stars, 2,907 forks, 757 open issues and last shipped yesterday. argo-cd has 24,178 stars, 7,853 forks, 4,362 open issues and last shipped yesterday. portainer leads on adoption by 59% (38,523 vs 24,178 stars). portainer is written in TypeScript under Zlib; argo-cd is written in Go under Apache-2.0. portainer has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, argo-cd 32%. portainer was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (docker, hacktoberfest), 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
| portainer | argo-cd | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 39K | ★ 24K |
| License | Zlib | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-18 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.9K | ⑂ 7.9K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick portainer if
- You weight community size — 39K stars and counting
- You want the Zlib license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick argo-cd if
- You want the argo-cd feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and argo-cd fits your workflow better
About portainer
Portainer Community Edition is a free, lightweight container management UI for Docker, Swarm, Podman, Kubernetes, and ACI environments, distributed under the zlib licence and aimed at homelab operators, hobbyists, students, and anyone experimenting with containers on their own hardware.
read the full portainer overview →
About argo-cd
Argo CD is a declarative GitOps continuous delivery tool for Kubernetes. It lives in the cloud native ecosystem and is written in Go under the Apache 2.0 license. The project describes itself as a tool for declarative continuous delivery and continuous deployment, and its application definitions, configurations, and environments are expected to be declarative and version controlled. It sits in the Infrastructure and Operations category, specifically cloud infrastructure management, and it has been developed in the open for roughly nine years, with a large community footprint measured in tens of thousands of stars…
read the full argo-cd overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is portainer or argo-cd more popular?
portainer has 38,523 GitHub stars and argo-cd has 24,178. portainer has the larger community by that measure.
Are portainer and argo-cd free?
Both are open source. portainer is licensed under Zlib and argo-cd under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between portainer and argo-cd?
portainer is written in TypeScript and argo-cd in Go. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, portainer or argo-cd?
Choose portainer if you want the larger community (38,523 stars) or its Zlib licence terms. Choose argo-cd if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.