head to head · open source
portainer vs kubewall
portainer has 38,767 GitHub stars, 2,934 forks, 757 open issues and last shipped yesterday. kubewall has 1,948 stars, 106 forks, 26 open issues and last shipped 6 days ago. portainer leads on adoption by 1,890% (38,767 vs 1,948 stars). portainer is written in TypeScript under Zlib; kubewall is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0. portainer has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, kubewall 5%. portainer was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (kubernetes), 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 | kubewall | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 39K | ★ 1.9K |
| License | Zlib | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-10-28 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.9K | ⑂ 106 |
| 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 kubewall if
- You want the kubewall 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 kubewall fits your workflow better
About portainer
Portainer Community Edition is a free, lightweight container management UI for Docker, Swarm, Podman, Kubernetes, and ACI environments. It is provided as is, at no cost, for the convenience of homelab operators, hobbyists, students, and anyone experimenting with containers on their own hardware. Portainer Business Edition builds on the same open source base and adds the features, hardening, and commercial support that production and enterprise environments require (RBAC, GitOps, edge management, audit, SSO, and more). Find out more about Portainer Business Edition features Take3 – get 3 free nodes of Portainer…
read the full portainer overview →
About kubewall
kubewall Install Guide Releases Source Code kubewall is a Open Source, Single Binary Kubernetes Dashboard with Multi Cluster Management & AI Integration. It provides a simple and rich realtime interface to manage and investigate your clusters. :battery: Install 🐳 Docker ⛵ Helm 🛡️ With helm kubewall runs on port 8443 with self signed certificates. View chart → 🍺 Homebrew 🧃 Snap 🐧 Arch Linux 🪟 Winget 📦 Scoop 📁 Binary MacOS Binary ( Multi Architecture ) Linux (Binaries) amd64 arm64 i386 Windows (exe) amd64 arm64 i386 Manually 📂 Download the pre compiled binaries from the Release! page and copy them to the…
read the full kubewall overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is portainer or kubewall more popular?
portainer has 38,767 GitHub stars and kubewall has 1,948. portainer has the larger community by that measure.
Are portainer and kubewall free?
Both are open source. portainer is licensed under Zlib and kubewall under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between portainer and kubewall?
portainer is written in TypeScript and kubewall 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, portainer or kubewall?
Choose portainer if you want the larger community (38,767 stars) or its Zlib licence terms. Choose kubewall if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.