head to head · open source
publify vs htmly
publify has 1,853 GitHub stars, 3,627 forks, 86 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. htmly has 1,363 stars, 306 forks, 54 open issues and last shipped 8 months ago. publify leads on adoption by 36% (1,853 vs 1,363 stars). publify is written in Less under MIT; htmly is written in PHP under GPL-2.0. publify has attracted 196% as many forks as stars, htmly 22%. publify was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (blog-engine), 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
| publify | htmly | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 1.9K | ★ 1.4K |
| License | MIT | GPL-2.0 |
| Written in | Less | PHP |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-01-25 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.6K | ⑂ 306 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick publify if
- You weight community size — 1.9K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Less
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick htmly if
- You want the htmly feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches PHP
- You evaluated both and htmly fits your workflow better
About publify
Publify is a self hosted web publishing platform built on Ruby on Rails. It is the project formerly known as Typo, and it provides a blogging engine plus a small message system connected to Twitter.
read the full publify overview →
About htmly
HTMLy is an open source blogging platform and flat file CMS written in PHP. It serves people who want a blog or simple website without running a database server. The project stores content in files and uses an algorithm to list material by date, type, category, tag, or author. It lives in the PHP web publishing ecosystem.
read the full htmly overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is publify or htmly more popular?
publify has 1,853 GitHub stars and htmly has 1,363. publify has the larger community by that measure.
Are publify and htmly free?
Both are open source. publify is licensed under MIT and htmly under GPL-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between publify and htmly?
publify is written in Less and htmly in PHP. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, publify or htmly?
Choose publify if you want the larger community (1,853 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose htmly if its feature set, stack or GPL-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.