head to head · open source
Pulumi vs pyinfra
Pulumi has 25,840 GitHub stars, 1,478 forks, 2,419 open issues and last shipped yesterday. pyinfra has 6,064 stars, 564 forks, 160 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Pulumi leads on adoption by 326% (25,840 vs 6,064 stars). Pulumi is written in Go under Apache-2.0; pyinfra is written in Python under MIT. Pulumi has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, pyinfra 9%. Pulumi 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
| Pulumi | pyinfra | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 26K | ★ 6.1K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Go | Python |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.5K | ⑂ 564 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Pulumi if
- You weight community size — 26K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick pyinfra if
- You want the pyinfra feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and pyinfra fits your workflow better
About Pulumi
Infrastructure as Code for Humans and Agents Pulumi Infrastructure as Code is the easiest way to build and deploy infrastructure, of any architecture and on any cloud, using programming languages that you already know and love. Code and ship infrastructure faster with your favorite languages and tools, and embed IaC anywhere with Automation API. Simply write code in your favorite language and Pulumi automatically provisions and manages your resources on AWS, Azure, Google Cloud Platform, Kubernetes, and 300+ providers using an infrastructure as code approach. Skip the YAML, and use standard language features…
read the full Pulumi overview →
About pyinfra
pyinfra turns Python code into shell commands and runs them on your servers. Execute ad hoc commands and write declarative operations. Target SSH servers, local machine and Docker containers. Fast and scales from one server to thousands. Think ansible but Python instead of YAML, and a lot faster. Getting Started • Examples Repo • Chat on Matrix Documentation • Help & Support • Contributing Why pyinfra? Design features include: + 🚀 Super fast execution over thousands of hosts with predictable performance. + 🚨 Instant debugging with realtime stdin/stdout/stderr output ( vvv ). + 🔄 Idempotent…
read the full pyinfra overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Pulumi or pyinfra more popular?
Pulumi has 25,840 GitHub stars and pyinfra has 6,064. Pulumi has the larger community by that measure.
Are Pulumi and pyinfra free?
Both are open source. Pulumi is licensed under Apache-2.0 and pyinfra under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Pulumi and pyinfra?
Pulumi is written in Go and pyinfra in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Pulumi or pyinfra?
Choose Pulumi if you want the larger community (25,840 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose pyinfra if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.