head to head · open source
Pumpkin vs canary
Pumpkin has 12,320 GitHub stars, 915 forks, 452 open issues and last shipped yesterday. canary has 652 stars, 911 forks, 70 open issues and last shipped 5 days ago. Pumpkin leads on adoption by 1,790% (12,320 vs 652 stars). Pumpkin is written in Rust under GPL-3.0; canary is written in Lua under GPL-2.0. Pumpkin has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, canary 140%. Pumpkin was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (game-server, server), 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
| Pumpkin | canary | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 12K | ★ 652 |
| License | GPL-3.0 | GPL-2.0 |
| Written in | Rust | Lua |
| Last push | 2026-10-11 | 2026-10-07 |
| Forks | ⑂ 915 | ⑂ 911 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Pumpkin if
- You weight community size — 12K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick canary if
- You want the canary feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Lua
- You evaluated both and canary fits your workflow better
About Pumpkin
Pumpkin is a Minecraft server implementation written entirely in Rust that aims to let anyone host fast and efficient Java and Bedrock Edition servers, and it is built for server operators and plugin developers who want vanilla compatible gameplay without the official Java server.
read the full Pumpkin overview →
About canary
Canary is a free, open source MMORPG server emulator for the OpenTibia community, written in C++20 and Lua, intended for server operators and developers who want to run their own Tibia style game world.
read the full canary overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Pumpkin or canary more popular?
Pumpkin has 12,320 GitHub stars and canary has 652. Pumpkin has the larger community by that measure.
Are Pumpkin and canary free?
Both are open source. Pumpkin is licensed under GPL-3.0 and canary under GPL-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Pumpkin and canary?
Pumpkin is written in Rust and canary in Lua. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Pumpkin or canary?
Choose Pumpkin if you want the larger community (12,320 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose canary if its feature set, stack or GPL-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.