head to head · open source
puppeteer vs profiler
puppeteer has 95,671 GitHub stars, 9,587 forks, 259 open issues and last shipped yesterday. profiler has 1,536 stars, 496 forks, 862 open issues and last shipped yesterday. puppeteer leads on adoption by 6,129% (95,671 vs 1,536 stars). puppeteer is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; profiler is written in TypeScript under MPL-2.0. puppeteer has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, profiler 32%. profiler was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (firefox), 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
| puppeteer | profiler | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 96K | ★ 1.5K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MPL-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-10-08 | 2026-10-08 |
| Forks | ⑂ 9.6K | ⑂ 496 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick puppeteer if
- You weight community size — 96K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick profiler if
- You want the profiler feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and profiler fits your workflow better
About puppeteer
Puppeteer is an Apache 2.0 JavaScript and TypeScript library that provides a high level API for driving Chrome and Firefox over the DevTools Protocol or WebDriver BiDi, written for developers who automate browsers from Node.js.
read the full puppeteer overview →
About profiler
Firefox Profiler is an open source web application for visualizing performance profiles recorded from Firefox and other profilers, built for developers and Mozilla engineers who need to diagnose slow pages, scripts, and browser behaviour.
read the full profiler overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is puppeteer or profiler more popular?
puppeteer has 95,671 GitHub stars and profiler has 1,536. puppeteer has the larger community by that measure.
Are puppeteer and profiler free?
Both are open source. puppeteer is licensed under Apache-2.0 and profiler under MPL-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between puppeteer and profiler?
puppeteer is written in TypeScript and profiler 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, puppeteer or profiler?
Choose puppeteer if you want the larger community (95,671 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose profiler if its feature set, stack or MPL-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.