head to head · open source
qinglong vs Kan
qinglong has 19,887 GitHub stars, 3,232 forks, 108 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Kan has 5,656 stars, 477 forks, 135 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. qinglong leads on adoption by 252% (19,887 vs 5,656 stars). qinglong is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; Kan is written in TypeScript under AGPL-3.0. qinglong has attracted 16% as many forks as stars, Kan 8%. qinglong was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (typescript), 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
| qinglong | Kan | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 20K | ★ 5.7K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-15 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.2K | ⑂ 477 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick qinglong if
- You weight community size — 20K 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 Kan if
- You want the Kan feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and Kan fits your workflow better
About qinglong
Qinglong is a self hosted timed task management platform that schedules and runs Python 3, JavaScript, Shell, and TypeScript scripts from a web interface, built for developers and operators who want central control over scheduled jobs instead of hand editing crontab on every machine.
read the full qinglong overview →
About Kan
Kan is an open source project management application that provides kanban boards, positioned by its maintainers as the open source alternative to Trello. It is written in TypeScript under the AGPL 3.0 license, and it lives in the JavaScript and TypeScript ecosystem: the stack is built on Next.js, tRPC, Better Auth, Tailwind CSS, Drizzle ORM, React Email, Zod, and Turborepo. The repository has gathered 5,634 stars and 472 forks, with 135 open issues, and its homepage is hosted at kan.bn. It is actively maintained, with the most recent push recorded on 14 September 2026.
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Frequently asked questions
Is qinglong or Kan more popular?
qinglong has 19,887 GitHub stars and Kan has 5,656. qinglong has the larger community by that measure.
Are qinglong and Kan free?
Both are open source. qinglong is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Kan under AGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between qinglong and Kan?
qinglong is written in TypeScript and Kan 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, qinglong or Kan?
Choose qinglong if you want the larger community (19,887 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose Kan if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.