head to head · open source
raylib vs flame
raylib has 35,659 GitHub stars, 3,392 forks, 16 open issues and last shipped yesterday. flame has 10,819 stars, 1,067 forks, 90 open issues and last shipped yesterday. raylib leads on adoption by 230% (35,659 vs 10,819 stars). raylib is written in C under Zlib; flame is written in Dart under MIT. raylib has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, flame 10%. flame was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 3 topic tags (game-development, game-engine, gamedev), 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
| raylib | flame | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 36K | ★ 11K |
| License | Zlib | MIT |
| Written in | C | Dart |
| Last push | 2026-11-13 | 2026-11-13 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.4K | ⑂ 1.1K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick raylib if
- You weight community size — 36K stars and counting
- You want the Zlib license terms
- Your stack matches C
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick flame if
- You want the flame feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Dart
- You evaluated both and flame fits your workflow better
About raylib
raylib is a simple and easy to use library to enjoy videogames programming. raylib is highly inspired by Borland BGI graphics lib and by XNA framework and it's especially well suited for prototyping, tooling, graphical applications, embedded systems and education. NOTE for ADVENTURERS: raylib is a programming library to enjoy videogames programming; no fancy interface, no visual helpers, no debug button... just coding in the most pure spartan programmers way. Ready to learn? Jump to code examples! features NO external dependencies , all required libraries are included in raylib Multiple platforms supported…
read the full raylib overview →
About flame
A Flutter based game engine. Documentation The full documentation for Flame can be found on docs.flame engine.org. To change the version of the documentation, use the version selector noted with version: in the top of the page. Note : The documentation that resides in the main branch is newer than the released documentation on the docs website. Other useful links: The official Flame site. Examples of most features which can be tried out from your browser. To access the code for each example, press the button in the top right corner. Tutorials Some simple tutorials to get started. API Reference The generated…
read the full flame overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is raylib or flame more popular?
raylib has 35,659 GitHub stars and flame has 10,819. raylib has the larger community by that measure.
Are raylib and flame free?
Both are open source. raylib is licensed under Zlib and flame under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between raylib and flame?
raylib is written in C and flame in Dart. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, raylib or flame?
Choose raylib if you want the larger community (35,659 stars) or its Zlib licence terms. Choose flame if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.