head to head · open source
readest vs papermill
readest has 24,413 GitHub stars, 1,586 forks, 145 open issues and last shipped yesterday. papermill has 6,486 stars, 463 forks, 196 open issues and last shipped 2 months ago. readest leads on adoption by 276% (24,413 vs 6,486 stars). readest is written in TypeScript under AGPL-3.0; papermill is written in Python under BSD-3-Clause. readest has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, papermill 7%. readest 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
| readest | papermill | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 24K | ★ 6.5K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | BSD-3-Clause |
| Written in | TypeScript | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-07-06 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.6K | ⑂ 463 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick readest if
- You weight community size — 24K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick papermill if
- You want the papermill feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the BSD-3-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and papermill fits your workflow better
About readest
Readest is an open source, cross platform ebook reader built with Next.js 16 and Tauri v2 for readers who want one modern library across macOS, Windows, Linux, Android, iOS, and the web.
read the full readest overview →
About papermill
Papermill is a Python tool published under the BSD 3 Clause licence by the nteract project that parameterizes, executes, and analyzes Jupyter notebooks, and it is aimed at teams who need to run the same notebook repeatedly with different inputs inside data pipelines.
read the full papermill overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is readest or papermill more popular?
readest has 24,413 GitHub stars and papermill has 6,486. readest has the larger community by that measure.
Are readest and papermill free?
Both are open source. readest is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and papermill under BSD-3-Clause. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between readest and papermill?
readest is written in TypeScript and papermill 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, readest or papermill?
Choose readest if you want the larger community (24,413 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose papermill if its feature set, stack or BSD-3-Clause licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.