head to head · open source
rowboat vs workflow-core
rowboat has 17,914 GitHub stars, 1,784 forks, 167 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. workflow-core has 5,926 stars, 1,262 forks, 133 open issues and last shipped 4 days ago. rowboat leads on adoption by 202% (17,914 vs 5,926 stars). rowboat is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; workflow-core is written in C# under MIT. rowboat has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, workflow-core 21%. rowboat 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
| rowboat | workflow-core | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 18K | ★ 5.9K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | C# |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-16 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.8K | ⑂ 1.3K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick rowboat if
- You weight community size — 18K 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 workflow-core if
- You want the workflow-core feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches C#
- You evaluated both and workflow-core fits your workflow better
About rowboat
Rowboat is an open source desktop AI coworker, licensed Apache 2.0 and written in TypeScript, that maintains a memory of your work as a local Markdown knowledge graph and provides built in surfaces — email, notes, browser, code mode, meeting notes — for acting on that memory.
read the full rowboat overview →
About workflow-core
Workflow Core is a lightweight, embeddable workflow engine targeting .NET Standard, written in C and released under the MIT license. It lives in the .NET ecosystem, distributed as NuGet packages, and is built around the idea of long running processes that contain multiple tasks and must track their state between steps. Rather than running as a separate server, it is a library that is hosted inside an application, and it exposes a fluent C API for defining workflows. Workflows are expressed as a starting step followed by chained steps, and the same class can declare inputs and outputs that move data from one step …
read the full workflow-core overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is rowboat or workflow-core more popular?
rowboat has 17,914 GitHub stars and workflow-core has 5,926. rowboat has the larger community by that measure.
Are rowboat and workflow-core free?
Both are open source. rowboat is licensed under Apache-2.0 and workflow-core under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between rowboat and workflow-core?
rowboat is written in TypeScript and workflow-core in C#. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, rowboat or workflow-core?
Choose rowboat if you want the larger community (17,914 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose workflow-core if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.