head to head · open source
RWKV-Runner vs macai
RWKV-Runner has 6,482 GitHub stars, 601 forks, 178 open issues and last shipped 16 days ago. macai has 932 stars, 77 forks, 44 open issues and last shipped 1 months ago. RWKV-Runner leads on adoption by 595% (6,482 vs 932 stars). RWKV-Runner is written in TypeScript under MIT; macai is written in Swift under Apache-2.0. RWKV-Runner has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, macai 8%. RWKV-Runner was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 3 topic tags (api-client, chatgpt, llm), 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
| RWKV-Runner | macai | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 6.5K | ★ 932 |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Swift |
| Last push | 2026-09-04 | 2026-08-16 |
| Forks | ⑂ 601 | ⑂ 77 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick RWKV-Runner if
- You weight community size — 6.5K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick macai if
- You want the macai feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Swift
- You evaluated both and macai fits your workflow better
About RWKV-Runner
RWKV Runner is a management and startup tool for RWKV, an open source large language model that is available for commercial use. It ships as a lightweight executable of only a few megabytes and automates the work of getting a model running, so that the user does not have to assemble the runtime, dependencies, and serving stack by hand. The project is written in TypeScript and built with Wails, and it is distributed under the MIT license from the josStorer repository. It lives in the RWKV ecosystem and in the broader local inference tooling space, with a companion site at rwkv.com.
read the full RWKV-Runner overview →
About macai
macai is an all in one native macOS AI chat application that connects to virtually any AI provider — ChatGPT, Claude, xAI (Grok), Google Gemini, Perplexity, Ollama, OpenRouter, and almost any OpenAI compatible API — and it is built for people on macOS 14.0 or later who want one app instead of a different client per provider.
read the full macai overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is RWKV-Runner or macai more popular?
RWKV-Runner has 6,482 GitHub stars and macai has 932. RWKV-Runner has the larger community by that measure.
Are RWKV-Runner and macai free?
Both are open source. RWKV-Runner is licensed under MIT and macai under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between RWKV-Runner and macai?
RWKV-Runner is written in TypeScript and macai in Swift. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, RWKV-Runner or macai?
Choose RWKV-Runner if you want the larger community (6,482 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose macai if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.