head to head · open source
Open-Notebook vs saber
Open-Notebook has 39,222 GitHub stars, 4,548 forks, 110 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. saber has 4,817 stars, 371 forks, 401 open issues and last shipped 5 days ago. Open-Notebook leads on adoption by 714% (39,222 vs 4,817 stars). Open-Notebook is written in TypeScript under MIT; saber is written in Dart under GPL-3.0. Open-Notebook has attracted 12% as many forks as stars, saber 8%. Open-Notebook was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (notes-app), 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
| Open-Notebook | saber | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 39K | ★ 4.8K |
| License | MIT | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Dart |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-15 |
| Forks | ⑂ 4.5K | ⑂ 371 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Open-Notebook if
- You weight community size — 39K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick saber if
- You want the saber feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Dart
- You evaluated both and saber fits your workflow better
About Open-Notebook
Open Notebook is an open source, privacy focused research notebook that replicates and extends Google’s Notebook LM functionality. It runs locally or self hosted, letting users manage AI powered research workflows without surrendering data to cloud providers. Built with TypeScript, Next.js, React, SurrealDB, and LangChain, it targets researchers, students, and knowledge workers seeking control over their data and tools.
read the full Open-Notebook overview →
About saber
Saber is a cross platform, open source handwriting notes app for Android, iOS, Linux, macOS and Windows, built for students, professionals and anyone else who writes by hand on a screen and wants their notes to stay on their own terms.
read the full saber overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Open-Notebook or saber more popular?
Open-Notebook has 39,222 GitHub stars and saber has 4,817. Open-Notebook has the larger community by that measure.
Are Open-Notebook and saber free?
Both are open source. Open-Notebook is licensed under MIT and saber under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Open-Notebook and saber?
Open-Notebook is written in TypeScript and saber 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, Open-Notebook or saber?
Choose Open-Notebook if you want the larger community (39,222 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose saber if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.