head to head · open source
Insomnia vs SafeLine
Insomnia has 40,111 GitHub stars, 2,388 forks, 874 open issues and last shipped yesterday. SafeLine has 23,154 stars, 1,592 forks, 69 open issues and last shipped 12 days ago. Insomnia leads on adoption by 73% (40,111 vs 23,154 stars). Insomnia is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; SafeLine is written in Go under GPL-3.0. Insomnia has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, SafeLine 7%. Insomnia 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
| Insomnia | SafeLine | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 40K | ★ 23K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-10-22 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.4K | ⑂ 1.6K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Insomnia if
- You weight community size — 40K 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 SafeLine if
- You want the SafeLine feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and SafeLine fits your workflow better
About Insomnia
Insomnia API Client Insomnia is an open source, cross platform API client for GraphQL, REST, WebSockets, Server Sent Events (SSE), gRPC and any other HTTP compatible protocol. With Insomnia you can: Debug APIs using the most popular protocols and formats. Design APIs using the native OpenAPI editor and visual preview. Test APIs using native test suites and collection runner. Mock APIs using a cloud or self hosted mocking server. Build CI/CD pipelines using the native Insomnia CLI for linting and testing. Collaborate with others using the many collaboration features. And more including the ability to use 3rd…
read the full Insomnia overview →
About SafeLine
SafeLine Make your web apps secure 🏠 Website 📖 Docs 🔍 Live Demo 🙋♂️ Discord 中文版 🏆 Achievements 👋 INTRODUCTION SafeLine is a self hosted WAF(Web Application Firewall) to protect your web apps from attacks and exploits. A web application firewall helps protect web apps by filtering and monitoring HTTP traffic between a web application and the Internet. It typically protects web apps from attacks such as SQL injection , XSS , code injection , os command injection , CRLF injection , ldap injection , xpath injection , RCE , XXE , SSRF , path traversal , backdoor , bruteforce , http flood , bot abused , among…
read the full SafeLine overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Insomnia or SafeLine more popular?
Insomnia has 40,111 GitHub stars and SafeLine has 23,154. Insomnia has the larger community by that measure.
Are Insomnia and SafeLine free?
Both are open source. Insomnia is licensed under Apache-2.0 and SafeLine under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Insomnia and SafeLine?
Insomnia is written in TypeScript and SafeLine in Go. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Insomnia or SafeLine?
Choose Insomnia if you want the larger community (40,111 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose SafeLine if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.