head to head · open source
Saleor vs Spree Commerce
Saleor has 23,339 GitHub stars, 6,122 forks, 263 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Spree Commerce has 15,699 stars, 5,301 forks, 143 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Saleor leads on adoption by 49% (23,339 vs 15,699 stars). Saleor is written in Python under BSD-3-Clause; Spree Commerce is written in Ruby under BSD-3-Clause. Saleor has attracted 26% as many forks as stars, Spree Commerce 34%. Spree Commerce was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 4 topic tags (e-commerce, ecommerce, headless, headless-commerce), 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
| Saleor | Spree Commerce | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 23K | ★ 16K |
| License | BSD-3-Clause | BSD-3-Clause |
| Written in | Python | Ruby |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.1K | ⑂ 5.3K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Saleor if
- You weight community size — 23K stars and counting
- You want the BSD-3-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Spree Commerce if
- You want the Spree Commerce feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the BSD-3-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches Ruby
- You evaluated both and Spree Commerce fits your workflow better
About Saleor
Saleor is an open source e commerce platform written in Python and released under the BSD 3 Clause license. It positions itself as an open alternative to Shopify and describes itself as a high performance, composable, headless commerce API. The project lives in the e commerce ecosystem, where teams separate the backend order and catalog logic from the storefront, CMS, and dashboards.
read the full Saleor overview →
About Spree Commerce
Spree Commerce is an open source headless commerce platform written in Ruby and released under the BSD 3 Clause license. It lives in the open source e commerce ecosystem and is described as a platform for B2B, marketplaces, and enterprise use, with a REST API, a TypeScript SDK, and a Next.js storefront. It targets teams that want to self host their commerce stack, keep ownership of code, data, and infrastructure, and avoid platform fees or vendor lock in.
read the full Spree Commerce overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Saleor or Spree Commerce more popular?
Saleor has 23,339 GitHub stars and Spree Commerce has 15,699. Saleor has the larger community by that measure.
Are Saleor and Spree Commerce free?
Both are open source. Saleor is licensed under BSD-3-Clause and Spree Commerce under BSD-3-Clause. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Saleor and Spree Commerce?
Saleor is written in Python and Spree Commerce in Ruby. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Saleor or Spree Commerce?
Choose Saleor if you want the larger community (23,339 stars) or its BSD-3-Clause licence terms. Choose Spree Commerce if its feature set, stack or BSD-3-Clause licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.