head to head · open source
devdocs vs schemaspy
devdocs has 39,466 GitHub stars, 2,645 forks, 196 open issues and last shipped yesterday. schemaspy has 3,724 stars, 357 forks, 303 open issues and last shipped 7 months ago. devdocs leads on adoption by 960% (39,466 vs 3,724 stars). devdocs is written in Ruby under MPL-2.0; schemaspy is written in HTML under LGPL-3.0. devdocs has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, schemaspy 10%. devdocs was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (documentation), 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
| devdocs | schemaspy | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 39K | ★ 3.7K |
| License | MPL-2.0 | LGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Ruby | HTML |
| Last push | 2026-09-19 | 2026-03-05 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.6K | ⑂ 357 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick devdocs if
- You weight community size — 39K stars and counting
- You want the MPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Ruby
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick schemaspy if
- You want the schemaspy feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the LGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches HTML
- You evaluated both and schemaspy fits your workflow better
About devdocs
DevDocs is an API documentation browser that combines multiple developer documentations into a single, clean and organized web UI with instant search, offline support, a mobile version, a dark theme and keyboard shortcuts, and it is aimed at developers who need to read and search API and reference documentation quickly.
read the full devdocs overview →
About schemaspy
SchemaSpy is a standalone Java based database metadata analyzer that reverse engineers an existing database schema and produces a browsable HTML report with entity relationship diagrams, for database administrators and developers who need to understand a data model they did not design.
read the full schemaspy overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is devdocs or schemaspy more popular?
devdocs has 39,466 GitHub stars and schemaspy has 3,724. devdocs has the larger community by that measure.
Are devdocs and schemaspy free?
Both are open source. devdocs is licensed under MPL-2.0 and schemaspy under LGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between devdocs and schemaspy?
devdocs is written in Ruby and schemaspy in HTML. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, devdocs or schemaspy?
Choose devdocs if you want the larger community (39,466 stars) or its MPL-2.0 licence terms. Choose schemaspy if its feature set, stack or LGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.