head to head · open source
monaco-editor vs serenity
monaco-editor has 46,758 GitHub stars, 4,128 forks, 859 open issues and last shipped 5 days ago. serenity has 33,840 stars, 3,541 forks, 739 open issues and last shipped yesterday. monaco-editor leads on adoption by 38% (46,758 vs 33,840 stars). monaco-editor is written in JavaScript under MIT; serenity is written in C++ under BSD-2-Clause. monaco-editor has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, serenity 10%. serenity was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (browser), 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
| monaco-editor | serenity | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 47K | ★ 34K |
| License | MIT | BSD-2-Clause |
| Written in | JavaScript | C++ |
| Last push | 2026-09-13 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 4.1K | ⑂ 3.5K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick monaco-editor if
- You weight community size — 47K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick serenity if
- You want the serenity feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the BSD-2-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You evaluated both and serenity fits your workflow better
About monaco-editor
Monaco Editor is the fully featured code editor from VS Code, packaged as an npm library so that developers can embed the same editing experience inside their own browser based applications.
read the full monaco-editor overview →
About serenity
SerenityOS is a graphical Unix like operating system built for 64 bit x86, Arm, and RISC V computers. It is written in C++ and released under the BSD 2 Clause license, and it lives in the open source operating system ecosystem alongside other hobbyist and research kernels. The project describes itself as a love letter to 1990s user interfaces paired with a custom Unix like core, aiming for a marriage between the aesthetic of late 1990s productivity software and the power user accessibility of late 2000s Unix systems.
read the full serenity overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is monaco-editor or serenity more popular?
monaco-editor has 46,758 GitHub stars and serenity has 33,840. monaco-editor has the larger community by that measure.
Are monaco-editor and serenity free?
Both are open source. monaco-editor is licensed under MIT and serenity under BSD-2-Clause. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between monaco-editor and serenity?
monaco-editor is written in JavaScript and serenity in C++. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, monaco-editor or serenity?
Choose monaco-editor if you want the larger community (46,758 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose serenity if its feature set, stack or BSD-2-Clause licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.