head to head · open source
Shelf vs witness
Shelf has 3,014 GitHub stars, 367 forks, 181 open issues and last shipped yesterday. witness has 546 stars, 82 forks, 75 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. Shelf leads on adoption by 452% (3,014 vs 546 stars). Shelf is written in TypeScript under AGPL-3.0; witness is written in Go under Apache-2.0. Shelf has attracted 12% as many forks as stars, witness 15%. Shelf 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
| Shelf | witness | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 3.0K | ★ 546 |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-16 |
| Forks | ⑂ 367 | ⑂ 82 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Shelf if
- You weight community size — 3.0K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick witness if
- You want the witness feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and witness fits your workflow better
About Shelf
Shelf is a free, open source platform for tracking physical assets, including equipment, devices, tools, vehicles, props, and inventory. It is built for teams that need to know what they have, where it is, and who is using it. The project sits in the IT asset management, equipment management, scheduling, and operations software ecosystem.
read the full Shelf overview →
About witness
Witness is an Apache 2.0 Go command line framework from the CNCF in toto ecosystem that creates and verifies signed attestations about how software artifacts were built, and it is aimed at platform, release, and security engineers who must prove artifact provenance across a software development lifecycle.
read the full witness overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Shelf or witness more popular?
Shelf has 3,014 GitHub stars and witness has 546. Shelf has the larger community by that measure.
Are Shelf and witness free?
Both are open source. Shelf is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and witness under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Shelf and witness?
Shelf is written in TypeScript and witness 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, Shelf or witness?
Choose Shelf if you want the larger community (3,014 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose witness if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.