head to head · open source
silverbullet vs mindforger
silverbullet has 6,456 GitHub stars, 528 forks, 345 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. mindforger has 2,724 stars, 173 forks, 625 open issues and last shipped 8 days ago. silverbullet leads on adoption by 137% (6,456 vs 2,724 stars). silverbullet is written in TypeScript under MIT; mindforger is written in C++ under GPL-2.0. silverbullet has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, mindforger 6%. silverbullet was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (knowledge-management, markdown), 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.
← all 20902 open source comparisons
Side by side
| silverbullet | mindforger | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 6.5K | ★ 2.7K |
| License | MIT | GPL-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | C++ |
| Last push | 2026-11-03 | 2026-10-28 |
| Forks | ⑂ 528 | ⑂ 173 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick silverbullet if
- You weight community size — 6.5K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick mindforger if
- You want the mindforger feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You evaluated both and mindforger fits your workflow better
About silverbullet
SilverBullet SilverBullet is a Programmable, Private, Browser based, Open Source, Self Hosted, Personal Knowledge Database — a fancy term for a "notes app on steroids". Yowza! That surely is a lot of adjectives to describe a browser based Markdown editor programmable with Lua. Let’s get more specific. SilverBullet combines a clean live preview editor with wiki style linking, a built in database and query language, and a fully integrated Space Lua scripting environment, turning your notes into a programmable system that grows with you. In SilverBullet you keep your content as a collection of Markdown Pages…
read the full silverbullet overview →
About mindforger
Thinking Notebook & Markdown Editor Are you drowning in information , but starving for knowledge ? Where do you keep your private remarks like ideas, personal plans, gift tips, how tos, dreams, business vision, finance strategy, auto coaching notes? Loads of documents, sketches and remarks spread around the file system, cloud, web and Post it notes? Are you afraid of your knowledge privacy ? Are you able to find them once you create them? Do you know how are they mutually related when you read or write them? No? Thinking Notebook MindForger is human mind inspired personal knowledge management tool. Markdown…
read the full mindforger overview →
More in Productivity & Utilities
Related comparisons
More Note Taking & Knowledge Management projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the Note Taking & Knowledge Management field.
Frequently asked questions
Is silverbullet or mindforger more popular?
silverbullet has 6,456 GitHub stars and mindforger has 2,724. silverbullet has the larger community by that measure.
Are silverbullet and mindforger free?
Both are open source. silverbullet is licensed under MIT and mindforger under GPL-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between silverbullet and mindforger?
silverbullet is written in TypeScript and mindforger 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, silverbullet or mindforger?
Choose silverbullet if you want the larger community (6,456 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose mindforger if its feature set, stack or GPL-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.