head to head · open source
SiYuan vs notes
SiYuan has 46,429 GitHub stars, 3,012 forks, 18 open issues and last shipped today. notes has 4,267 stars, 384 forks, 137 open issues and last shipped 4 months ago. SiYuan leads on adoption by 988% (46,429 vs 4,267 stars). SiYuan is written in TypeScript under AGPL-3.0; notes is written in C++ under MPL-2.0. SiYuan has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, notes 9%. SiYuan was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 3 topic tags (local-first, markdown, note-taking), 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
| SiYuan | notes | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 46K | ★ 4.3K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | MPL-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | C++ |
| Last push | 2026-09-19 | 2026-05-15 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.0K | ⑂ 384 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick SiYuan if
- You weight community size — 46K 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 notes if
- You want the notes feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You evaluated both and notes fits your workflow better
About SiYuan
SiYuan is an open source, self hosted knowledge management system built for privacy first workflows. It operates as a local first workspace where users store data in encrypted repositories on their own infrastructure, avoiding reliance on third party cloud services. The project lives in the productivity and utilities ecosystem, specifically targeting note taking and knowledge management use cases, and positions itself as a privacy respecting alternative to Notion.
read the full SiYuan overview →
About notes
Notes is an open source, cross platform note taking application written in C++ with Qt, built for people who want a private, local first place to write Markdown notes on Linux, macOS, or Windows.
read the full notes overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is SiYuan or notes more popular?
SiYuan has 46,429 GitHub stars and notes has 4,267. SiYuan has the larger community by that measure.
Are SiYuan and notes free?
Both are open source. SiYuan is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and notes under MPL-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between SiYuan and notes?
SiYuan is written in TypeScript and notes 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, SiYuan or notes?
Choose SiYuan if you want the larger community (46,429 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose notes if its feature set, stack or MPL-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.