head to head · open source
SiYuan vs vnote
SiYuan has 47,039 GitHub stars, 3,095 forks, 18 open issues and last shipped yesterday. vnote has 13,029 stars, 1,295 forks, 270 open issues and last shipped yesterday. SiYuan leads on adoption by 261% (47,039 vs 13,029 stars). SiYuan is written in TypeScript under AGPL-3.0; vnote is written in C++ under LGPL-3.0. SiYuan has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, vnote 10%. SiYuan was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (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 | vnote | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 47K | ★ 13K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | LGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | C++ |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.1K | ⑂ 1.3K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick SiYuan if
- You weight community size — 47K 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 vnote if
- You want the vnote feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the LGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You evaluated both and vnote fits your workflow better
About SiYuan
From thought to insight, with agents English 中文 日本語 Türkçe Table of Contents 💡 Introduction 🔮 Features 🏗️ Architecture and Ecosystem 🗺️ Roadmap 🚀 Download Setup App Market Installation Package Package Manager Docker Hosting Unraid Hosting TrueNAS Hosting Test Channels ⌨️ Command line Interface 🏘️ Community 🛠️ Development Guide ❓ FAQ How does SiYuan store data? Does it support data synchronization through a third party sync disk? Is SiYuan open source? How to upgrade to a new version? What if some blocks (such as paragraph blocks in list items) cannot find the block icon? What should I do if the data repo…
read the full SiYuan overview →
About vnote
VNote 简体中文 Project on Gitee A pleasant note taking platform. For more information, please visit VNote's Home Page . Description VNote is a Qt based, free and open source note taking application, focusing on Markdown now. VNote is designed to provide a pleasant note taking platform with excellent editing experience. VNote is NOT just a simple editor for Markdown. By providing notes management, VNote makes taking notes in Markdown simpler. In the future, VNote will support more formats besides Markdown. Utilizing Qt, VNote could run on Linux , Windows , and macOS . Downloads Continuous builds on master branch…
read the full vnote overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is SiYuan or vnote more popular?
SiYuan has 47,039 GitHub stars and vnote has 13,029. SiYuan has the larger community by that measure.
Are SiYuan and vnote free?
Both are open source. SiYuan is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and vnote under LGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between SiYuan and vnote?
SiYuan is written in TypeScript and vnote 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 vnote?
Choose SiYuan if you want the larger community (47,039 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose vnote if its feature set, stack or LGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.