head to head · open source
Strapi vs next-drupal
Strapi has 73,184 GitHub stars, 9,875 forks, 558 open issues and last shipped yesterday. next-drupal has 711 stars, 214 forks, 219 open issues and last shipped 1 months ago. Strapi leads on adoption by 10,193% (73,184 vs 711 stars). Strapi is written in TypeScript under a custom or non-standard licence; next-drupal is written in TypeScript under MIT. Strapi has attracted 13% as many forks as stars, next-drupal 30%. Strapi was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (graphql, headless-cms), 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
| Strapi | next-drupal | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 73K | ★ 711 |
| License | Custom / other | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-08-11 |
| Forks | ⑂ 9.9K | ⑂ 214 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Strapi if
- You weight community size — 73K stars and counting
- You want the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick next-drupal if
- You want the next-drupal feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and next-drupal fits your workflow better
About Strapi
Strapi is an open source headless content management system built entirely in JavaScript and TypeScript. It provides a customizable admin dashboard and automatically generates REST and GraphQL APIs for any content structure defined through its visual Content Type Builder. Strapi lives in the JavaScript ecosystem and targets developers who need to deliver content to diverse frontends—including web, mobile, and IoT applications—without being locked into a specific presentation layer.
read the full Strapi overview →
About next-drupal
Next.js for Drupal is a TypeScript toolkit for building a decoupled front end for a Drupal site using Next.js. It ships the NextDrupal client class, which talks to Drupal through JSON:API or GraphQL, and it carries the MIT license. The project lives in the Drupal and Next.js ecosystems at once: it publishes as a Next.js plugin ( next plugin ) and pairs with companion Drupal modules, which is why the repository also carries the drupal modules topic.
read the full next-drupal overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Strapi or next-drupal more popular?
Strapi has 73,184 GitHub stars and next-drupal has 711. Strapi has the larger community by that measure.
Are Strapi and next-drupal free?
Both are open source. Strapi has no licence declared in this registry, and next-drupal is licensed under MIT. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Strapi and next-drupal?
Strapi is written in TypeScript and next-drupal in TypeScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Strapi or next-drupal?
Choose Strapi if you want the larger community (73,184 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose next-drupal if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.