head to head · open source
nats-server vs Trench
nats-server has 20,989 GitHub stars, 2,025 forks, 472 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Trench has 1,666 stars, 66 forks, 3 open issues and last shipped 7 months ago. nats-server leads on adoption by 1,160% (20,989 vs 1,666 stars). nats-server is written in Go under Apache-2.0; Trench is written in TypeScript under MIT. nats-server has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, Trench 4%. nats-server 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
| nats-server | Trench | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 21K | ★ 1.7K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Go | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-04-06 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.0K | ⑂ 66 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick nats-server if
- You weight community size — 21K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Trench if
- You want the Trench feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and Trench fits your workflow better
About nats-server
NATS is a simple, secure and performant communications system for digital systems, services and devices. NATS is part of the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF). NATS has over 40 client language implementations, and its server can run on premise, in the cloud, at the edge, and even on a Raspberry Pi. NATS can secure and simplify design and operation of modern distributed systems. [![License][License Image]][License Url] [![Build][Build Status Image]][Build Status Url] [![Release][Release Image]][Release Url] [![Slack][Slack Image]][Slack Url] [![Coverage][Coverage Image]][Coverage Url] [![Docker…
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About Trench
Open Source Analytics Infrastructure Documentation · Website · Slack Community · Demo 🌊 What is Trench? Trench is an event tracking system built on top of Apache Kafka and ClickHouse. It can handle large event volumes and provides real time analytics. Trench is no cookie, GDPR, and PECR compliant. Users have full control to access, rectify, or delete their data. Our team built Trench to scale up the real time event tracking pipeline at Frigade . ⭐ Features 🤝 Compliant with the Segment API (Track, Group, Identify) 🐳 Deploy quickly with a single production ready Docker image 💻 Process thousands of events per…
read the full Trench overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is nats-server or Trench more popular?
nats-server has 20,989 GitHub stars and Trench has 1,666. nats-server has the larger community by that measure.
Are nats-server and Trench free?
Both are open source. nats-server is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Trench under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between nats-server and Trench?
nats-server is written in Go and Trench 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, nats-server or Trench?
Choose nats-server if you want the larger community (20,989 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose Trench if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.