head to head · open source
Trigger vs agent-framework
Trigger has 16,699 GitHub stars, 1,523 forks, 342 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. agent-framework has 14,499 stars, 2,558 forks, 617 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Trigger leads on adoption by 15% (16,699 vs 14,499 stars). Trigger is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; agent-framework is written in Python under MIT. Trigger has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, agent-framework 18%. agent-framework was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (ai, orchestration), 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
| Trigger | agent-framework | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 17K | ★ 14K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Python |
| Last push | 2026-10-31 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.5K | ⑂ 2.6K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Trigger if
- You weight community size — 17K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick agent-framework if
- You want the agent-framework feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and agent-framework fits your workflow better
About Trigger
Build and deploy fully‑managed AI agents and workflows Website Docs Issues Example projects Feature requests Public roadmap Self hosting About Trigger.dev Trigger.dev is the open source platform for building AI workflows in TypeScript. Long running tasks with retries, queues, observability, and elastic scaling. The platform designed for building AI agents Build AI agents using all the frameworks, services and LLMs you're used to, deploy them to Trigger.dev and get durable, long running tasks with retries, queues, observability, and elastic scaling out of the box. Long running without timeouts : Execute your…
read the full Trigger overview →
About agent-framework
Welcome to Microsoft Agent Framework! Microsoft Agent Framework (MAF) is an open, multi language framework for building production grade AI agents and multi agent workflows in .NET and Python . Microsoft Agent Framework is built for teams taking agents from prototype to production. It provides a consistent foundation for building, orchestrating, and operating agent systems across Python, .NET and Go, while keeping architecture choices open as requirements evolve, and supports a broad ecosystem including Microsoft Foundry, Azure OpenAI, OpenAI, and the GitHub Copilot SDK, with samples and hosting patterns for…
read the full agent-framework overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Trigger or agent-framework more popular?
Trigger has 16,699 GitHub stars and agent-framework has 14,499. Trigger has the larger community by that measure.
Are Trigger and agent-framework free?
Both are open source. Trigger is licensed under Apache-2.0 and agent-framework under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Trigger and agent-framework?
Trigger is written in TypeScript and agent-framework in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Trigger or agent-framework?
Choose Trigger if you want the larger community (16,699 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose agent-framework if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.