head to head · open source
Trigger vs swarmclaw
Trigger has 16,706 GitHub stars, 1,522 forks, 342 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. swarmclaw has 704 stars, 144 forks, 23 open issues and last shipped 4 months ago. Trigger leads on adoption by 2,273% (16,706 vs 704 stars). Trigger is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; swarmclaw is written in TypeScript under MIT. Trigger has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, swarmclaw 20%. Trigger was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 3 topic tags (ai, ai-agent-framework, ai-agents), 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.
← all 20902 open source comparisons
Side by side
| Trigger | swarmclaw | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 17K | ★ 704 |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-11-03 | 2026-06-30 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.5K | ⑂ 144 |
| 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 swarmclaw if
- You want the swarmclaw feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and swarmclaw 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 swarmclaw
SwarmClaw The self hosted AI agent runtime and multi agent framework for autonomous agents. Open source agent swarms with durable agent memory, MCP tools, skills, delegation, schedules, and 23+ LLM providers — a practical Claude Code and LangChain alternative. SwarmClaw is an open source, self hosted AI agent runtime and multi agent framework. Run autonomous AI agents, agent swarms, and orchestrators with heartbeats, schedules, delegation, agent memory, runtime skills, and reviewed conversation to skill learning — across OpenClaw gateways, Claude, GPT, Gemini, OpenRouter, Ollama, and 23+ other providers. Use it…
read the full swarmclaw overview →
More in Infrastructure & Operations
Related comparisons
More Orchestration & Scheduling projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the Orchestration & Scheduling field.
Frequently asked questions
Is Trigger or swarmclaw more popular?
Trigger has 16,706 GitHub stars and swarmclaw has 704. Trigger has the larger community by that measure.
Are Trigger and swarmclaw free?
Both are open source. Trigger is licensed under Apache-2.0 and swarmclaw under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Trigger and swarmclaw?
Trigger is written in TypeScript and swarmclaw 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, Trigger or swarmclaw?
Choose Trigger if you want the larger community (16,706 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose swarmclaw if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.