head to head · open source
tvheadend vs BookWyrm
tvheadend has 3,524 GitHub stars, 975 forks, 107 open issues and last shipped 6 days ago. BookWyrm has 2,780 stars, 338 forks, 418 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. tvheadend leads on adoption by 27% (3,524 vs 2,780 stars). tvheadend is written in C under GPL-3.0; BookWyrm is written in Python under a custom or non-standard licence. tvheadend has attracted 28% as many forks as stars, BookWyrm 12%. BookWyrm 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
| tvheadend | BookWyrm | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 3.5K | ★ 2.8K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | Custom / other |
| Written in | C | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-14 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 975 | ⑂ 338 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick tvheadend if
- You weight community size — 3.5K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick BookWyrm if
- You want the BookWyrm feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and BookWyrm fits your workflow better
About tvheadend
Tvheadend is an open source TV streaming server and digital video recorder for Linux. It lives in the Linux media and streaming ecosystem, and it is written in C under the GPL 3.0 license. The project provides a server that can receive television signals and streams from many input types, then make those channels available over the network.
read the full tvheadend overview →
About BookWyrm
BookWyrm is a social reading network for tracking books, writing reviews, and discovering what to read next. It lives in the ActivityPub ecosystem, so users can interact with other BookWyrm instances and with ActivityPub services such as Mastodon and Pleroma. The project is a Python web application using Django, PostgreSQL, Redis, Celery, and ActivityPub.
read the full BookWyrm overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is tvheadend or BookWyrm more popular?
tvheadend has 3,524 GitHub stars and BookWyrm has 2,780. tvheadend has the larger community by that measure.
Are tvheadend and BookWyrm free?
Both are open source. tvheadend is licensed under GPL-3.0, and BookWyrm has no licence declared in this registry. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between tvheadend and BookWyrm?
tvheadend is written in C and BookWyrm 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, tvheadend or BookWyrm?
Choose tvheadend if you want the larger community (3,524 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose BookWyrm if its feature set, stack or Custom / other licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.