head to head · open source
Tyk vs RWKV-Runner
Tyk has 10,873 GitHub stars, 1,169 forks, 509 open issues and last shipped yesterday. RWKV-Runner has 6,498 stars, 594 forks, 178 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Tyk leads on adoption by 67% (10,873 vs 6,498 stars). Tyk is written in Go under a custom or non-standard licence; RWKV-Runner is written in TypeScript under MIT. Tyk has attracted 11% as many forks as stars, RWKV-Runner 9%. Tyk was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (api, llm), 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
| Tyk | RWKV-Runner | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 11K | ★ 6.5K |
| License | Custom / other | MIT |
| Written in | Go | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.2K | ⑂ 594 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Tyk if
- You weight community size — 11K stars and counting
- You want the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick RWKV-Runner if
- You want the RWKV-Runner feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and RWKV-Runner fits your workflow better
About Tyk
Documentation Forum Blog About Tyk API Gateway Tyk Gateway is the cloud native, open source, enterprise ready API Gateway supporting REST, GraphQL, TCP and gRPC protocols. Built from the ground up, as the fastest API Gateway on the planet since 2014. Tyk Gateway is provided ‘Batteries included’, with no feature lockout. Enabling your organization to rate limit, auth, gather analytics, apply microservice patterns and more with ease. Tyk runs natively on Kubernetes , if you prefer, thanks to the Tyk Kubernetes Operator Everything you need to manage APIs. Follow the simple Get Started guide below 👇 The Enterprise…
About RWKV-Runner
RWKV Runner This project aims to eliminate the barriers of using large language models by automating everything for you. All you need is a lightweight executable program of just a few megabytes. Additionally, this project provides an interface compatible with the OpenAI API, which means that every ChatGPT client is an RWKV client. [![license][license image]][license url] [![release][release image]][release url] [![py version][py version image]][py version url] English 简体中文 日本語 Install [![Windows][Windows image]][Windows url] [![MacOS][MacOS image]][MacOS url] [![Linux][Linux image]][Linux url] FAQs Preview…
read the full RWKV-Runner overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Tyk or RWKV-Runner more popular?
Tyk has 10,873 GitHub stars and RWKV-Runner has 6,498. Tyk has the larger community by that measure.
Are Tyk and RWKV-Runner free?
Both are open source. Tyk has no licence declared in this registry, and RWKV-Runner is licensed under MIT. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Tyk and RWKV-Runner?
Tyk is written in Go and RWKV-Runner 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, Tyk or RWKV-Runner?
Choose Tyk if you want the larger community (10,873 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose RWKV-Runner if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.