head to head · open source
Warp vs Ghostty
Warp has 65,069 GitHub stars, 5,563 forks, 5,218 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Ghostty has 61,231 stars, 3,461 forks, 251 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Warp leads on adoption by 6% (65,069 vs 61,231 stars). Warp is written in Rust under AGPL-3.0; Ghostty is written in Zig under MIT. Warp has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, Ghostty 6%. Warp 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
| Warp | Ghostty | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 65K | ★ 61K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Rust | Zig |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.6K | ⑂ 3.5K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Warp if
- You weight community size — 65K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Ghostty if
- You want the Ghostty feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Zig
- You evaluated both and Ghostty fits your workflow better
About Warp
Warp is an agentic development environment, born out of the terminal, built for developers and teams who want a modern shell on Linux and macOS with AI coding agents working inside it.
About Ghostty
Ghostty is a fast, feature rich, cross platform terminal emulator that uses platform native UI and GPU acceleration, written in Zig under the MIT licence and aimed at developers who want speed, features, and a native app experience in one terminal instead of choosing between them.
read the full Ghostty overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Warp or Ghostty more popular?
Warp has 65,069 GitHub stars and Ghostty has 61,231. Warp has the larger community by that measure.
Are Warp and Ghostty free?
Both are open source. Warp is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and Ghostty under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Warp and Ghostty?
Warp is written in Rust and Ghostty in Zig. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Warp or Ghostty?
Choose Warp if you want the larger community (65,069 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose Ghostty if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.