head to head · open source
webpack vs rspack
webpack has 65,945 GitHub stars, 9,545 forks, 123 open issues and last shipped yesterday. rspack has 12,906 stars, 854 forks, 224 open issues and last shipped yesterday. webpack leads on adoption by 411% (65,945 vs 12,906 stars). webpack is written in JavaScript under MIT; rspack is written in Rust under MIT. webpack has attracted 14% as many forks as stars, rspack 7%. webpack was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 6 topic tags (build-tool, compiler, esm, javascript), 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
| webpack | rspack | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 66K | ★ 13K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | JavaScript | Rust |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 9.5K | ⑂ 854 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick webpack if
- You weight community size — 66K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick rspack if
- You want the rspack feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You evaluated both and rspack fits your workflow better
About webpack
webpack is an open source module bundler for JavaScript and related assets, distributed under the MIT license and published to npm. It lives in the JavaScript ecosystem, where the README describes its main purpose as bundling JavaScript files for use in a browser, while also being capable of transforming, bundling, or packaging just about any resource or asset. Loaders let modules arrive in many forms — CommonJS, AMD, ES6 modules, CSS, images, JSON, CoffeeScript, LESS, or custom formats — and the plugin system extends what the build can do.
read the full webpack overview →
About rspack
Rspack is a fast bundler for the web written in Rust, distributed under the MIT license. It modernizes the webpack API so that webpack configurations can be replaced seamlessly, while the Rust core delivers fast build speeds. The project lives in the JavaScript and TypeScript build tooling ecosystem, and it is part of Rstack, a unified JavaScript toolchain that also includes Rsbuild, Rslib, Rspress, Rsdoctor, Rstest, and Rslint. The repository carries the topics build tool, bundler, compiler, esm, javascript, jsx, loaders, module bundler, rspack, rstack, rust, and typescript.
read the full rspack overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is webpack or rspack more popular?
webpack has 65,945 GitHub stars and rspack has 12,906. webpack has the larger community by that measure.
Are webpack and rspack free?
Both are open source. webpack is licensed under MIT and rspack under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between webpack and rspack?
webpack is written in JavaScript and rspack in Rust. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, webpack or rspack?
Choose webpack if you want the larger community (65,945 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose rspack if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.