head to head · open source
Wekan vs freeplane
Wekan has 21,150 GitHub stars, 3,002 forks, 165 open issues and last shipped yesterday. freeplane has 4,448 stars, 504 forks, 453 open issues and last shipped 4 days ago. Wekan leads on adoption by 375% (21,150 vs 4,448 stars). Wekan is written in JavaScript under MIT; freeplane is written in Java under GPL-2.0. Wekan has attracted 14% as many forks as stars, freeplane 11%. Wekan 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
| Wekan | freeplane | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 21K | ★ 4.4K |
| License | MIT | GPL-2.0 |
| Written in | JavaScript | Java |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-10-30 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.0K | ⑂ 504 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Wekan if
- You weight community size — 21K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick freeplane if
- You want the freeplane feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You evaluated both and freeplane fits your workflow better
About Wekan
WeKan ® Open Source kanban Downloads Docker Containers GitHub Docker Hub RedHat Quay.io docker compose.yml at Standards WeKan and Standard for Public Code assessment was made at 2023 11. Currently Wekan meets 8 out of 16 criteria out of the box. Some others could be met with small changes. Code stats CII Best Practices Code Climate Open Hub OSS Insight Translate WeKan ® at Transifex Translations to non English languages are accepted only at Transifex using webbrowser. New English strings of new features can be added as PRs to master branch file wekan/imports/i18n/data/en.i18n.json . WeKan ® feature requests and…
read the full Wekan overview →
About freeplane
Freeplane ========= Freeplane is a free and open source software application that supports thinking, sharing information, getting things done at work, in school and at home. It provides you a set of tools for mind mapping (also known as concept mapping or information mapping) and navigating the mapped information. Freeplane is also a more robust and superior alternative to Xmind, Mindmeister, and similar mind mapping software. Freeplane is written in Java using OSGi and Java Swing. It runs on any operating system that has a current version of Java installed. It can be installed or can run from removable storage…
read the full freeplane overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Wekan or freeplane more popular?
Wekan has 21,150 GitHub stars and freeplane has 4,448. Wekan has the larger community by that measure.
Are Wekan and freeplane free?
Both are open source. Wekan is licensed under MIT and freeplane under GPL-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Wekan and freeplane?
Wekan is written in JavaScript and freeplane in Java. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Wekan or freeplane?
Choose Wekan if you want the larger community (21,150 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose freeplane if its feature set, stack or GPL-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.