head to head · open source
wiki vs obsidian-wiki
wiki has 28,937 GitHub stars, 3,314 forks, 182 open issues and last shipped yesterday. obsidian-wiki has 3,422 stars, 338 forks, 7 open issues and last shipped yesterday. wiki leads on adoption by 746% (28,937 vs 3,422 stars). wiki is written in Vue under AGPL-3.0; obsidian-wiki is written in Python under MIT. wiki has attracted 11% as many forks as stars, obsidian-wiki 10%. obsidian-wiki was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (wiki), 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
| wiki | obsidian-wiki | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 29K | ★ 3.4K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Vue | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.3K | ⑂ 338 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick wiki if
- You weight community size — 29K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Vue
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick obsidian-wiki if
- You want the obsidian-wiki feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and obsidian-wiki fits your workflow better
About wiki
Wiki.js is a modern, lightweight wiki application built on NodeJS and distributed as open source under the AGPL 3.0 licence, aimed at teams and organisations that want to publish and maintain their own documentation and knowledge base rather than renting a hosted one.
About obsidian-wiki
obsidian wiki is a Python package and agent skill framework for maintaining a personal knowledge base in Obsidian. It lives in the Obsidian, markdown, and AI agent ecosystem, where agents can read and run skills from a shared .skills/ directory. The project presents itself as a digital brain that remembers what a user figures out, connects new material to existing notes, and answers questions from that knowledge.
read the full obsidian-wiki overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is wiki or obsidian-wiki more popular?
wiki has 28,937 GitHub stars and obsidian-wiki has 3,422. wiki has the larger community by that measure.
Are wiki and obsidian-wiki free?
Both are open source. wiki is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and obsidian-wiki under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between wiki and obsidian-wiki?
wiki is written in Vue and obsidian-wiki 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, wiki or obsidian-wiki?
Choose wiki if you want the larger community (28,937 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose obsidian-wiki if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.