head to head · open source
Windmill vs web-builder
Windmill has 17,982 GitHub stars, 1,097 forks, 852 open issues and last shipped today. web-builder has 585 stars, 98 forks, 3 open issues and last shipped 8 days ago. Windmill leads on adoption by 2,974% (17,982 vs 585 stars). Windmill is written in Rust under a custom or non-standard licence; web-builder is written in TypeScript under AGPL-3.0. Windmill has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, web-builder 17%. Windmill was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (low-code), 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
| Windmill | web-builder | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 18K | ★ 585 |
| License | Custom / other | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Rust | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-20 | 2026-09-12 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.1K | ⑂ 98 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Windmill if
- You weight community size — 18K stars and counting
- You want the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick web-builder if
- You want the web-builder feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and web-builder fits your workflow better
About Windmill
Windmill is an open source developer platform for internal code, including APIs, background jobs, workflows, and UIs. It lives in the self hostable low code automation ecosystem and supports Python, TypeScript, Go, Bash, SQL, GraphQL, PowerShell, Rust, and more. The project is positioned as an open source alternative to Zapier and, in the README, to Retool, Pipedream, Superblocks, and a simplified Temporal.
read the full Windmill overview →
About web-builder
web builder is an open source, AI assisted low code platform for visually building and publishing responsive web pages and mini program screens, intended for front end and full stack teams that run a headless Drupal backend and want drag and drop layout work instead of hand written Tailwind markup.
read the full web-builder overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Windmill or web-builder more popular?
Windmill has 17,982 GitHub stars and web-builder has 585. Windmill has the larger community by that measure.
Are Windmill and web-builder free?
Both are open source. Windmill has no licence declared in this registry, and web-builder is licensed under AGPL-3.0. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Windmill and web-builder?
Windmill is written in Rust and web-builder 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, Windmill or web-builder?
Choose Windmill if you want the larger community (17,982 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose web-builder if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.