head to head · open source
Grafana Loki vs witr
Grafana Loki has 29,111 GitHub stars, 4,169 forks, 1,620 open issues and last shipped yesterday. witr has 22,906 stars, 808 forks, 17 open issues and last shipped 11 days ago. Grafana Loki leads on adoption by 27% (29,111 vs 22,906 stars). Grafana Loki is written in Go under AGPL-3.0; witr is written in Go under Apache-2.0. Grafana Loki has attracted 14% as many forks as stars, witr 4%. Grafana Loki 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
| Grafana Loki | witr | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 29K | ★ 23K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-10-23 |
| Forks | ⑂ 4.2K | ⑂ 808 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Grafana Loki if
- You weight community size — 29K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick witr if
- You want the witr feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and witr fits your workflow better
About Grafana Loki
Loki: like Prometheus, but for logs. Loki is a horizontally scalable, highly available, multi tenant log aggregation system inspired by Prometheus. It is designed to be very cost effective and easy to operate. It does not index the contents of the logs, but rather a set of labels for each log stream. Compared to other log aggregation systems, Loki: does not do full text indexing on logs. By storing compressed, unstructured logs and only indexing metadata, Loki is simpler to operate and cheaper to run. indexes and groups log streams using the same labels you’re already using with Prometheus, enabling you to…
read the full Grafana Loki overview →
About witr
witr Why is this running? Trace any process, port, container, or file back to the exact chain that started it — one command, machine readable JSON, or an interactive TUI. 🎮 Try witr in your browser → Investigate a simulated Linux box — a guided tutorial and free play sandbox, no install required. Purpose • Installation • TUI • Flags • Core Concept • Examples Output Behavior • Platforms • Success Criteria • Sponsors 1. Purpose witr exists to answer a single question: Why is this running? When something is running on a system, whether it is a process, a service, or something bound to a port, there is always a…
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Frequently asked questions
Is Grafana Loki or witr more popular?
Grafana Loki has 29,111 GitHub stars and witr has 22,906. Grafana Loki has the larger community by that measure.
Are Grafana Loki and witr free?
Both are open source. Grafana Loki is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and witr under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Grafana Loki and witr?
Grafana Loki is written in Go and witr in Go. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Grafana Loki or witr?
Choose Grafana Loki if you want the larger community (29,111 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose witr if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.