head to head · open source
compose vs workflow-core
compose has 38,195 GitHub stars, 5,825 forks, 111 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. workflow-core has 5,926 stars, 1,262 forks, 133 open issues and last shipped 4 days ago. compose leads on adoption by 545% (38,195 vs 5,926 stars). compose is written in Go under Apache-2.0; workflow-core is written in C# under MIT. compose has attracted 15% as many forks as stars, workflow-core 21%. compose 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
| compose | workflow-core | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 38K | ★ 5.9K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Go | C# |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-16 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.8K | ⑂ 1.3K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick compose if
- You weight community size — 38K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick workflow-core if
- You want the workflow-core feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches C#
- You evaluated both and workflow-core fits your workflow better
About compose
Docker Compose is an Apache 2.0 licensed Go tool that defines and runs multi container applications on Docker from a single Compose file, aimed at developers and operators who need several containers to start together as one isolated application.
read the full compose overview →
About workflow-core
Workflow Core is a lightweight, embeddable workflow engine targeting .NET Standard, written in C and released under the MIT license. It lives in the .NET ecosystem, distributed as NuGet packages, and is built around the idea of long running processes that contain multiple tasks and must track their state between steps. Rather than running as a separate server, it is a library that is hosted inside an application, and it exposes a fluent C API for defining workflows. Workflows are expressed as a starting step followed by chained steps, and the same class can declare inputs and outputs that move data from one step …
read the full workflow-core overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is compose or workflow-core more popular?
compose has 38,195 GitHub stars and workflow-core has 5,926. compose has the larger community by that measure.
Are compose and workflow-core free?
Both are open source. compose is licensed under Apache-2.0 and workflow-core under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between compose and workflow-core?
compose is written in Go and workflow-core in C#. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, compose or workflow-core?
Choose compose if you want the larger community (38,195 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose workflow-core if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.