head to head · open source
Zotero vs silverbullet
Zotero has 15,327 GitHub stars, 1,124 forks, 1,600 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. silverbullet has 6,099 stars, 485 forks, 345 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Zotero leads on adoption by 151% (15,327 vs 6,099 stars). Zotero is written in JavaScript under a custom or non-standard licence; silverbullet is written in TypeScript under MIT. Zotero has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, silverbullet 8%. silverbullet 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
| Zotero | silverbullet | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 15K | ★ 6.1K |
| License | Custom / other | MIT |
| Written in | JavaScript | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-19 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.1K | ⑂ 485 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Zotero if
- You weight community size — 15K stars and counting
- You want the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick silverbullet if
- You want the silverbullet feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and silverbullet fits your workflow better
About Zotero
Zotero is a free tool for research sources. It lives in the JavaScript application ecosystem and is listed under Productivity & Utilities / Note Taking & Knowledge Management. The provided GitHub metadata reports 15,272 stars, 1,117 forks, 1,600 open issues, 0 contributors, a repository age of 0 years, and a last push timestamp of 2026 09 14T16:40:51Z. The homepage is https://www.zotero.org, and no topics are listed. The license field is NOASSERTION.
read the full Zotero overview →
About silverbullet
SilverBullet is an open source, self hosted, browser based personal knowledge database that stores notes as Markdown pages and makes them programmable with Space Lua, aimed at individual knowledge workers who want a notes app they can script rather than merely configure.
read the full silverbullet overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Zotero or silverbullet more popular?
Zotero has 15,327 GitHub stars and silverbullet has 6,099. Zotero has the larger community by that measure.
Are Zotero and silverbullet free?
Both are open source. Zotero has no licence declared in this registry, and silverbullet is licensed under MIT. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Zotero and silverbullet?
Zotero is written in JavaScript and silverbullet 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, Zotero or silverbullet?
Choose Zotero if you want the larger community (15,327 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose silverbullet if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.