SHSelfHostIndex

13ft vs Open Library

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted e-books & media library options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

Not the right match-up?
13 13ft Bypass paywall by acting as GoogleBot VS OP Open Library Open, editable catalog and library platform for books
Feature13ftOpen Library
CategoryE-books & Media LibraryE-books & Media Library
LicenseMITAGPL-3.0
LanguagePythonPython
Setup difficultyEasyHard
Min. RAM50 MB4,096 MB
Deploymentbare-metaldocker
GitHub stars★ 4,250★ 6,597
First released20232007
Replaces12ftGoodreads

Why pick each one

Choose 13ft if…

  • Released under the MIT license
  • Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
  • Active community (4.2k GitHub stars)
  • Written in Python
13ft details

Choose Open Library if…

  • Huge catalog data
  • Battle-tested platform
Open Library details

Frequently asked questions

Is 13ft or Open Library better?

Neither is universally better. Open Library has the larger community, while 13ft is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.

Are 13ft and Open Library free and open-source?

Yes. 13ft is licensed under MIT and Open Library under AGPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run 13ft and Open Library with Docker?

13ft: check the project docs for container support. Open Library: yes.

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