SHSelfHostIndex

Stable Diffusion WebUI vs Stable Diffusion WebUI Forge

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted ai image generation options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

Not the right match-up?
ST Stable Diffusion WebUI Popular Gradio web UI for Stable Diffusion VS ST Stable Diffusion WebUI Forge Optimized fork of the Stable Diffusion WebUI
FeatureStable Diffusion WebUIStable Diffusion WebUI Forge
CategoryAI Image GenerationAI Image Generation
LicenseAGPL-3.0AGPL-3.0
LanguagePythonPython
Setup difficultyMediumMedium
Min. RAM8,192 MB8,192 MB
Deploymentdocker, bare-metal, sourcebare-metal, source
GitHub stars★ 164,436★ 12,939
First released20222024
ReplacesMidjourney, DALL-EMidjourney

Why pick each one

Choose Stable Diffusion WebUI if…

  • Released under the AGPL-3.0 license
  • First-class Docker support for quick deployment
  • Mature project with 164.4k GitHub stars
  • Written in Python
Stable Diffusion WebUI details

Choose Stable Diffusion WebUI Forge if…

  • Released under the AGPL-3.0 license
  • Mature project with 12.9k GitHub stars
  • Written in Python
Stable Diffusion WebUI Forge details

Frequently asked questions

Is Stable Diffusion WebUI or Stable Diffusion WebUI Forge better?

Neither is universally better. Stable Diffusion WebUI has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.

Are Stable Diffusion WebUI and Stable Diffusion WebUI Forge free and open-source?

Yes. Stable Diffusion WebUI is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and Stable Diffusion WebUI Forge under AGPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Stable Diffusion WebUI and Stable Diffusion WebUI Forge with Docker?

Stable Diffusion WebUI: yes. Stable Diffusion WebUI Forge: check the project docs for container support.

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