Bar Assistant vs Chowdown
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted recipe managers options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Bar Assistant
Manage your home bar while adding your ingredients, searching for
VS
Chowdown
Static-site recipe collection built on Jekyll
| Feature | Bar Assistant | Chowdown |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Recipe Managers | Recipe Managers |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Language | PHP | HTML |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 512 MB | 64 MB |
| Deployment | docker | bare-metal, source |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,059 | ★ 665 |
| First released | 2026 | 2014 |
| Replaces | — | Paprika, BigOven |
Why pick each one
Choose Bar Assistant if…
- Released under the MIT license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (1.1k GitHub stars)
- Written in PHP
Frequently asked questions
Is Bar Assistant or Chowdown better?
Neither is universally better. Bar Assistant has the larger community, while Chowdown is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Bar Assistant and Chowdown free and open-source?
Yes. Bar Assistant is licensed under MIT and Chowdown under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Bar Assistant and Chowdown with Docker?
Bar Assistant: yes. Chowdown: check the project docs for container support.