Bridgetown vs Pencil
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted blogging platforms options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | Bridgetown | Pencil |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Read-the-docs project | Read-the-docs project |
| Health score | 84 · Excellent | 62 · Good |
| Category | Blogging Platforms | Blogging Platforms |
| License | MIT | BSD-3-Clause |
| Language | Ruby | Haskell |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Hard |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 64 MB |
| Deployment | source, binary | source, binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,366 | ★ 5 |
| First released | 2020 | 2017 |
| Replaces | Jekyll, WordPress | Jekyll |
What are Bridgetown and Pencil?
Bridgetown
Bridgetown is a Ruby-based static site generator and full-stack web framework that grew out of the Jekyll ecosystem. It supports component-based design, plugins, and optional dynamic rendering for blogs and websites.
- Component-based design
- Plugin ecosystem
- Front-end bundling
- Static and hybrid rendering
Pencil
Pencil is a static site generator library and tool written in Haskell that compiles Markdown and templates into a static website. It gives developers a programmatic way to define site structure and content transformations.
- Haskell library API
- Markdown rendering
- Template inheritance
- Static output
Bridgetown vs Pencil: key differences
Bridgetown is written in Ruby, while Pencil is built with Haskell. Licensing differs — MIT for Bridgetown versus BSD-3-Clause for Pencil. Pencil is the lighter option, starting around 64 MB of RAM against 256 MB for Bridgetown. Pencil is the more established project (first released 2017), while Bridgetown arrived in 2020. Bridgetown has the considerably larger community, at 1,366 GitHub stars versus 5.
Why pick each one
Choose Bridgetown if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Active community (1.4k GitHub stars)
- Written in Ruby
- Tiny footprint — runs in 256 MB RAM
Choose Pencil if…
- Released under the BSD-3-Clause license
- Written in Haskell
- Tiny footprint — runs in 64 MB RAM
Frequently asked questions
Is Bridgetown or Pencil better?
Bridgetown is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler medium setup. Consider Pencil if its specific feature set fits your needs better.
Are Bridgetown and Pencil free and open-source?
Yes. Bridgetown is licensed under MIT and Pencil under BSD-3-Clause. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Bridgetown and Pencil with Docker?
Bridgetown: check the project docs for container support. Pencil: check the project docs for container support.
Which is lighter on resources, Bridgetown or Pencil?
Pencil has the smaller minimum footprint at 64 MB of RAM, compared to about 256 MB for Bridgetown. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.