calcurse vs Horde Kronolith
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted calendar & contacts options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | calcurse | Horde Kronolith |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Read-the-docs project | Read-the-docs project |
| Health score | 77 · Good | 69 · Good |
| Category | Calendar & Contacts | Calendar & Contacts |
| License | BSD-2-Clause | GPL-2.0 |
| Language | C | PHP |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Hard |
| Min. RAM | 16 MB | 256 MB |
| Deployment | binary, source | bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,303 | ★ 10 |
| First released | 2004 | 2003 |
| Replaces | Google Calendar | Google Calendar, Exchange |
What are calcurse and Horde Kronolith?
calcurse
calcurse is a text-based personal organizer with a calendar, an appointments list, and a to-do manager, all in a curses interface. It supports CalDAV synchronization so it can connect to self-hosted calendar servers.
- Text-based calendar and to-do
- CalDAV synchronization
- Very low resource use
Horde Kronolith
Kronolith is the calendar component of the Horde groupware framework. It provides shared calendars, event management, and supports CalDAV synchronization with desktop and mobile clients.
- Part of Horde groupware
- Shared calendar support
- CalDAV synchronization
calcurse vs Horde Kronolith: key differences
Calcurse is written in C, while Horde Kronolith is built with PHP. Licensing differs — BSD-2-Clause for calcurse versus GPL-2.0 for Horde Kronolith. Calcurse is the lighter option, starting around 16 MB of RAM against 256 MB for Horde Kronolith. Calcurse has the considerably larger community, at 1,303 GitHub stars versus 10.
Why pick each one
Choose calcurse if…
- Released under the BSD-2-Clause license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- Active community (1.3k GitHub stars)
- Written in C
Choose Horde Kronolith if…
- Released under the GPL-2.0 license
- Written in PHP
- Tiny footprint — runs in 256 MB RAM
Frequently asked questions
Is calcurse or Horde Kronolith better?
calcurse is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler easy setup. Consider Horde Kronolith if its specific feature set fits your needs better.
Are calcurse and Horde Kronolith free and open-source?
Yes. calcurse is licensed under BSD-2-Clause and Horde Kronolith under GPL-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run calcurse and Horde Kronolith with Docker?
calcurse: check the project docs for container support. Horde Kronolith: check the project docs for container support.
Which is lighter on resources, calcurse or Horde Kronolith?
calcurse has the smaller minimum footprint at 16 MB of RAM, compared to about 256 MB for Horde Kronolith. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.