Penpot vs Garden

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted developer tools & git options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

Not the right match-up?
FeaturePenpotGarden
CategoryDeveloper Tools & GitDeveloper Tools & Git
LicenseMPL-2.0MPL-2.0
LanguageClojureTypeScript
Setup difficultyMediumMedium
Min. RAM2,048 MB1,024 MB
Deploymentdocker, kubernetesbinary, source
GitHub stars★ 58,249★ 3,604
First released20202018
ReplacesFigmaSkaffold, Tilt

Why pick each one

Choose Penpot if…

  • Released under the MPL-2.0 license
  • First-class Docker support for quick deployment
  • Kubernetes-ready with Helm charts available
  • Mature project with 58.2k GitHub stars
Penpot details

Choose Garden if…

  • Released under the MPL-2.0 license
  • Active community (3.6k GitHub stars)
  • Written in TypeScript
Garden details

Frequently asked questions

Is Penpot or Garden better?

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

Are Penpot and Garden free and open-source?

Yes. Penpot is licensed under MPL-2.0 and Garden under MPL-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Penpot and Garden with Docker?

Penpot: yes. Garden: check the project docs for container support.

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