Penpot vs Semaphore UI

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

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FeaturePenpotSemaphore UI
CategoryDeveloper Tools & GitDeveloper Tools & Git
LicenseMPL-2.0MIT
LanguageClojureGo
Setup difficultyMediumEasy
Min. RAM2,048 MB256 MB
Deploymentdocker, kubernetesdocker, binary, bare-metal
GitHub stars★ 58,249★ 13,973
First released20202017
ReplacesFigmaAnsible Tower, AWX

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 Semaphore UI if…

  • Released under the MIT license
  • Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
  • First-class Docker support for quick deployment
  • Mature project with 14k GitHub stars
Semaphore UI details

Frequently asked questions

Is Penpot or Semaphore UI better?

Neither is universally better. Penpot has the larger community, while Semaphore UI is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.

Are Penpot and Semaphore UI free and open-source?

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

Can I run Penpot and Semaphore UI with Docker?

Penpot: yes. Semaphore UI: yes.

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