digiKam vs fgallery
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted photo management options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
digiKam
Professional photo management with advanced metadata tools
VS
fgallery
Archived
Minimalist static photo gallery generator
| Feature | digiKam | fgallery |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Read-the-docs project | Read-the-docs project |
| Status | Actively maintained | Archived |
| Category | Photo Management | Photo Management |
| License | GPL-2.0 | MIT |
| Language | C++ | JavaScript |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 1,024 MB | 128 MB |
| Deployment | bare-metal, binary | bare-metal, source |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,200 | ★ 248 |
| First released | 2002 | 2013 |
| Replaces | Adobe Lightroom, Google Photos | Flickr, Google Photos |
What are digiKam and fgallery?
digiKam
digiKam is a professional-grade photo management application that handles huge collections with face recognition, geotagging, and powerful metadata editing. Its database and albums can be hosted on a shared server for multi-machine access.
- Face recognition
- Geotagging support
- Advanced metadata editing
- Handles huge libraries
fgallery
fgallery is a static photo gallery generator that produces a minimalist, self-contained HTML gallery from a folder of images. The generated gallery is fully static, privacy-respecting, and can be hosted on any web server.
- Minimalist static galleries
- Self-contained output
- Mobile friendly
- No tracking
digiKam vs fgallery: key differences
The biggest difference is maintenance: fgallery's repository is archived and no longer developed, while digiKam is actively maintained. DigiKam is written in C++, while fgallery is built with JavaScript. Licensing differs — GPL-2.0 for digiKam versus MIT for fgallery. Fgallery is the lighter option, starting around 128 MB of RAM against 1,024 MB for digiKam. DigiKam is the more established project (first released 2002), while fgallery arrived in 2013. DigiKam has the considerably larger community, at 1,200 GitHub stars versus 248.
Why pick each one
Choose digiKam if…
- Very feature rich
- Scales to large collections
Watch out for
- Steep learning curve
- Desktop application only
Choose fgallery if…
- Clean simple design
- Privacy respecting
Watch out for
- Command-line only
- Minimal features
Frequently asked questions
Is digiKam or fgallery better?
Neither is universally better. digiKam has the larger community, while fgallery is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are digiKam and fgallery free and open-source?
Yes. digiKam is licensed under GPL-2.0 and fgallery under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run digiKam and fgallery with Docker?
digiKam: check the project docs for container support. fgallery: check the project docs for container support.
Which is lighter on resources, digiKam or fgallery?
fgallery has the smaller minimum footprint at 128 MB of RAM, compared to about 1,024 MB for digiKam. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.