Gollum vs WackoWiki
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted wikis & documentation options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | Gollum | WackoWiki |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 51 · Fair | 69 · Good |
| Category | Wikis & Documentation | Wikis & Documentation |
| License | MIT | BSD-3-Clause |
| Language | Ruby | PHP |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 128 MB |
| Deployment | binary, docker, source | bare-metal, docker, source |
| GitHub stars | ★ 14,330 | ★ 55 |
| First released | 2010 | 2003 |
| Replaces | Confluence, Notion | Confluence, Notion |
What are Gollum and WackoWiki?
Gollum
Gollum is an open-source wiki system built on top of Git, where every page is a file in a Git repository. It powers the wikis found on GitHub and supports many markup languages.
- Git-backed page storage
- Multiple markup languages
- Powers GitHub wikis
- Full history via Git
WackoWiki
WackoWiki is a lightweight, open-source wiki engine focused on ease of installation and multilingual support. It includes WYSIWYG editing, access control, and file uploads.
- Easy installation
- WYSIWYG editing
- Multilingual interface
- Access control lists
Gollum vs WackoWiki: key differences
Gollum is written in Ruby, while WackoWiki is built with PHP. Licensing differs — MIT for Gollum versus BSD-3-Clause for WackoWiki. WackoWiki is the lighter option, starting around 128 MB of RAM against 256 MB for Gollum. WackoWiki is the more established project (first released 2003), while Gollum arrived in 2010. Gollum has the considerably larger community, at 14,330 GitHub stars versus 55.
Why pick each one
Choose Gollum if…
- Pages are plain files in Git
- Easy version control
Watch out for
- No fine-grained ACLs
- Ruby toolchain required
Choose WackoWiki if…
- Lightweight and simple
- Good multilingual support
Watch out for
- Small community
- Limited extensions
Frequently asked questions
Is Gollum or WackoWiki better?
Neither is universally better. Gollum has the larger community, while WackoWiki is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Gollum and WackoWiki free and open-source?
Yes. Gollum is licensed under MIT and WackoWiki under BSD-3-Clause. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Gollum and WackoWiki with Docker?
Gollum: yes. WackoWiki: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Gollum or WackoWiki?
WackoWiki has the smaller minimum footprint at 128 MB of RAM, compared to about 256 MB for Gollum. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.