Homarr vs Homer
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted dashboards & startpages options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Homarr
Customizable dashboard for your self-hosted services
VS
Homer
Static, fast and simple service dashboard
| Feature | Homarr | Homer |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | ≈5-minute setup |
| Health score | 89 · Excellent | 93 · Excellent |
| Category | Dashboards & Startpages | Dashboards & Startpages |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Language | TypeScript | Vue |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 64 MB |
| Deployment | docker | docker, bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 4,768 | ★ 11,615 |
| First released | 2022 | 2019 |
| Replaces | Heimdall | Heimdall |
What are Homarr and Homer?
Homarr
Homarr is a sleek, customizable dashboard that organizes links and widgets for your self-hosted services with deep integrations. It targets home labbers wanting a polished start page. It is deployed via Docker.
- Drag-and-drop layout editor
- Service status integrations
- Built-in widgets and search
- Theming support
Homer
Homer is a very simple static dashboard for your services, configured with a single YAML file and served as static assets. It targets users wanting the lightest possible start page. It is deployed via Docker or any static host.
- Single YAML configuration
- Pure static, no backend
- Themes and search
- Tiny resource use
Homarr vs Homer: key differences
Homarr is written in TypeScript, while Homer is built with Vue. Homer is the lighter option, starting around 64 MB of RAM against 256 MB for Homarr. Homer is the more established project (first released 2019), while Homarr arrived in 2022. Homer has the considerably larger community, at 11,615 GitHub stars versus 4,768.
Why pick each one
Choose Homarr if…
- Beautiful modern UI
- Easy drag-and-drop config
- Good integrations
Watch out for
- Newer with evolving features
- Mostly single-dashboard focus
Choose Homer if…
- Extremely lightweight
- Trivial to host
- Fast
Watch out for
- No dynamic widgets
- Manual config edits
Frequently asked questions
Is Homarr or Homer better?
Neither is universally better. Homer has the larger community; both share a easy setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Homarr and Homer free and open-source?
Yes. Homarr is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Homer under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Homarr and Homer with Docker?
Homarr: yes. Homer: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Homarr or Homer?
Homer has the smaller minimum footprint at 64 MB of RAM, compared to about 256 MB for Homarr. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.