Newsboat vs RSS Guard
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted rss & news readers options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Newsboat
Terminal RSS and Atom feed reader for text consoles
VS
RSS Guard
Cross-platform desktop feed reader with plugin support
| Feature | Newsboat | RSS Guard |
|---|---|---|
| Category | RSS & News Readers | RSS & News Readers |
| License | MIT | GPL-3.0 |
| Language | C++ | C++ |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 32 MB | 256 MB |
| Deployment | binary, bare-metal | binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 3,874 | ★ 2,711 |
| First released | 2007 | 2013 |
| Replaces | Feedly | Feedly |
Why pick each one
Choose Newsboat if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Active community (3.9k GitHub stars)
- Written in C++
- Tiny footprint — runs in 32 MB RAM
Choose RSS Guard if…
- Released under the GPL-3.0 license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- Active community (2.7k GitHub stars)
- Written in C++
Frequently asked questions
Is Newsboat or RSS Guard better?
Neither is universally better. Newsboat has the larger community, while RSS Guard is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Newsboat and RSS Guard free and open-source?
Yes. Newsboat is licensed under MIT and RSS Guard under GPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Newsboat and RSS Guard with Docker?
Newsboat: check the project docs for container support. RSS Guard: check the project docs for container support.