Open Source Point of Sale vs Bigcapital
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted crm & business apps options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Open Source Point of Sale
Web-based point of sale and inventory management system
VS
Bigcapital
Open-source accounting and financial management
| Feature | Open Source Point of Sale | Bigcapital |
|---|---|---|
| Category | CRM & Business Apps | CRM & Business Apps |
| License | MIT | AGPL-3.0 |
| Language | PHP | TypeScript |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 512 MB | 1,024 MB |
| Deployment | docker, bare-metal | docker, source |
| GitHub stars | ★ 4,336 | ★ 3,821 |
| First released | 2010 | 2022 |
| Replaces | Square, Lightspeed | QuickBooks, Xero |
Why pick each one
Choose Open Source Point of Sale if…
- Released under the MIT license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (4.3k GitHub stars)
- Written in PHP
Choose Bigcapital if…
- Released under the AGPL-3.0 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (3.8k GitHub stars)
- Written in TypeScript
Frequently asked questions
Is Open Source Point of Sale or Bigcapital better?
Neither is universally better. Open Source Point of Sale has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Open Source Point of Sale and Bigcapital free and open-source?
Yes. Open Source Point of Sale is licensed under MIT and Bigcapital under AGPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Open Source Point of Sale and Bigcapital with Docker?
Open Source Point of Sale: yes. Bigcapital: yes.