DiscoursevsNATS
Two self-hosted projects, compared on the numbers selfhost.directory tracks live: score, popularity, release cadence and setup effort.
| Discourse | NATS | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 83/100 | 80/100 |
| Rank in category | #1 of 69 in Social Networks & Forums | #2 of 12 in Message Broker |
| GitHub stars | 48 029 | 20 957 |
| Stars, last 30 days | +133 | +192 |
| Stable releases, 12 months | 1 | 18 |
| Latest release | _gh-attach-assets · 15 Jul 2026 | v2.14.9 · 26 Oct 2026 |
| Setup | Moderate | Moderate |
| Official Docker image | Yes | Yes |
| License | GPL-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Main language | Ruby | Go |
Which one should you pick?
Discourse scores 83/100 against 80/100 for NATS, so it is the safer default.
NATS ships more often: 18 stable releases in the past year, against 1 for Discourse.
Discourse details →NATS details →