DiscoursevsNGINX
Two self-hosted projects, compared on the numbers selfhost.directory tracks live: score, popularity, release cadence and setup effort.
| Discourse | NGINX | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 83/100 | 84/100 |
| Rank in category | #1 of 69 in Social Networks & Forums | #2 of 12 in Web Servers |
| GitHub stars | 48 024 | 31 998 |
| Stars, last 30 days | +135 | +277 |
| Stable releases, 12 months | 1 | 21 |
| Latest release | _gh-attach-assets · 15 Jul 2026 | release-1.31.8 · 21 Oct 2026 |
| Setup | Moderate | Moderate |
| Official Docker image | Yes | Yes |
| License | GPL-2.0 | BSD-2-Clause |
| Main language | Ruby | C |
Which one should you pick?
NGINX scores 84/100 against 83/100 for Discourse, so it is the safer default.
NGINX ships more often: 21 stable releases in the past year, against 1 for Discourse.
NGINX is growing faster right now (+277 stars in 30 days).
Discourse details →NGINX details →