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Open source alternatives to pen.dev

2 open source tools do the job of pen.dev. The most starred is Penpot, with 62.3k stars. Verified on GitHub. About pen.dev

pen.dev homepage
pen.devFree
Penpot homepage
Penpot62.3k stars · MPL 2.0GitHub

All 2 alternatives

Questions about alternatives to pen.dev

What is the best open source alternative to pen.dev?

By GitHub stars it is Penpot, with 62,334 stars and a commit on 13 Nov. Choose Penpot when you want a full design canvas that your own agents can drive through an open MCP server, on servers you host. Next come OpenPencil (9,834 stars).

Is there a free alternative to pen.dev?

Yes. The code of all 2 is public under MPL 2.0 or MIT, so you can use them with no licence fee. Running one yourself costs the server and your time to look after it, and some makers also sell a hosted plan.

How do I choose between them?

Start from the job you use pen.dev for. Choose OpenPencil when you want to open .pen documents in an MIT-licensed editor that also runs headless from a CLI.

Which pen.dev alternatives can I host on my own server?

All 2: Penpot and OpenPencil. Each tool's page says what it needs to run.

Which ones are still being worked on?

All 2 we track had a commit in the last 30 days, among them Penpot and OpenPencil. A recent commit shows the project is kept up, not that it will stay that way.

What licences do they use?

MPL 2.0 (1), MIT (1). MIT, BSD and Apache let you change and reuse the code freely.

What do I lose by leaving pen.dev?

The hosting. pen.dev's maker runs the servers for you; with an open source tool the updates, backups, security fixes and support are yours, unless you take the maker's hosted plan. Features differ too, so check what each one imports and exports before you move your data.