Misskey vs PixelFed

Both are self-hosted communication - social networks and forums projects. This page compares how well each one is actually maintained — the part you cannot see from a feature list.

Misskey and PixelFed are closely matched on maintenance health (88 vs 88). Neither is the safer bet on activity alone, so choose on features, licence and the stack you already run.
MisskeyPixelFed
Health score 88/100 88/100
Commits (11 mo) 1091 1210
Commits (last 3 mo) 396 672
Stars 11k 7.1k
Latest release 23 Sept 2026 22 Sept 2026
Licence AGPL-3.0 AGPL-3.0
Built with Nodejs, Docker PHP
Typical RAM 1 GB 1 GB

Misskey

Decentralized app-like microblogging server/SNS for the Fediverse, using the ActivityPub protocol like GNU social and Mastodon.

88/100
Thriving

High commit volume, frequent releases and growing activity.

Maintenance 32/40
Releases 25/25
Community 16/20
Momentum 15/15

Commit activity more than 81% of tracked projects; popularity more than 81%. How this is calculated.

Commits, last 11 months

2025-10: 142 commits 2025-11: 155 commits 2025-12: 110 commits 2026-01: 66 commits 2026-02: 18 commits 2026-03: 47 commits 2026-04: 62 commits 2026-05: 95 commits 2026-06: 150 commits 2026-07: 200 commits 2026-08: 46 commits

PixelFed

Ethical photo sharing platform, powered by ActivityPub federation (alternative to Instagram).

88/100
Thriving

High commit volume, frequent releases and growing activity.

Maintenance 33/40
Releases 25/25
Community 15/20
Momentum 15/15

Commit activity more than 82% of tracked projects; popularity more than 73%. How this is calculated.

Commits, last 11 months

2025-10: 21 commits 2025-11: 265 commits 2025-12: 23 commits 2026-01: 49 commits 2026-02: 83 commits 2026-03: 78 commits 2026-04: 5 commits 2026-05: 14 commits 2026-06: 25 commits 2026-07: 2 commits 2026-08: 645 commits

How to read this

Everything above is measured, not opinion: commit counts and release dates come from the public repositories, and the health score ranks each project against all 1352 projects we track. Read the full method.

What this comparison deliberately does not do is tell you which has the better feature set. Maintenance health tells you which project will still be receiving security fixes in two years. Decide that first, then compare features on the projects that survive the filter.

See every option in this category: self-hosted communication - social networks and forums.