The Lounge vs ZNC
Both are self-hosted communication - irc projects. This page compares how well each one is actually maintained — the part you cannot see from a feature list.
| The Lounge | ZNC | |
|---|---|---|
| Health score | 60/100 | 50/100 |
| Commits (11 mo) | 108 | 140 |
| Commits (last 3 mo) | 42 | 49 |
| Stars | 6.3k | 2.1k |
| Latest release | 22 Jul 2026 | none tagged |
| Licence | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Built with | Nodejs, Docker | C++, deb |
| Typical RAM | 1 GB | 1 GB |
The Lounge
Self-hosted web IRC client.
Maintained, but at a slower pace than the leaders in its category.
Commit activity more than 32% of tracked projects; popularity more than 71%. How this is calculated.
Commits, last 11 months
ZNC
Advanced IRC bouncer.
Activity has dropped noticeably. Check the repository before committing to it.
Commit activity more than 37% of tracked projects; popularity more than 50%. How this is calculated.
Commits, last 11 months
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 - irc.