CKAN
Make open data websites.
Actively maintained with regular releases.
Commit activity more than 77% of tracked projects; popularity more than 67%. How this is calculated.
Commits, last 11 months
| Stars | 5.1k |
|---|---|
| Latest release | ckan-2.12.0 · 26 Aug 2026 |
| Repo updated | 24 Sept 2026 |
| Licence | AGPL-3.0 |
| Built with | Python |
Is CKAN actively maintained?
CKAN is under active development: 857 commits landed over the last 11 months, averaging roughly 90 commits a month in the most recent quarter.
The most recent tagged release, ckan-2.12.0, shipped within the last month — a current, installable version exists today.
Of the 19 projects we track in Archiving and Digital Preservation (DP), CKAN ranks #4 by health score — in the top quarter of its category.
What CKAN actually does
CKAN is a software platform designed to build open data portals and repositories. It helps organisations publish, share, and manage structured datasets for public or internal access.
Best fit: Public sector bodies, research institutions, and large organisations needing to host searchable data catalogues.
Worth knowing: The AGPL-3.0 licence places strict copyleft requirements on your modifications if you host the service for third-party access, and customising templates can involve a steep learning curve.
Deployment notes
As a Python application, it typically requires a WSGI or ASGI server behind a reverse proxy handling TLS, alongside a separate relational database and persistent storage for uploaded files.
Links
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