Ghost vs Halo
Ghost and Halo are both CMS software. Ghost is open source under MIT, with 56k GitHub stars. Halo is open source under GPL-3.0, with 40k GitHub stars.
Which to pick
- Pick Ghost when
- You publish content and want to run paid memberships or newsletters without taking a platform cut.
- Pick Halo when
- You want a WordPress-style site builder with a strong Chinese community and plugin market.
Side by side
A publishing platform for blogs and newsletters with built-in memberships, paid subscriptions through Stripe, email sending and themes.
A Java website builder and CMS for blogs, knowledge bases, company sites and small shops, with themes and plugins.
Self-hosting requires Node.js and MySQL plus Mailgun for newsletters; Ghost(Pro) is the easier route.
Documentation and plugins are mostly Chinese, and some plugins and themes are paid.
Production-ready (both)
Self-hosted server and cloud service
Self-hosted server
JavaScript, TypeScript, Node.js and MySQL
Java, Spring Boot, TypeScript and Vue
Open source, MIT (permissive)
Open source, GPL-3.0 (strong copyleft)
You can build it into a product you sell, as long as you keep its copyright notice.
Use inside your business is unrestricted, but anything you distribute that includes it must be released under the same license.
56k GitHub stars
40k GitHub stars
Established: started 13 years ago, latest release v6.73.0.
Established: started 8 years ago, latest release v2.27.2.
Other comparisons
More content management systems
Both sides were judged on 2026-11-03 from each project's README and GitHub data. License, age and popularity lines are worked out directly.