Grist-core vs Mathesar
Grist-core and Mathesar are both no-code database software. Grist-core is open source under Apache-2.0, with 12k GitHub stars. Mathesar is open source under GPL-3.0, with 5.2k GitHub stars.
Which to pick
- Pick Grist-core when
- Your team has outgrown spreadsheets and wants Airtable-style structure that can be self-hosted.
- Pick Mathesar when
- Non-technical colleagues need to work with data in an existing Postgres database and you want them to use the real tables, not a copy.
Side by side
A spreadsheet-database hybrid with typed columns, linked tables, Python formulas, custom widgets and access rules.
A spreadsheet-like web interface for viewing, editing and querying data directly in PostgreSQL, using Postgres roles for access control.
Some features such as certain integrations live in Grist's paid hosted service, and very large datasets slow it down.
Still pre-1.0, and it only works with PostgreSQL.
Production-ready
Usable
Self-hosted server and cloud service (both)
TypeScript, Python, Node.js and SQLite
Python, Django, Svelte, TypeScript and PostgreSQL
Open source, Apache-2.0 (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.
12k GitHub stars
5.2k GitHub stars
Established: started 6 years ago, latest release v1.7.22.
Established: started 5 years ago, latest release 0.12.0.
Other comparisons
More no-code databases and spreadsheet-database apps
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.