htmx VS Alpine.js

Compare htmx vs Alpine.js and see what are their differences.

htmx

</> htmx - high power tools for HTML (by bigskysoftware)

Alpine.js

A rugged, minimal framework for composing JavaScript behavior in your markup. (by alpinejs)
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htmx Alpine.js
562 242
31,071 26,445
8.6% 1.4%
9.5 9.2
5 days ago 7 days ago
JavaScript HTML
GNU General Public License v3.0 or later MIT License
The number of mentions indicates the total number of mentions that we've tracked plus the number of user suggested alternatives.
Stars - the number of stars that a project has on GitHub. Growth - month over month growth in stars.
Activity is a relative number indicating how actively a project is being developed. Recent commits have higher weight than older ones.
For example, an activity of 9.0 indicates that a project is amongst the top 10% of the most actively developed projects that we are tracking.

htmx

Posts with mentions or reviews of htmx. We have used some of these posts to build our list of alternatives and similar projects. The last one was on 2024-03-09.
  • Show HN: ZakuChess, an open source web game built with Django, Htmx and Tailwind
    3 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 9 Mar 2024
    Apart from the source code itself, the repo's README also gives a bit more details about the various packages I used.

    1. htmx: https://htmx.org/

  • 🤓 My top 3 Go packages that I wish I'd known about earlier
    6 projects | dev.to | 1 Mar 2024
    ✨ In recent months, I have been developing web projects using GOTTHA stack: Go + Templ + Tailwind CSS + htmx + Alpine.js. As soon as I'm ready to talk about all the subtleties and pitfalls, I'll post it on my social networks.
  • FLaNK Stack 26 February 2024
    50 projects | dev.to | 26 Feb 2024
  • Go + Hypermedia - A Learning Journey (Part 1)
    6 projects | dev.to | 23 Feb 2024
    I've been digging into HTMX lately (using Python web frameworks) and find the concepts and approach to be interesting and promising. The idea of hypermedia driven systems over the current practice of JavaScript based frameworks (I never really got into React, played with Vue, and enjoy Svelte/SvelteKit) and the ability to chose your language/framework for the backend while primarily leveraging HTML/CSS on the frontend just seems refreshing.
  • Htmx become 0 clause BSD-licensed
    3 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 17 Feb 2024
    Apparently it changed from 2-clause BSD: https://github.com/bigskysoftware/htmx/commit/e16f1865a494b6...

    (The zero clause license drops the requirements for preserving the copyright notice when distributing)

    3 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 17 Feb 2024
  • Web frameworks we are most excited for in 2024
    5 projects | dev.to | 13 Feb 2024
    It would be a sin not to start with something that prides itself on being the front-end library of peace. HTMX skyrocketed in popularity in 2023, gaining most of its GitHub stars during the past year. HTMX is not your average JS framework. If you work in HTMX, you will spend most of your time in the world of hypermedia, looking at web development from a completely different pair of eyes as compared to our usual JS-heavy outlook on modern web development. HTMX leverages the power of the concept of HATEOAS (Hypermedia as the Engine of Application State), enabling developers to access browser features directly from HTML, instead of using Javascript.
  • The Front-End Development we’re used to is dying
    3 projects | dev.to | 9 Feb 2024
    htmx - high power tools for html
  • Use PostgREST and HTMX to Build RESTful APIs from PostgreSQL Databases
    4 projects | dev.to | 5 Feb 2024
    PostgREST is a standalone web server that turns your PostgreSQL database into a RESTful API using the database's structural constraints and permissions to define the API's endpoints and operations. In this tutorial, you will create a simple note-taking app by leveraging PostgREST to construct a RESTful API for the app and using htmx to deliver HTML content.
  • VueJS turns 10 years old
    5 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 4 Feb 2024
    Vue with Vite (the builder/runner) is a stable, open source option. It is really a lightweight start where you're mostly writing HTML with interpolated data, and Vue is updating values correctly and performantly. Just build your reactive HTML app in one file and break into separate components as you're feeling the spirit. https://vuejs.org/guide/quick-start

    Mithril if you just want to drop in want a tiny, complete reactive library that doesn't require a build step--this one is most like what you might end up creating in a large jQuery app. You can understand everything from the homepage. https://mithril.js.org/

    HTMX if you really like HTML conventions. This doesn't feel jQuery-like and depends on your approach to your server app. https://htmx.org/

Alpine.js

Posts with mentions or reviews of Alpine.js. We have used some of these posts to build our list of alternatives and similar projects. The last one was on 2024-03-09.
  • Biometric authentication with Passkeys
    3 projects | dev.to | 9 Mar 2024
    Alpine.js for reactive frontend
  • 🤓 My top 3 Go packages that I wish I'd known about earlier
    6 projects | dev.to | 1 Mar 2024
    ✨ In recent months, I have been developing web projects using GOTTHA stack: Go + Templ + Tailwind CSS + htmx + Alpine.js. As soon as I'm ready to talk about all the subtleties and pitfalls, I'll post it on my social networks.
  • Htmx Is Composable?
    3 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 17 Jan 2024
    > But honestly, torn towards htmx but undecided.

    We are in the middle of migrating from our monster react application into server rendered pages (with jinja2). The velocity at which we are able to ship and the reduction of complexity has been great so far.

    Managing client side state for simple things like (is the dropdown open/closed), listening to keyboard events and such can be done with something like alpine-js [1] without all the baggage that something like react brings.

    It appears this is already the trend with JS frameworks too - with server side rendering being the new norm.

    [1] https://alpinejs.dev/

  • Pocketbase: Open-source back end in 1 file
    15 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 6 Jan 2024
  • Coming to grips with JS: a Rubyist's deep dive
    16 projects | dev.to | 29 Dec 2023
    Sure, you can use any number of JS-avoidance libraries. I'm a fan of Turbo, and there's also htmx, Unpoly, Alpine, hyperscript, swup, barba.js, and probably others.
  • Kicking the tires with NestJS and Hotwire: Part II
    2 projects | dev.to | 15 Nov 2023
    If you want more details on the initial setup I encourage you to take a look at the Part I that covers more of the initial implementation. For this portion, I added Prisma as an ORM, a frontend style library called Tachyons, and AlpineJS to handle any client-side interactions. I did this to avoid needing to add a client-side bundler to the build and instead just rely on plain old module imports to compose the frontend. This is now the default for Rails and it is quite nice to not need any additional build tools for the client.
  • Deveplop a simple GUI app by Wails use Golang
    6 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 6 Nov 2023
    - [swallow-pywebview](https://github.com/rangwea/swallow-pywebview): Base on [pywebview](https://pywebview.flowrl.com/) using Python,the frontend base on [alpinejs](https://alpinejs.dev/) and [tailwindcss](https://tailwindcss.com/)。
  • A First Look at HTMX and How it Compares to React
    6 projects | dev.to | 18 Sep 2023
    The approach is not new, essentially a variation of Knockout, Alpine, and similar "JS-in-HTML" approaches.
  • Javascript in Razor Pages, good Libraries?
    2 projects | /r/dotnet | 10 Jul 2023
    alpinejs + htmx
  • What's the easiest front end framework to pick for a simple website?
    2 projects | /r/webdev | 23 Jun 2023
    You're way out of the "simple website" territory already, If your backend is working and you know your way around it just make it render some HTML and send it to the browser. Then if you really want a javascript framework for interactive elements maybe alpineJS ?

What are some alternatives?

When comparing htmx and Alpine.js you can also consider the following projects:

Svelte - Cybernetically enhanced web apps

petite-vue - 6kb subset of Vue optimized for progressive enhancement

React - The library for web and native user interfaces.

Stimulus - A modest JavaScript framework for the HTML you already have [Moved to: https://github.com/hotwired/stimulus]

hyperscript - Create HyperText with JavaScript.

Vue.js - This is the repo for Vue 2. For Vue 3, go to https://github.com/vuejs/core

jQuery - jQuery JavaScript Library

knockout - Knockout makes it easier to create rich, responsive UIs with JavaScript

Mithril.js - A JavaScript Framework for Building Brilliant Applications

Angular - Deliver web apps with confidence 🚀

astro - The web framework for content-driven websites. ⭐️ Star to support our work!

Preact - ⚛️ Fast 3kB React alternative with the same modern API. Components & Virtual DOM.