Strapi leads in popularity with 72,749 stars vs 36,933 stars for Directus. The 97% higher star count indicates stronger community adoption. In terms of developer contributions, Strapi has 9,811 forks, indicating strong developer engagement.

Both projects show recent activity, with Directus last updated 5 hours ago and Strapi 4 hours ago.

Both tools share common technology foundations, being built with JavaScript, Typescript. However, they differ in their additional technology choices: Directus uses CSS, SCSS, Vue while Strapi leverages Bash, JSX.

Directus has been in development longer, starting 14 years ago, compared to Strapi which began 11 years ago. This 2.8-year head start suggests Directus may have more mature features and established processes.

Both tools serve similar use cases in Headless CMS. However, they also have distinct specializations: Directus also focuses on Low-Code/No-Code, Backend-as-a-Service (BaaS).

Both Directus and Strapi offer self-hosting capabilities, giving you full control over your data and infrastructure.