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Kaskade vs AKHQ: catalog facts
Kaskade	AKHQ
Free Free and open source under the MIT licence.	Free Free and open source.
Command line	Web, Self-hosted
Browse and manage Kafka topics in a terminal UI Decode records as JSON, Avro, or Protobuf	Browse topic data with live tail Consumer group lag monitoring
Requires access to a Kafka cluster	You have to deploy and run the server yourself Only useful if you operate Kafka
Downloadable app	Self-hosted
Open source	Open source
License: MIT	License: Apache-2.0
Not stated if an account is needed	Not stated if an account is needed
Not stated if it works offline	Not stated if it works offline
Official website Full listing and sources Checked October 8, 2026	Official website Full listing and sources Checked October 2, 2026

Catalog facts only. Anything “not stated” is unconfirmed. Check full listings for details.