Hexo vs MkDocs

Overview

Hexo

Stacks358

Followers386

Votes70

GitHub Stars41.0K

Forks5.0K

MkDocs

Stacks167

Followers152

Votes14

Hexo vs MkDocs: What are the differences?

Key Differences between Hexo and MkDocs

Static Site Generator: Hexo is a static site generator written in Node.js, whereas MkDocs is a static site generator built with Python. While both tools serve the purpose of generating static websites, the underlying programming language can be a deciding factor based on the developer's familiarity and preferences.
Documentation Generation: MkDocs is primarily designed for creating project documentation with a focus on simplicity and ease of use. On the other hand, Hexo is more versatile and can be used for creating a wide range of websites beyond just documentation. Depending on the specific requirements of the project, the choice between MkDocs and Hexo can be influenced by the focus on documentation versus general website generation.
Theming and Customization: Hexo provides a wide array of themes and plugins for customizing the appearance and functionality of the generated website. In contrast, MkDocs offers a simpler theming system with limited customization options compared to Hexo. If extensive theming and customization are essential for the project, developers may lean towards Hexo for its flexibility.
Community and Ecosystem: Hexo has a larger and more active community compared to MkDocs, resulting in a broader range of plugins, themes, and community support. This can be advantageous when seeking help, troubleshooting issues, or finding resources to enhance the functionality of the static site generator. Developers who prioritize community support and a rich ecosystem may opt for Hexo over MkDocs.
Development Speed and Performance: MkDocs is known for its rapid setup and straightforward workflow, making it a suitable choice for quick documentation projects. Hexo, with its Node.js foundation, offers efficient performance and speed during the development and generation process. Depending on the project's emphasis on development speed or runtime performance, developers can choose between MkDocs and Hexo accordingly.
Markdown Support: Both Hexo and MkDocs rely on Markdown for content creation, but they may have differences in Markdown extensions and rendering capabilities. Developers should consider the Markdown features required for their project, such as support for tables, syntax highlighting, or mathematical expressions, to determine which static site generator aligns better with their needs.

In Summary, the key differences between Hexo and MkDocs lie in their programming language, focus on documentation, theming flexibility, community support, development speed, and Markdown support.

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CLI (Node.js)

Manual

Detailed Comparison

Hexo	MkDocs
Hexo is a fast, simple and powerful blog framework. It parses your posts with Markdown or other render engine and generates static files with the beautiful theme. All of these just take seconds.	It builds completely static HTML sites that you can host on GitHub pages, Amazon S3, or anywhere else you choose. There's a stack of good looking themes available. The built-in dev-server allows you to preview your documentation as you're writing it. It will even auto-reload and refresh your browser whenever you save your changes.
Blazing Fast - Node.js brings you incredible generating speed. Hundreds of files take only seconds to build.;Markdown Support - All features of GitHub Flavored Markdown are supported. You can even use most Octopress plugins in Hexo.;One-Command Deployment - You only need one command to deploy your site to GitHub Pages, Heroku or other sites.;Various Plugins - Hexo has a powerful plugin system. You can install more plugins for Jade, CoffeeScript plugins.	-
Statistics
GitHub Stars 41.0K	GitHub Stars -
GitHub Forks 5.0K	GitHub Forks -
Stacks 358	Stacks 167
Followers 386	Followers 152
Votes 70	Votes 14
Pros & Cons
Pros 18 Ease of deployment 13 Uses NodeJS and npm 12 Easy GitHub Pages publishing 10 Powerful templating 7 Useful tools and plugins	Pros 5 Speed 4 Gitlab integration 3 Extensibility 2 Themes Cons 1 Build time increases exponentially as site grows
Integrations
TypeScript Netlify CoffeeScript Heroku Node.js GitHub Pages Azure Search	No integrations available

What are some alternatives to Hexo, MkDocs?

Jekyll

Think of Jekyll as a file-based CMS, without all the complexity. Jekyll takes your content, renders Markdown and Liquid templates, and spits out a complete, static website ready to be served by Apache, Nginx or another web server. Jekyll is the engine behind GitHub Pages, which you can use to host sites right from your GitHub repositories.

Hugo

Hugo is a static site generator written in Go. It is optimized for speed, easy use and configurability. Hugo takes a directory with content and templates and renders them into a full html website. Hugo makes use of markdown files with front matter for meta data.

Gatsby

Gatsby lets you build blazing fast sites with your data, whatever the source. Liberate your sites from legacy CMSs and fly into the future.

Middleman

Middleman is a command-line tool for creating static websites using all the shortcuts and tools of the modern web development environment.

Gridsome

Build websites using latest web tech tools that developers love - Vue.js, GraphQL and Webpack. Get hot-reloading and all the power of Node.js. Gridsome makes building websites fun again.

Sphinx

It lets you either batch index and search data stored in an SQL database, NoSQL storage, or just files quickly and easily — or index and search data on the fly, working with it pretty much as with a database server.

Pelican

Pelican is a static site generator that supports Markdown and reST syntax. Write your weblog entries directly with your editor of choice (vim!) in reStructuredText or Markdown.

DocPad

Empower your website frontends with layouts, meta-data, pre-processors (markdown, jade, coffeescript, etc.), partials, skeletons, file watching, querying, and an amazing plugin system. DocPad will streamline your web development process allowing you to craft full-featured websites quicker than ever before.

Metalsmith

In Metalsmith, all of the logic is handled by plugins. You simply chain them together. Since everything is a plugin, the core library is actually just an abstraction for manipulating a directory of files.

11ty

A simpler static site generator. An alternative to Jekyll. Written in JavaScript. Transforms a directory of templates (of varying types) into HTML. Works with HTML, Markdown, Liquid, Nunjucks, Handlebars, Mustache, EJS, Haml, Pug, and JavaScript Template Literals.

Related Comparisons

Hexo vs MkDocs: What are the differences?

Key Differences between Hexo and MkDocs

Static Site Generator: Hexo is a static site generator written in Node.js, whereas MkDocs is a static site generator built with Python. While both tools serve the purpose of generating static websites, the underlying programming language can be a deciding factor based on the developer's familiarity and preferences.
Documentation Generation: MkDocs is primarily designed for creating project documentation with a focus on simplicity and ease of use. On the other hand, Hexo is more versatile and can be used for creating a wide range of websites beyond just documentation. Depending on the specific requirements of the project, the choice between MkDocs and Hexo can be influenced by the focus on documentation versus general website generation.
Theming and Customization: Hexo provides a wide array of themes and plugins for customizing the appearance and functionality of the generated website. In contrast, MkDocs offers a simpler theming system with limited customization options compared to Hexo. If extensive theming and customization are essential for the project, developers may lean towards Hexo for its flexibility.
Community and Ecosystem: Hexo has a larger and more active community compared to MkDocs, resulting in a broader range of plugins, themes, and community support. This can be advantageous when seeking help, troubleshooting issues, or finding resources to enhance the functionality of the static site generator. Developers who prioritize community support and a rich ecosystem may opt for Hexo over MkDocs.
Development Speed and Performance: MkDocs is known for its rapid setup and straightforward workflow, making it a suitable choice for quick documentation projects. Hexo, with its Node.js foundation, offers efficient performance and speed during the development and generation process. Depending on the project's emphasis on development speed or runtime performance, developers can choose between MkDocs and Hexo accordingly.
Markdown Support: Both Hexo and MkDocs rely on Markdown for content creation, but they may have differences in Markdown extensions and rendering capabilities. Developers should consider the Markdown features required for their project, such as support for tables, syntax highlighting, or mathematical expressions, to determine which static site generator aligns better with their needs.

In Summary, the key differences between Hexo and MkDocs lie in their programming language, focus on documentation, theming flexibility, community support, development speed, and Markdown support.

Hexo vs MkDocs

Overview