Astro Starlight vs Readme: Features, Pricing and User Reviews 2026
Compare features, pricing, reviews, and more to make an informed decision
Astro Starlight
Astro Starlight is a free, open-source documentation theme that helps you build beautiful, fast, and accessible documentation websites.
Readme
Readme is a developer documentation platform that helps teams create interactive API documentation and build better developer experiences with ease.
Astro Starlight
Astro Starlight is a free, open-source documentation theme that helps you build beautiful, fast, and accessible documentation websites.
Readme
Readme is a developer documentation platform that helps teams create interactive API documentation and build better developer experiences with ease.
Astro Starlight
Fast static site generation with minimal JavaScript
Built-in search with Pagefind
Full internationalization support
Automatic navigation generation
Dark and light themes included
Markdown, MDX, and Markdoc support
Multiple framework integration (React, Vue, Svelte)
Accessibility-focused design
Mobile responsive layout
Customizable themes and colors
Edit page links
Social media integration
SEO optimized
Readme
Interactive API reference with Try It functionality
OpenAPI and Swagger file sync
Markdown editor for guides and tutorials
Multiple API version management
Custom domains and white-label branding
Real-time analytics and usage tracking
Team collaboration with reviews and branching
Changelog and discussion forums
SSO and advanced security
AI-powered documentation tools
Mobile responsive design
Astro Starlight
Astro Starlight is completely free and open source. There are no pricing tiers, subscriptions, or hidden costs. You can use Starlight for personal projects, commercial websites, or large enterprise documentation without paying anything.
The project is released under the MIT license, which means you have full freedom to use, modify, and distribute it. You can customize every aspect of Starlight to match your needs. Hosting costs depend on where you choose to deploy your documentation. Many hosting services like Netlify, Vercel, and GitHub Pages offer free tiers that work perfectly with Starlight sites.
Since Starlight is open source, you also benefit from community contributions and regular updates from the Astro team. Support is available through the active Astro Discord community and GitHub discussions.
Readme
Readme offers flexible pricing to match different team sizes and needs. The platform provides four main plans plus an optional AI booster.
The Free plan costs nothing and includes unlimited API versions, interactive API reference, markdown editor, and basic AI features like AI Dropdown and LLMs.txt support.
The Startup plan at $99 per month adds important features like custom domains, changelogs, discussion forums, MDX components, and the Agent Owlbert AI assistant with AI Doc Linting.
The Business plan at $399 per month removes Readme branding and adds advanced features including CSS/HTML customization, reusable content, metrics export, and branching for team workflows.
The Enterprise plan offers custom pricing with everything in Business plus dedicated design help, shared component libraries, custom JavaScript, audit logs, SSO, and full Docs Audit capabilities with Ask AI API access.