The best Composer alternatives
5 tools that do a similar job to Composer, 5 of them open source. Each entry says what it does and who it suits, so you can pick the one that fits instead of the most famous.
You're replacing
ComposerDependency manager for PHP projects: declare, install, and update the libraries your code uses.
- 1
Pipenv
Open source · MIT · ★ 25k
A tool that manages a Python project's virtual environment and dependencies in one place.
Best for: Python application developers who want one command set for environments and dependencies; Teams that want reproducible installs from a lock file with hash checking
- 2
vcpkg
Open source · MIT · ★ 27.6k
A free C/C++ package manager that downloads and builds libraries for your projects.
Best for: C and C++ developers who need third-party libraries in their projects; Teams using Visual Studio, CMake, or MSBuild
- 3
Poetry
Open source · MIT · ★ 34.3k
A tool for managing Python project dependencies and packaging them, using one pyproject.toml file.
Best for: Python developers starting a new project who want one config file for dependencies and packaging; Teams that need the same dependency versions installed on every machine and in CI
- 4
pnpm
Open source · MIT · ★ 37k
A fast Node.js package manager that saves disk space by sharing installed packages.
Best for: Developers working in Node.js projects who want faster installs and less disk use; Teams maintaining monorepos with multiple packages in one repository
- 5
patch-package
Open source · MIT · ★ 11.2k
Lets you fix npm dependencies in place and keep those fixes in version control.
Best for: Teams running a Node.js app who need a quick fix to a dependency before the upstream project publishes one; Developers on npm 5 or later, or yarn v1, who want patches applied on every install
How we pick: tools in the same category that solve the same problem, projects that name each other as alternatives, and open-source projects that describe themselves as an alternative to Composer. We don't take payment for placement.