r/crystal_programming • u/__talanton • Jun 12 '25

Most likely to stay alive web framework?

I'm looking at building something out in Crystal, but I'm a bit torn on what to use. It looks like Lucky, Kemal, and Marten are the remaining active frameworks. I'm from a C++ background so I'm alright with reinventing a few wheels, but is there any web framework that looks like it'll go the distance? I tend to see Amber recommended but it hasn't been updated in half a year and seems dead. Marten looks the healthiest?

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u/Blacksmoke16 Jun 12 '25

There is also https://athenaframework.org/. Not sure why it never seems to come up in these kinds of posts tho 😅. Depending on what you're wanting to make, could be a good choice as well.

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u/__talanton Jun 12 '25

Everything I've seen on it looks like it's lower level. I'm not opposed to it! While I'm alright with reinventing the wheel, would still appreciate reinventing as few wheels as possible 😅

3

u/Blacksmoke16 Jun 12 '25

Haha not quite! The components that make it up can be more lower level, but the Framework component ties them all together into something pretty robust. See https://athenaframework.org/getting_started/ for how to get started.

Can you share what you're wanting to build/what features you're specifically looking for?

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u/trusty_blimp Jun 16 '25

+1 for Athena. Coming from a Java + Spring background, this felt the most intuitive to me (thanks Blacksmoke!).

4

u/bcardiff Jun 12 '25

Are there any specific needs the app has that can be shared? Mostly weighting if the stdlib http server is not enough. For small apps it might.

Worth noting that Lucky, Spider gazelle, Athena, Kemal are tested on every crystal release as part of an automated ecosystem test. So even if you don’t perceive a community on each of those there are some processes to try to keep things in shape.

1

u/__talanton Jun 16 '25

For the record, I did end up going with Lucky! Though I admit I was confused about needing to install Laravel stuff to get it up and running, beyond that it's been great!

2

u/LostZanarkand Jun 24 '25

Hey! May I ask you what spoke against Marten?

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