# Mayavi vs PyVista

## Key differences

- PyVista has 2.7× as many GitHub stars as Mayavi (3.9K vs 1.4K).
- PyVista had more development activity over the last 12 months: 928 commits vs 45.
- PyVista is downloaded 252× as often on PyPI (466.3K vs 1.8K per week).
- Mayavi is licensed under BSD-3-Clause; PyVista under MIT.
- Mayavi is the older project: its repository was created in 2011, PyVista's in 2017.

| | Mayavi | PyVista |
|---|---|---|
| Description | Interactive scientific data visualization and 3D plotting in Python. | 3D plotting and mesh analysis through a streamlined interface for the Visualization Toolkit (VTK) |
| GitHub stars | 1,412 | 3,870 |
| Commits (12 months) | 45 | 928 |
| Contributors | 62 | 218 |
| License | BSD-3-Clause | MIT |
| Language | Python | Python |
| Status | Active | Active |
| Install | `pip install mayavi` | `pip install pyvista` |

Source: https://awesomedataviz.com/compare/mayavi-vs-pyvista/ · Data updated 2026-11-01 · Content: CC BY 4.0, Awesome Dataviz (https://awesomedataviz.com).
