google/diff-match-patch

Health v2 · maintenance only

Flags: no_releases archived

Adoption not part of the score

8140 stars · 1171 forks observed · 2026-08-28

What it is AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, 2026-08-29, confidence not recorded

A multi-language library (C++, C#, Dart, Java, JavaScript, Lua, Objective-C, Python) implementing robust algorithms for diffing, fuzzy matching, and patching plain text. Originally built to power Google Docs, it uses Myers' diff algorithm and Bitap matching.

Use cases

• compare two text blocks and get a list of differences
• apply patches to text that may have changed
• find fuzzy matches of a search string in text
• build collaborative editing or sync features
• implement version tracking for plain text content
• highlight word or line-level changes in an editor

When to choose

• you need battle-tested diff/match/patch algorithms across multiple languages
• you need best-effort patching of text that doesn't exactly match
• you want the same API in different language ports

When to avoid

• you need structured (XML/JSON) diffs rather than plain text
• you need git-compatible unidiff tooling as a primary feature
• you need binary file diffing

Facets

library · maturity stable

parser search-engine serialization developer-tools text-editors cross-platform python cpp jvm cross-platform lua diff patch fuzzy-matching text-processing myers-algorithm bitap multi-language algorithms javascript

Member repositories

For agents

markdown · JSON · MCP: product_card(name="google/diff-match-patch")