Series / Stop Paying
AlternativesStop Paying
Alternatives you can host yourself to what you pay for every month today: your photos, your passwords, your movies, your PDFs and your cloud. Each one has its own license: some are open source and others only source-available.
Is there an alternative I can host myself instead of paying every month?
That is the question this series answers. Each video comes with a fact sheet: what it is, the key fact, how to start and my verdict. How the fact sheet works.
Before you start.
Who it is for
For anyone who pays for photo, password, movie, PDF or cloud subscriptions and wants to know whether an open alternative exists.
What to check
Self-hosting means backups, updates and the server become yours. Check each license: not all of them are open source, and there can be running costs. See the full checklist.
The 20 repos that have already appeared in this series.
7 of 20 already have their own guide (“Guide” label): license, requirements, installation and warnings. The rest open their project on GitHub. The license label comes from GitHub and each repo’s LICENSE file; each repo’s warning is still in its video (in Spanish).
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Immich
Your photos and videos on your own server.
Guide
(opens the guide)
License: AGPL-3.0 Official project (opens GitHub in a new tab) Calculator
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Vaultwarden
Password server compatible with Bitwarden.
Guide
(opens the guide)
License: AGPL-3.0 Official project (opens GitHub in a new tab)
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Jellyfin
Your own server for movies, series and music.
Guide
(opens the guide)
License: GPL-2.0 Official project (opens GitHub in a new tab) Calculator
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Nextcloud
Your own cloud: files, calendar and contacts.
Guide
(opens the guide)
License: AGPL-3.0 Official project (opens GitHub in a new tab) Calculator
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Stirling-PDF
Merge, split, sign and edit PDFs on your own server.
Guide
(opens the guide)
License: MIT Official project (opens GitHub in a new tab) Calculator
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Excalidraw
Whiteboard for drawing diagrams with a hand-drawn look.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: MIT
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Penpot
Open design and prototyping, the Figma alternative.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: MPL-2.0
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n8n
Automate tasks by connecting your apps.
Guide
(opens the guide)
License: Sustainable Use License 1.0 Official project (opens GitHub in a new tab)
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AppFlowy
Notes and projects, the Notion alternative.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: AGPL-3.0
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Actual
Personal budgeting that lives in your own data.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: MIT
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Paperless-ngx
Archive of scanned documents, with text search.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: GPL-3.0
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Syncthing
Sync folders between your devices with no cloud in the middle.
Guide
(opens the guide)
License: MPL-2.0 Official project (opens GitHub in a new tab)
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Duplicati
Encrypted backups to the cloud of your choice.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: MIT
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CasaOS
A panel to manage your home server.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: Apache-2.0
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openmediavault
A system to build your own NAS.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: GPL-3.0 Calculator
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Audacity
Audio editor.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: GPL-3.0
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darktable
RAW photo development.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: GPL-3.0
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Kdenlive
Video editor.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: GPL-3.0
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OpenToonz
2D animation.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: BSD-3-Clause
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OpenCut
Video editor in the browser.
GitHub ↗
(opens GitHub in a new tab)
License: MIT