Best self-hosted project management for Privacy-First / Self-Hosters (2026)

OpenProject is a leading open-source project management platform that runs entirely on your own infrastructure. The free Community Edition gives unlimited users and projects work-package tracking, Gantt charts, agile boards (Scrum/Kanban), time and cost tracking, roadmaps, and per-project wikis. It began in 2012 as a fork of ChiliProject (itself a fork of Redmine) and is maintained by OpenProject GmbH in Berlin, which also sells Enterprise on-premises and cloud editions.

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Plane is a modern, fast open-source project management platform positioned as an alternative to Jira, Linear, and ClickUp. Its AGPL-3.0 Community Edition self-hosts on Docker or Kubernetes, offering issue tracking, sprints/cycles, Kanban and Gantt views, project wikis (Pages), dashboards, and an AI workspace; paid Commercial and Airgapped self-hosted editions add enterprise features. Founded in 2022 with teams in San Francisco and Hyderabad, it is the most-starred open-source PM project on GitHub.

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Taiga is a free, open-source project management platform built for cross-functional agile teams working in Scrum or Kanban. Self-hostable on your own server (Docker), it offers backlogs, sprints, story points, customizable Kanban boards, issue tracking, a wiki, and time-tracking integrations, with a deliberately clean, usability-first interface. It is developed by Kaleidos Ventures SL in Madrid, Spain, and the backend is built on Django/Python.

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AppFlowy is a privacy-first, open-source workspace that brings projects, wikis, and team collaboration together, widely regarded as the leading open-source alternative to Notion. It offers documents, databases with grid/board/calendar views, project tracking, and AI features, and can be self-hosted (AppFlowy Cloud) so teams keep full control of their data. Built largely in Rust and Dart (Flutter) for cross-platform native apps, it is AGPL-3.0 licensed and was founded in 2021.

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Huly is an open-source, all-in-one project management platform positioned as an alternative to Linear, Jira, Slack, Notion, and Motion. It combines issue/project tracking, virtual office with built-in chat and video, collaborative docs, a team planner with time-blocking, two-way GitHub sync, and modules spanning HR/ATS and CRM. Licensed under EPL-2.0 with a Docker-first self-host repo (huly-selfhost), it is built by Hardcore Engineering Inc. and is one of the fastest-growing open-source PM platforms.

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Leantime is an open-source, goals-focused project management system designed for non-project managers and built with ADHD, autism, and dyslexia in mind. It combines strategy, planning, and execution with task management, Kanban and Gantt views, time tracking, docs, goals, blueprints, retrospectives, and a personalized My Work dashboard. The core is AGPL-3.0 and self-hostable via Docker or direct install; paid Cloud and Enterprise tiers add advanced features and support.

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Redmine is a long-running, free and open-source web-based project management and issue-tracking tool written in Ruby on Rails. Released in 2006 by Jean-Philippe Lang, it offers flexible issue tracking with custom workflows, Gantt charts, a calendar, time tracking, per-project wikis and forums, document management, and multi-project support, all extensible through a large plugin ecosystem (including agile boards). It is GPL-2.0 licensed and self-hosted on your own server, with version 7.0 (June 2026) adding webhooks and a modernized UI.

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Kanboard is a free and open-source Kanban project management tool focused on simplicity and minimalism. Created by Frédéric Guillot and first released in 2014, it offers a clean drag-and-drop board with configurable columns, work-in-progress (WIP) limits, swimlanes, task filtering via a simple query language, subtasks, automatic actions, and a plugin system. It is MIT-licensed and self-hosts on a basic PHP server using SQLite, MySQL, or PostgreSQL.

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Tuleap is an open-source Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) and project management platform that unifies agile planning, issue/tracker management, document management, Git/SVN code hosting, code review, CI/CD, and test management in one self-hosted system. The Community Edition is free under GPL-2.0; an Enterprise edition adds support and premium features. Originally built by Enalean in Saint-Alban-Leysse, France, Tuleap was acquired by Dassault Systèmes in April 2026.

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Vikunja is a fast, self-hostable open-source to-do and project manager positioned as an alternative to Todoist, ClickUp, and Notion-style task tools. Written in Go, it offers list, Kanban, Gantt, and table views, subtasks, reminders, attachments, filters, and team sharing, with core features (including reminders and attachments) not paywalled. The core is AGPL-3.0 and free to self-host; Vikunja Cloud and a Pro tier add hosted convenience and admin features.

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MantisBT (Mantis Bug Tracker) is one of the longest-running open-source, self-hosted issue and bug trackers, in development since 2000. Written in PHP with MySQL/PostgreSQL backends, it offers customizable issue workflows, per-project role-based access control, email notifications, and an event-driven plugin system, and remains actively maintained with regular security releases (2.28.4 shipped July 2026).

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Wekan is a completely free and open-source collaborative Kanban board, MIT-licensed and built with Meteor. Maintained by Lauri Ojansivu since 2016, it offers boards, lists, cards, swimlanes, drag-and-drop, due dates, task assignments, custom fields, granular permissions, and real-time collaboration with no artificial limits. It self-hosts on your own server or via Docker/Snap and is favored by privacy-focused teams that want a Trello alternative they fully control.

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Kan (kan.bn) is a modern open-source Trello alternative for kanban boards, built with Next.js and tRPC and licensed under AGPL-3.0. It self-hosts via Docker Compose with a bundled PostgreSQL database and automatic migrations, and offers boards and workspaces, labels and filtering, card comments and activity history, reusable board templates, one-click Trello import, and an MCP server so AI assistants can operate your boards.

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Planka is a Kanban-style project management tool built with React and Node.js as an open alternative to Trello, backed by PostgreSQL and shipped as a single Docker image. It offers unlimited boards and cards, real-time synchronization, markdown card descriptions, file attachments, OIDC single sign-on, and 35+ languages. Its source is publicly available under a custom PLANKA "Fair Use License" (not OSI-approved): a free Community tier covers internal organizational use, while some features require a paid Pro license.

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Phorge is a community-maintained open-source software development and project management platform, forked from Phabricator after its original maintainer discontinued it in 2021. Phorge picks up Phabricator's tooling: Maniphest (tasks/bug tracking and project management), Differential (code review), Diffusion (repository hosting), Phriction (wiki), and workboards (Kanban). It is Apache-2.0 licensed, self-hosted on a PHP stack, and actively developed by a non-profit community in 2026.

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ProjeQtOr (Quality-based Project Organizer) is a free, open-source project management suite from France, in development since 2009, that covers an unusually broad span for a no-cost tool: capacity planning with baselines, ticketing for incidents and requests, risk and action monitoring, budgets and expenses, team workload tracking, and combined traditional + agile methods. Written in PHP under AGPL, it self-hosts on a standard LAMP stack and remains very actively released (V13.0 announced in 2026).

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ProjectLibre is the leading open-source desktop alternative to Microsoft Project, running locally on Windows, macOS, and Linux. It covers Gantt charts, network diagrams, WBS/RBS charts, resource allocation, task dependencies, critical-path tracking, and earned-value costing, and can read and write Microsoft Project (.mpp) files. Founded by Marc O'Brien and Laurent Chretienneau, it is released under the Common Public Attribution License (CPAL) and has been downloaded millions of times worldwide.

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GanttProject is a free, open-source desktop project-scheduling application for Windows, macOS, and Linux, written in Java and licensed under GPL-3.0. Maintained since 2003 by BarD Software, it focuses on Gantt charts, task hierarchies and dependencies, milestones, resource assignments with load charts, PERT charts, and baselines, and can import/export Microsoft Project files plus export to PDF and HTML. It is a lightweight, single-user alternative to Microsoft Project.

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Group-Office is a PHP-based, self-hosted groupware, CRM, and document-management platform developed by the Dutch company Intermesh since 2003. The open-source Group-Office Community edition is licensed under the AGPL and provides email, calendar, contacts, files, and notes; project management and time tracking are delivered through the commercial Group-Office Professional edition, which also runs on your own server. It integrates the Collabora Online office suite for in-browser document editing.

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Tracks is a free, open-source, self-hosted web application built to help you implement David Allen's Getting Things Done (GTD) methodology. Written in Ruby on Rails and licensed under the GNU GPL, it organizes work into projects and contexts, supports next actions, deferred/tickler items, notes, and recurring todos, and ships with a built-in web server for easy self-hosting. It is maintained by a team of community contributors.

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