Docmost vs Outline vs AFFiNE: Best Self-Hosted Knowledge Base 2026

When your team outgrows Google Docs and shared drives, you need a proper knowledge base. Self-hosting gives you full control over your data, eliminates vendor lock-in, and keeps sensitive documentation behind your own firewall.

In 2026, three open-source platforms dominate the self-hosted knowledge base space: Docmost, Outline, and AFFiNE. Each takes a different approach to organizing and collaborating on information. This guide compares them head-to-head to help you pick the right tool for your team.

Why Self-Host Your Knowledge Base

Running your own knowledge base platform means your documentation, wikis, and team notes never leave your infrastructure. This matters for several reasons:

• Data sovereignty: Your content stays on your servers. No third-party scanning, indexing, or analytics.
• Offline availability: Self-hosted tools work on your network regardless of external service outages.
• Cost control: No per-seat licensing fees that scale with your team size.
• Customization: Full access to the codebase means you can modify, extend, and integrate as needed.
• Compliance: Easier to meet GDPR, HIPAA, or SOC 2 requirements when you control the data pipeline.

For related reading on documentation tools, see our documentation generators comparison and collaborative editors guide.

Overview of the Three Platforms

Docmost (19,900+ Stars)

Docmost is a relatively new entrant (launched 2023) that has quickly gained traction as a Confluence alternative. Written in TypeScript and licensed under AGPL-3.0, it focuses on being a straightforward, feature-complete wiki with real-time collaboration.

Key strengths include built-in diagram support (Draw.io, Excalidraw, Mermaid), page history, comments, spaces, groups, and granular permissions. It ships as a single Docker deployment with PostgreSQL and Redis dependencies, making it one of the easier platforms to get running.

Outline (38,200+ Stars)

Outline has been around since 2016 and is the most mature of the three. It positions itself as “the fastest knowledge base for growing teams” with a clean, polished interface inspired by Notion. Written in TypeScript with React and styled-components.

Outline’s standout features include real-time collaborative editing, markdown compatibility, a block-based editor, extensive third-party integrations (Slack, GitHub, Google SSO), and a powerful API. It requires an S3-compatible storage backend in addition to PostgreSQL and Redis, which adds some complexity to the deployment.

AFFiNE (67,600+ Stars)

AFFiNE takes a different approach entirely. Rather than being just a wiki, it combines documents, whiteboard canvas, and database tables into a single platform — positioning itself as a Notion and Miro alternative. Launched in 2022, it has become the most-starred project in this comparison.

The self-hosted server is written in TypeScript/Rust and includes PostgreSQL with vector extensions and Redis. AFFiNE’s local-first architecture means it works well offline, syncing changes when connectivity returns. It also supports edge-page mode for a Miro-like canvas experience alongside traditional document editing.

Feature Comparison

Deployment: Docker Compose Guides

Deploying Docmost

Docmost offers the simplest Docker setup of the three. A single docker-compose.yml file brings up the application, PostgreSQL, and Redis:

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services:
  docmost:
    image: docmost/docmost:latest
    depends_on:
      - db
      - redis
    environment:
      APP_URL: 'https://wiki.example.com'
      APP_SECRET: 'REPLACE_WITH_LONG_RANDOM_SECRET'
      DATABASE_URL: 'postgresql://docmost:STRONG_DB_PASSWORD@db:5432/docmost'
      REDIS_URL: 'redis://redis:6379'
    ports:
      - "3000:3000"
    restart: unless-stopped
    volumes:
      - docmost_storage:/app/data/storage

  db:
    image: postgres:18
    environment:
      POSTGRES_DB: docmost
      POSTGRES_USER: docmost
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: STRONG_DB_PASSWORD
    restart: unless-stopped
    volumes:
      - db_data:/var/lib/postgresql/data

  redis:
    image: redis:8
    command: ["redis-server", "--appendonly", "yes", "--maxmemory-policy", "noeviction"]
    restart: unless-stopped
    volumes:
      - redis_data:/data

volumes:
  docmost_storage:
  db_data:
  redis_data:

Save as docker-compose.yml and run:

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docker compose up -d

Docmost will be available at http://localhost:3000. For production, place it behind a reverse proxy with TLS termination.

Deploying Outline

Outline requires more infrastructure. In addition to PostgreSQL and Redis, it needs an S3-compatible storage backend for file attachments. Here’s a complete setup using MinIO for local S3:

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services:
  outline:
    image: outlinewiki/outline:latest
    depends_on:
      - postgres
      - redis
      - minio
    ports:
      - "3000:3000"
    environment:
      NODE_ENV: production
      URL: https://wiki.example.com
      SECRET_KEY: REPLACE_WITH_LONG_SECRET
      UTILS_SECRET: REPLACE_WITH_UTILS_SECRET
      DATABASE_URL: postgresql://user:pass@postgres:5432/outline
      REDIS_URL: redis://redis:6379
      AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID: minioadmin
      AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY: minioadmin
      AWS_REGION: us-east-1
      AWS_S3_BUCKET: outline
      AWS_S3_FORCE_PATH_STYLE: true
      AWS_S3_ENDPOINT: http://minio:9000
      STORAGE_USE_PROXY: true
    restart: unless-stopped

  postgres:
    image: postgres:16
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: user
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: pass
      POSTGRES_DB: outline
    volumes:
      - pg_data:/var/lib/postgresql/data
    restart: unless-stopped

  redis:
    image: redis:7
    command: ["redis-server", "--appendonly", "yes"]
    volumes:
      - redis_data:/data
    restart: unless-stopped

  minio:
    image: minio/minio:latest
    command: server /data --console-address ":9001"
    environment:
      MINIO_ROOT_USER: minioadmin
      MINIO_ROOT_PASSWORD: minioadmin
    volumes:
      - minio_data:/data
    ports:
      - "9000:9000"
      - "9001:9001"
    restart: unless-stopped

volumes:
  pg_data:
  redis_data:
  minio_data:

After starting with docker compose up -d, create the S3 bucket via the MinIO console at http://localhost:9001, then run database migrations:

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docker compose exec outline yarn db:migrate
docker compose exec outline yarn db:seed

Outline also requires an authentication provider (Google, Slack, OIDC, or SAML) to be configured before users can log in.

Deploying AFFiNE

AFFiNE’s self-hosted setup includes a pre-deployment migration job and uses pgvector for its database:

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name: affine
services:
  affine:
    image: ghcr.io/toeverything/affine:stable
    container_name: affine_server
    ports:
      - '3010:3010'
    depends_on:
      redis:
        condition: service_healthy
      postgres:
        condition: service_healthy
      affine_migration:
        condition: service_completed_successfully
    volumes:
      - ./storage:/root/.affine/storage
      - ./config:/root/.affine/config
    env_file:
      - .env
    environment:
      - REDIS_SERVER_HOST=redis
      - DATABASE_URL=postgresql://affine:AFFINE_PASSWORD@postgres:5432/affine
    restart: unless-stopped

  affine_migration:
    image: ghcr.io/toeverything/affine:stable
    container_name: affine_migration
    volumes:
      - ./storage:/root/.affine/storage
      - ./config:/root/.affine/config
    command: ['sh', '-c', 'node ./scripts/self-host-predeploy.js']
    env_file:
      - .env
    environment:
      - REDIS_SERVER_HOST=redis
      - DATABASE_URL=postgresql://affine:AFFINE_PASSWORD@postgres:5432/affine
    depends_on:
      postgres:
        condition: service_healthy
      redis:
        condition: service_healthy

  redis:
    image: redis:7
    container_name: affine_redis
    healthcheck:
      test: ['CMD', 'redis-cli', '--raw', 'incr', 'ping']
      interval: 10s
      timeout: 5s
      retries: 5
    restart: unless-stopped

  postgres:
    image: pgvector/pgvector:pg16
    container_name: affine_postgres
    volumes:
      - ./pgdata:/var/lib/postgresql/data
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: affine
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: AFFINE_PASSWORD
      POSTGRES_DB: affine
    healthcheck:
      test: ['CMD', 'pg_isready', '-U', 'affine', '-d', 'affine']
      interval: 10s
      timeout: 5s
      retries: 5
    restart: unless-stopped

Create a .env file with your secrets:

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DB_USERNAME=affine
DB_PASSWORD=your_strong_password
DB_DATABASE=affine
REDIS_SERVER_HOST=redis

Then start:

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docker compose up -d

AFFiNE will be available at http://localhost:3010. The migration job runs first to set up the database schema before the main application starts.

Which Platform Should You Choose?

Choose Docmost if:

• You want the simplest deployment — single compose file, no external S3 needed
• You need built-in diagram support (Draw.io, Excalidraw, Mermaid) without plugins
• You’re looking for a direct Confluence replacement with familiar wiki semantics
• Your team values quick setup over extensive customization
• You want an actively developed project with a clean AGPL-3.0 license

Choose Outline if:

• You need enterprise authentication (SAML, OIDC, Google, Slack SSO) out of the box
• You want the most polished user interface — Outline’s design is consistently praised
• Your team works heavily with markdown and needs seamless import/export
• You already run S3-compatible storage (MinIO, Cloudflare R2, AWS S3)
• You need a mature, battle-tested platform with 10 years of development history

Choose AFFiNE if:

• You want more than a wiki — documents, whiteboard canvases, and database tables in one tool
• Offline support is critical — AFFiNE’s local-first architecture handles disconnected work
• You need a Notion + Miro replacement in a single self-hosted platform
• Your team does visual planning alongside documentation
• You want desktop and mobile apps that sync with your self-hosted server

Reverse Proxy Setup

All three platforms should sit behind a reverse proxy for TLS termination. Here’s a Caddy example that works for any of them:

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wiki.example.com {
    reverse_proxy localhost:3000

    encode gzip
    header {
        Strict-Transport-Security "max-age=31536000; includeSubDomains"
        X-Content-Type-Options "nosniff"
        X-Frame-Options "DENY"
    }
}

Replace localhost:3000 with the appropriate port (3000 for Docmost/Outline, 3010 for AFFiNE). For production deployments with multiple services, see our complete Caddy reverse proxy guide.

Migration Considerations

Moving from an existing platform? Here’s what to expect:

• From Confluence: Docmost is the closest match in terms of wiki structure and permission model. Outline also supports Confluence import via its API.
• From Notion: Both Outline and AFFiNE support markdown export from Notion, making migration straightforward. AFFiNE’s canvas mode provides the closest visual experience.
• From Google Docs: Outline’s block editor feels most similar to Google Docs’ collaborative editing experience.
• From Wiki.js: See our Wiki.js vs BookStack vs Outline comparison for detailed migration paths between wiki platforms.

FAQ

Is Docmost free to self-host?

Yes. Docmost’s core is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and can be self-hosted without any cost. Enterprise features like advanced SSO and audit logs require a paid license, but the base wiki functionality is fully open-source and free.

Can I use Outline without an S3 provider?

No. Outline requires an S3-compatible storage backend for file attachments and images. You can use AWS S3, MinIO (self-hosted), Cloudflare R2, or any S3-compatible service. This is a hard requirement and cannot be bypassed.

Does AFFiNE work offline?

Yes. AFFiNE uses a local-first architecture where data is stored locally on your device and synced to the self-hosted server when connectivity is available. This makes it unique among the three platforms compared here.

Which platform has the best collaborative editing?

All three support real-time collaborative editing. Outline is generally considered to have the smoothest experience, with conflict-free resolution and a polished block-based editor. Docmost and AFFiNE also support simultaneous editing but with slightly different approaches to conflict handling.

Can I import data from other wiki platforms?

Outline has the most mature import ecosystem, supporting imports from Notion, Confluence, and Markdown files. Docmost supports markdown import. AFFiNE supports markdown and has dedicated import tools for Notion workspaces. For migrating from traditional wikis, Outline is typically the best choice.

Which platform is easiest to deploy?

Docmost is the simplest — a single docker compose up command brings up everything you need. Outline requires configuring an external S3 provider and authentication provider. AFFiNE requires running a migration job before the main service starts but has no external storage dependency.

Do these platforms support mobile access?

All three are accessible via web browser on mobile devices. AFFiNE additionally offers native desktop and mobile applications that sync with your self-hosted server. Docmost and Outline are web-only, though both have responsive designs that work well on phones and tablets.