Pretix vs Indico vs Open Event: Best Self-Hosted Event Management 2026

Why Self-Host Your Event Management Platform?

Whether you are organizing a tech conference, music festival, academic workshop, or community meetup, the platform you use to manage registrations, ticketing, and schedules matters enormously. Relying on proprietary SaaS tools like Eventbrite, Cvent, or Splash comes with real drawbacks:

• High fees: Eventbrite charges 3.7% + $1.79 per paid ticket. For a 500-person conference at $50/ticket, that is over $1,300 in fees
• Data ownership: Your attendee data lives on someone else’s servers, subject to their privacy policies and retention rules
• Vendor lock-in: Migrating years of event history, attendee profiles, and financial records is painful when a platform raises prices or shuts down
• Customization limits: SaaS platforms offer rigid templates — you cannot modify the checkout flow, add custom fields, or integrate with your own payment processor
• Branding: Your event page carries the platform’s branding, not yours

Self-hosting an event management platform gives you full control over ticketing logic, attendee data, payment flows, and branding — with zero per-ticket fees. Here is how the three leading open-source options compare in 2026.

Overview: The Three Platforms

Pretix

Pretix is a ticket shop application built for conferences, festivals, concerts, tech events, shows, exhibitions, workshops, and barcamps. Written in Python and Django, it focuses on powerful ticketing with support for complex pricing, voucher codes, seating plans, and multi-event organizations. As of April 2026, it has 2,374 GitHub stars and was last updated on Aprildocker026. The official Docker image pretix/standalone has over 1 million pulls.

Best for: Commercial events, festivals, and conferences that need robust ticketing with payment integration.

Indico

Indico is a feature-rich event management system originally built at CERN — the place where the Web was born. It handles conference scheduling, abstract management, peer review, registration, and timetable creation. It has 2,055 GitHub stars and was last updated on April 17, 2026. Indico is the gold standard for academic and scientific conferences.

Best for: Academic conferences, scientific workshops, and institutions that need abstract submission and peer review workflows.

Open Event (Eventyay)

Open Event, developed by FOSSASIA, is an event management platform with a strong focus on the open-source community. It provides event creation, ticketing, scheduling, and a public event website. It has 3,005 GitHub stars (the most of the three) and was last updated on April 2, 2026. The FOSSASIA team has used it to run large-scale open-source summits.

Best for: Open-source community events, tech summits, and organizations that want a full event website with speaker management.

Feature Comparison

Deployment: Docker Compose Guides

Pretix — Docker Compose

Pretix ships with an official standalone Docker image (pretix/standalone, 1redislls) that bundles the web server, worker, and Redis in a single container. Here is a production-ready compose setup:

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version: '3.8'

services:
  pretix:
    image: pretix/standalone:latest
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - "8080:80"
    environment:
      PRETIX_SECRET_KEY: "change-this-to-a-random-50-char-string"
      PRETIX_SITE_URL: "https://tickets.example.com"
      PRETIX_DB_TYPE: postgresql
      PRETIX_DB_NAME: pretix
      PRETIX_DB_USER: pretix
      PRETIX_DB_PASSWORD: "secure-db-password"
      PRETIX_DB_HOST: postgres
      PRETIX_REDIS_URL: redis://redis:6379/0
      PRETIX_EMAIL_BACKEND: smtp
      PRETIX_EMAIL_HOST: smtp.example.com
      PRETIX_EMAIL_PORT: 587
      PRETIX_EMAIL_USER: noreply@example.com
      PRETIX_EMAIL_PASSWORD: "email-password"
      PRETIX_EMAIL_FROM: noreply@example.com
    volumes:
      - pretix-data:/data
    depends_on:
      - postgres
      - redis

  postgres:
    image: postgres:16-alpine
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: pretix
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: "secure-db-password"
      POSTGRES_DB: pretix
    volumes:
      - postgres-data:/var/lib/postgresql/data

  redis:
    image: redis:7-alpine
    restart: unless-stopped

volumes:
  pretix-data:
  postgres-data:

Start it with docker compose up -d, then navigate to http://localhost:8080/control/ to create your admin account and first event.

Indico — Docker Compose

Indico provides an official Docker setup. Here is a production compose configuration based on their official deployment documentation:

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version: '3.8'

services:
  indico:
    image: indico/indico:latest
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - "8080:8000"
    environment:
      INDICO_SECRET_KEY: "change-this-to-a-random-50-char-string"
      INDICO_BASE_URL: "https://events.example.com"
      INDICO_DB_URI: "postgresql://indico:secure-db-password@postgres:5432/indico"
      INDICO_REDIS_URL: "redis://redis:6379/0"
      INDICO_SMTP_SERVER: "smtp.example.com"
      INDICO_SMTP_PORT: 587
      INDICO_SMTP_LOGIN: "noreply@example.com"
      INDICO_SMTP_PASSWORD: "email-password"
      INDICO_SMTP_USE_TLS: "yes"
      INDICO_NO_REPLY_EMAIL: "noreply@example.com"
    volumes:
      - indico-config:/opt/indico/etc
      - indico-archive:/opt/indico/archive
    depends_on:
      - postgres
      - redis

  postgres:
    image: postgres:16-alpine
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: indico
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: "secure-db-password"
      POSTGRES_DB: indico
    volumes:
      - postgres-data:/var/lib/postgresql/data

  redis:
    image: redis:7-alpine
    restart: unless-stopped

volumes:
  indico-config:
  indico-archive:
  postgres-data:

After starting with docker compose up -d, run docker compose exec indico indico setup wizard to complete the initial configuration.

Open Event — Docker Compose

Open Event ships with a docker-compose.yml file in the repository root:

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version: '3.5'

services:
  postgres:
    image: postgis/postgis:12-3.0-alpine
    restart: unless-stopped
    volumes:
      - pg-data:/var/lib/postgresql/data
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: open_event_user
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: opev_pass
      POSTGRES_DB: open_event

  redis:
    image: redis:7-alpine
    restart: unless-stopped

  web:
    image: eventyay/open-event-server:latest
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - "8080:8080"
    environment:
      POSTGRES_HOST: postgres
      DATABASE_URL: "postgresql://open_event_user:opev_pass@postgres:5432/open_event"
      REDIS_URL: "redis://redis:6379/0"
      SECRET_KEY: "change-this-to-a-random-string"
      ADMIN_EMAIL: "admin@example.com"
      ADMIN_PASSWORD: "secure-admin-password"
    depends_on:
      - postgres
      - redis

  celery:
    image: eventyay/open-event-server:latest
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      POSTGRES_HOST: postgres
      DATABASE_URL: "postgresql://open_event_user:opev_pass@postgres:5432/open_event"
      REDIS_URL: "redis://redis:6379/0"
      SECRET_KEY: "change-this-to-a-random-string"
      C_FORCE_ROOT: "true"
    command: celery
    depends_on:
      - web

volumes:
  pg-data:

When to Choose Each Platform

Choose Pretix If

• You are selling tickets to concerts, festivals, or commercial conferences
• You need advanced pricing: early-bird tiers, group discounts, seating plans, or voucher campaigns
• You want a polished checkout experience with multiple payment gateway options
• You need a dedicated check-in app for door staff (Pretix has Android + web check-in)
• You are running a ticketing business or event agency managing multiple event organizers

Pretix is the most battle-tested option for revenue-generating events. Its plugin marketplace extends functionality with add-ons for invoicing, badge printing, and hotel booking integration.

Choose Indico If

• You are organizing an academic or scientific conference
• You need a call-for-papers workflow with abstract submission and peer review
• You need to build complex multi-track timetables with room assignments
• You want built-in badge generation, certificate templates, and minutes recording
• Your institution values the CERN heritage — Indico powers CERN’s own conference system and is used by hundreds of research organizations worldwide

Indico is unmatched for academic events. Its abstract review workflow (with scoring, commenting, and acceptance/rejection cycles) is something neither Pretix nor Open Event offers.

Choose Open Event If

• You are part of the open-source community and want a platform aligned with those values
• You need a full public event website with speaker profiles, session pages, and sponsor listings
• You want built-in scheduling with a visual timetable editor
• You need mobile check-in and badge scanning at the door
• You value the FOSSASIA ecosystem — the platform is designed around running large-scale open-source summits

Open Event provides the most complete “event website” experience out of the box, with a public-facing site that looks professional without any custom development.

Migration and Data Portability

All three platforms support data export, but the formats differ:

• Pretix: Exports orders, attendees, and financial reports as CSV and JSON. The API provides programmatic access to all event data.
• Indico: Exports events and abstracts as JSON and XML. The REST API and GraphQL API enable deep integration with external systems.
• Open Event: Uses Open Event format (JSON API spec) for event data export. The platform supports importing and exporting between Open Event-compatible systems.

For organizations migrating from Eventbrite or Cvent, Pretix offers the easiest path thanks to its CSV import wizard for attendee lists. Indico provides import tools specifically designed for migrating from other academic conference systems.

For related reading, see our scheduling and booking platforms guide for appointment scheduling tools, Rallly vs Framadate vs Dudle for collaborative event planning polls, and the self-hosted calendar and contacts guide for managing event calendars with CalDAV.

FAQ

Can I use Pretix for free for non-profit events?

Yes. Pretix is open-source under the Apache 2.0 license and free to self-host for any purpose, including commercial use. You only pay for your own server costs. There is no per-ticket fee, unlike Eventbrite which charges 3.7% + $1.79 per ticket.

Does Indico support virtual or hybrid conferences?

Indico has built-in support for virtual rooms and hybrid events. You can assign video conference links (Zoom, Jitsi, BBB) to individual sessions in the timetable, allowing attendees to join remotely. The platform also supports live streaming integration for keynote sessions.

Which platform has the best payment gateway support?

Pretix leads with the widest payment gateway support, including Stripe, PayPal, direct bank transfer, and numerous regional payment providers through its plugin system. Indico supports Stripe, PayPal, and bank transfer natively. Open Event supports Stripe, PayPal, and OMPS.

Is there a mobile app for managing events?

Pretix offers a dedicated Android check-in app for scanning tickets at the door, plus a web-based check-in interface. Open Event provides mobile check-in functionality through its responsive web interface. Indico relies on its web interface, which is mobile-responsive but does not have a native app.

Can I customize the ticket design and branding?

Pretix offers the most customization, allowing you to modify ticket PDF templates, email templates, and the entire checkout flow through its plugin API. Indico lets you customize the event website theme and email templates. Open Event provides theme customization for the public event website.

How do these platforms handle GDPR compliance?

All three platforms are designed with European privacy laws in mind. Pretix includes built-in GDPR features like data export and deletion requests. Indico provides granular privacy controls for attendee data. Open Event supports data export and consent management. Since you self-host all three, you control exactly where attendee data is stored and how long it is retained.