Self-hosting 2026-07-03

The self-hosting wave: goodbye to half a dozen subscriptions

A handful of mature projects now replace Google Photos, DocuSign, Calendly or Google Analytics, hosted by you.

An undercurrent of 2026 is the return to self-hosting, driven by open-source projects that no longer need to apologize next to their paid equivalents. Immich replaces Google Photos, Documenso replaces DocuSign, Cal replaces Calendly, Plausible and PostHog replace Google Analytics, and Coolify replaces platforms like Vercel or Heroku.

The appeal is not only cost. By hosting the service yourself, the data is yours and the vendor cannot change the rules or the pricing overnight. In exchange you take on the operations: updates, backups and availability. For many small teams that trade pays off, especially with a PaaS like Coolify that cuts deployment friction.

Our stance: self-host with judgement. It makes full sense for internal tools and sensitive data; for critical customer-facing services, measure the real cost of running them. We use several of these projects in our own infrastructure.

Tools mentioned

immich-app/immich Self-hosted photos and video; a Google Photos alternative. documenso/documenso Document signing; a DocuSign alternative. calcom/cal.diy Scheduling; a Calendly alternative. plausible/analytics Cookie-free web analytics; a Google Analytics alternative. coollabsio/coolify Self-hostable PaaS; a Vercel or Heroku alternative.

Sources