Plane vs Planka: Which Should You Self-Host?
Quick Verdict
These aren’t competitors — they’re different product categories. Planka is a Trello-style drag-and-drop kanban board for small teams who want simplicity. Plane is a full Jira/Linear replacement with sprints, cycles, modules, and analytics for teams running agile workflows. If your team is under 5 people and you just need a shared task board, use Planka. If you’re running structured development with multiple workstreams, use Plane.
Overview
Plane is an open-source project management platform (AGPL license) that aims to replace Jira and Linear. It launched in 2023 and has grown rapidly — 45,900+ GitHub stars and adoption by 50,000+ teams. It ships as a microservices architecture with 13 containers including a Django backend, Next.js frontend, PostgreSQL, Redis, and background workers.
Planka is a lightweight kanban board inspired by Trello. MIT-licensed, it runs as a simple Node.js application with PostgreSQL. The focus is pure visual task management — boards, lists, and cards — without the complexity of agile frameworks.
Feature Comparison
| Feature | Plane | Planka |
|---|---|---|
| Kanban boards | Yes | Yes |
| Sprints / Cycles | Yes (with velocity tracking) | No |
| Modules | Yes (group issues by feature) | No |
| Gantt charts | Yes | No |
| Time tracking | Built-in | No |
| Custom fields | Yes | No |
| Views | Spreadsheet, calendar, Gantt, board | Board only |
| Issue relations | Parent, child, blocking, related | Checklists only |
| Integrations | GitHub, GitLab, Slack (50+) | None built-in |
| API | Full REST API | Limited API |
| Activity feed | Per-issue and per-project | Per-card |
| Notifications | Email + in-app | In-app only |
| Mobile app | Yes (iOS, Android) | No (responsive web) |
| Labels & filters | Advanced (custom attributes) | Basic labels |
| User roles | Admin, member, guest, viewer | Admin, member |
| Multi-workspace | Yes | Single workspace |
| Real-time collaboration | Yes | Yes |
| File attachments | Yes | Yes |
| Markdown support | Yes (pages + issue descriptions) | Yes (card descriptions) |
| Self-hosted license | AGPL v3 (free) | MIT (free) |
Architecture and Resource Usage
This is where the tools diverge sharply.
Plane runs 13 microservices: API server, web frontend, background workers, beat scheduler, live server (WebSockets), PostgreSQL, Redis, and MinIO for file storage. A production deployment needs 6–10 GB of RAM. Setup takes 30–60 minutes with the official Docker Compose or setup.sh script.
Planka runs 2 services: the Node.js app and PostgreSQL. Total RAM usage is 200–500 MB. Setup takes under 5 minutes.
| Resource | Plane | Planka |
|---|---|---|
| Containers | 13 | 2 |
| RAM (idle) | 4–6 GB | 150–300 MB |
| RAM (production) | 6–10 GB | 300–500 MB |
| CPU | 4+ cores recommended | 1 core sufficient |
| Disk | 10 GB+ (MinIO + PostgreSQL) | 1–5 GB |
| Setup time | 30–60 minutes | Under 5 minutes |
If you’re running a homelab on a mini PC with 8 GB of RAM, Plane will consume most of it. Planka barely registers.
Installation Complexity
Planka: Download the Docker Compose file, set a secret key, run docker compose up -d. The web UI is available immediately with a default admin account.
Plane: Clone the repo, run setup.sh, configure environment variables across multiple services, wait for 13 containers to initialize. The first startup creates database schemas, migrates data, and builds assets. It works, but there’s more surface area for things to go wrong.
When to Choose Plane
- Your team runs agile (sprints, story points, velocity tracking)
- You need project-level analytics and burn-down charts
- You have 5+ developers and multiple workstreams
- You want GitHub/GitLab integration for issue linking
- You need custom fields and advanced filtering
- You’re replacing Jira, Linear, or Asana
- Your server has 8+ GB of RAM to spare
When to Choose Planka
- You want a visual task board and nothing more
- Your team is 1–5 people
- You’re tracking personal projects, household tasks, or small team work
- You want something running in 5 minutes
- Your server has limited resources (Raspberry Pi, small VPS)
- You don’t need sprints, cycles, or analytics
- You’re replacing Trello or a physical sticky-note board
Final Verdict
For teams running agile development: Plane. It’s the closest self-hosted equivalent to Jira or Linear, and it’s free. The resource cost is justified by the feature set — you’re getting a complete project management platform.
For everything else: Planka. Most people asking “should I self-host a task board?” don’t need agile tooling. They need a place to drag cards between columns. Planka does that with 1/20th the resources and zero configuration overhead.
If you’re unsure, start with Planka. You can always migrate to Plane later if your workflow demands it. Going the other direction — from Plane to Planka — means you overbuilt from the start.
For a middle-ground option that offers more features than Planka without Plane’s complexity, check out Vikunja or Kanboard.
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