Self-Hosted Alternatives to Trello
Why Replace Trello?
Trello’s free tier keeps shrinking. In 2023, Atlassian removed unlimited power-ups, limited boards to 10 per workspace, and pushed users toward paid plans starting at $5/user/month. For a team of 10, that’s $600/year for what’s fundamentally a Kanban board.
Beyond cost, Trello stores all your project data — task descriptions, attachments, comments, internal discussions — on Atlassian’s servers. If your team handles client work, proprietary roadmaps, or sensitive projects, that’s a meaningful privacy concern.
Self-hosted alternatives give you unlimited boards, unlimited users, no per-seat fees, and full control over your data. Most take under 10 minutes to deploy.
Best Alternatives
Planka — Best Overall Trello Replacement
Planka is the closest self-hosted equivalent to Trello’s UI and workflow. Drag-and-drop Kanban boards, card labels, due dates, checklists, attachments, and real-time updates. If your team uses Trello for its simplicity, Planka matches that experience.
- Docker: Single container + PostgreSQL (2 containers total)
- RAM: ~200 MB idle
- License: AGPLv3
- Key advantage: Looks and feels like Trello. Minimal learning curve.
Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Planka
Plane — Best Feature-Rich Alternative
Plane goes beyond Trello with cycles (sprints), modules, pages (docs), and a GitHub-like issue tracker. It’s more comparable to Linear or Jira than Trello, but the Kanban board view works well for teams migrating from Trello who want room to grow.
- Docker: 7+ containers (PostgreSQL, Redis, MinIO, workers)
- RAM: ~1 GB idle
- License: AGPLv3
- Key advantage: Rich feature set. Issues, cycles, modules, pages. Grows with your team.
Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Plane
Vikunja — Best Lightweight Option
Vikunja is a task manager and to-do list that includes Kanban boards, list views, Gantt-style timeline views, and CalDAV integration. It runs as a single Go binary with SQLite — one of the lightest options available.
- Docker: Single container (SQLite mode) or 2 containers (with PostgreSQL/MySQL)
- RAM: ~50 MB idle
- License: AGPLv3
- Key advantage: Incredibly lightweight. CalDAV support for syncing with calendar apps.
Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Vikunja
Focalboard — Best for Notion-Like Views
Focalboard (by Mattermost) provides multiple views of the same data: board, table, gallery, and calendar. It’s less a Trello clone and more a Notion-databases alternative. Built into Mattermost or deployable standalone.
- Docker: Single container (standalone personal edition)
- RAM: ~100 MB idle
- License: MIT (personal) / Enterprise source (team features)
- Key advantage: Multiple views. Switch between board, table, gallery, calendar.
Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Focalboard
Taiga — Best for Agile Teams
If your team has outgrown Trello and wants proper Scrum — sprints, backlogs, user stories, burndown charts — Taiga is the answer. It includes Kanban boards too, but its strength is full agile project management.
- Docker: 9 containers (microservices architecture)
- RAM: ~1.5 GB idle
- License: MPL 2.0
- Key advantage: Full Scrum and Kanban. Sprints, backlogs, epics, burndown charts.
Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Taiga
Migration Guide
Trello’s export format is JSON. Most self-hosted alternatives don’t have a direct Trello import, so migration is semi-manual:
- Export from Trello: Go to Board Menu → More → Print and Export → Export to JSON
- What transfers: Board name, list names, card titles, card descriptions, labels, due dates, checklists
- What doesn’t transfer: Attachments, comments, activity history, power-up data, automations
- For Planka/Plane: Recreate boards manually (fastest for <100 cards). For large boards, use the API to script the import
- For Vikunja: Has an experimental Trello importer in its API
For most teams with <50 active cards per board, manual recreation takes 30-60 minutes and gives you a chance to clean up stale cards.
Cost Comparison
| Trello Free | Trello Standard | Self-Hosted | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly cost (10 users) | $0 | $50/month | $0 (your hardware) |
| Annual cost (10 users) | $0 | $600/year | $0 |
| 3-year cost (10 users) | $0 | $1,800 | $0 |
| Boards | 10 per workspace | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Users | Unlimited (limited features) | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Storage | 10 MB/file | 250 MB/file | Unlimited (your disk) |
| Power-ups | 1 per board | Unlimited | N/A |
| Privacy | Atlassian servers | Atlassian servers | Full control |
Trello’s free tier is usable for personal task tracking but inadequate for teams. The moment you need more than 10 boards or unlimited power-ups, you’re paying $5/user/month. Self-hosted tools give you everything for the cost of running a server (as low as $5/month for a VPS).
What You Give Up
- Trello’s Butler automation — No self-hosted equivalent has Trello’s no-code automation builder. n8n or Activepieces can fill this gap with more effort.
- Trello’s mobile apps — Most alternatives have responsive web apps but not native iOS/Android apps (except Vikunja, which has mobile apps).
- Power-up ecosystem — Trello’s marketplace of integrations has no self-hosted equivalent. You’ll rely on APIs and webhooks.
- Managed reliability — Self-hosted means you handle backups, updates, and uptime.
- Shared workspaces across organizations — Trello makes it easy to share boards with external collaborators. Self-hosted requires VPN or public exposure with authentication.
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