Focalboard vs Kanban
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted project management & tasks options
— licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one
replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Compare Focalboard with
choose an app… AppFlowy AFFiNE Memos Mark Text Joplin Plane SiYuan Logseq Outline Trilium Notes TriliumNext Notes Khoj Chatwoot Wiki.js Notable Docmost Super Productivity Wekan Obsidian SimpleX Chat BookStack Etherpad Docs by Suite Numerique OpenProject Notesnook Gollum Habitica Self-Hosted Zettlr Quartz MarkText Workspace Planka Leantime Centrifugo Screego Typebot git-bug Kanboard Berty TiddlyWiki Anytype Mumble Kaneo The Lounge Papercups Taskwarrior Zammad WorkAdventure OpenEMR Maybe Tasks Taskcafe Vikunja Kimai2 Octobox Nullboard Godo Worklenz Donetick Tasks.md Restyaboard Tegon Taskell FossBilling Nextcloud Deck Kanban Lite eLabFTW Tracks Gerrit OrangeHRM GanttProject eigenfocus osem Taiga Firefly III Importer LibreBooking 4ga Boards Todoman Web Vikunja Frontend Mobile Admidio Agorakit Facilmap LibrePlan HamsterBase Tasks DumbBudget WorkAdventure Tasks ShipShipShip TaskLite OpenHabitTracker Fab-manager May croodle rgit Traq myTinyTodo Our Shopping List DumbDo DumbKan SCM Manager FlowInquiry Satdress motion.tools (Antragsgrün) Grr Task Keeper Mergeable Bileto Mobilizon Tasks Galette phpCollab minimal-git-server Rukovoditel PyInventory CiviCRM on Drupal Listaway 92five Active Collab Bénévalibre BitBucket Server Buddy Enterprise Coin Crucible Cultivons Diacamma Dokos Kanban Tool Kantree Liberaforms Paheko PMB Pollaris ProjeQtOr Smederee Solo Tuleap
Compare Kanban with
choose an app… Plane Super Productivity Wekan OpenProject Habitica Self-Hosted Planka Leantime git-bug Kanboard Kaneo Taskwarrior OpenEMR Maybe Tasks Taskcafe Vikunja Kimai2 Octobox Nullboard Godo Worklenz Donetick Tasks.md Restyaboard Tegon Taskell Nextcloud Deck Kanban Lite Taiga
Feature Focalboard Kanban Category Project Management & Tasks Project Management & Tasks License MIT MIT Language TypeScript Vue Setup difficulty Easy Easy Min. RAM 512 MB 128 MB Deployment docker, bare-metal docker, source GitHub stars ★ 26,376 ★ 1,988 First released 2021 2022 Replaces Trello, Asana, Notion Trello
Why pick each one
Choose Focalboard if… Clean Trello-like UI Lightweight Mattermost integration Focalboard details Choose Kanban if… Released under the MIT license Easy to set up — beginner-friendly First-class Docker support for quick deployment Active community (2k GitHub stars) Kanban details
Frequently asked questions Is Focalboard or Kanban better? Neither is universally better. Focalboard has the larger community; both share a easy setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Focalboard and Kanban free and open-source? Yes. Focalboard is licensed under MIT and Kanban under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Focalboard and Kanban with Docker? Focalboard: yes. Kanban: yes.