Focalboard vs Plane
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 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 Kanban 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 Plane with
choose an app… AppFlowy AFFiNE Memos Mark Text Joplin SiYuan Logseq Outline Trilium Notes TriliumNext Notes Khoj Chatwoot Wiki.js Huly Super Productivity Wekan SimpleX Chat Etherpad OpenProject Habitica Self-Hosted Planka Phabricator Leantime Centrifugo Screego Typebot git-bug Kanboard Berty Mumble Kaneo The Lounge Papercups Redmine Taskwarrior Zammad WorkAdventure OpenEMR Maybe Tasks Taskcafe Vikunja Kimai2 Octobox Nullboard Godo Worklenz Donetick Tasks.md Restyaboard Kanban Tegon MantisBT Taskell FossBilling ZenTao Kanban Lite eLabFTW Tracks Gerrit OrangeHRM GanttProject eigenfocus osem Bugzilla Taiga Firefly III Importer LibreBooking Phorge 4ga Boards Todoman Web Vikunja Frontend Mobile Trac Admidio The Bug Genie 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 eTraxis 92five Active Collab Bénévalibre BitBucket Server Buddy Enterprise Coin Crucible Cultivons Diacamma Dokos Kanban Tool Kantree Liberaforms Paheko PMB Pollaris ProjeQtOr Smederee Solo Tuleap
Feature Focalboard Plane Category Project Management & Tasks Project Management & Tasks License MIT AGPL-3.0 Language TypeScript TypeScript Setup difficulty Easy Medium Min. RAM 512 MB 2,048 MB Deployment docker, bare-metal docker GitHub stars ★ 26,376 ★ 55,704 First released 2021 2023 Replaces Trello, Asana, Notion Jira, Linear, Asana
Why pick each one
Choose Focalboard if… Clean Trello-like UI Lightweight Mattermost integration Focalboard details Choose Plane if… Polished modern interface Good for product teams Active development Plane details
Frequently asked questions Is Focalboard or Plane better? Neither is universally better. Plane has the larger community, while Focalboard is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Focalboard and Plane free and open-source? Yes. Focalboard is licensed under MIT and Plane under AGPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Focalboard and Plane with Docker? Focalboard: yes. Plane: yes.