SHSelfHostIndex

Frappe Books vs Crater Self-Hosted Invoicing

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted budgeting & finance options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

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FR Frappe Books Free desktop accounting for small businesses VS CR Crater Self-Hosted Invoicing Open-source invoicing for freelancers and businesses
FeatureFrappe BooksCrater Self-Hosted Invoicing
CategoryBudgeting & FinanceBudgeting & Finance
LicenseAGPL-3.0AGPL-3.0
LanguageTypeScriptPHP
Setup difficultyEasyMedium
Min. RAM256 MB512 MB
Deploymentbare-metal, sourcedocker, source
GitHub stars★ 4,874★ 1,784
First released20202023
ReplacesQuickBooks, WaveFreshBooks, Wave

Why pick each one

Choose Frappe Books if…

  • No subscription needed
  • Simple and clean
Frappe Books details

Choose Crater Self-Hosted Invoicing if…

  • Released under the AGPL-3.0 license
  • First-class Docker support for quick deployment
  • Active community (1.8k GitHub stars)
  • Written in PHP
Crater Self-Hosted Invoicing details

Frequently asked questions

Is Frappe Books or Crater Self-Hosted Invoicing better?

Frappe Books is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler easy setup. Consider Crater Self-Hosted Invoicing if its specific feature set fits your needs better.

Are Frappe Books and Crater Self-Hosted Invoicing free and open-source?

Yes. Frappe Books is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and Crater Self-Hosted Invoicing under AGPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Frappe Books and Crater Self-Hosted Invoicing with Docker?

Frappe Books: check the project docs for container support. Crater Self-Hosted Invoicing: yes.

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