SHSelfHostIndex

Dendrite vs Miaou

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted apps from related categories — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

Not the right match-up?
DE Dendrite Second-generation Matrix homeserver written in Go VS MI Miaou Self-hosted multi-room chat with markdown and code blocks
FeatureDendriteMiaou
CategoryMatrix & XMPPChat & Communication
LicenseApache-2.0MIT
LanguageGoJavaScript
Setup difficultyMediumMedium
Min. RAM512 MB256 MB
Deploymentdocker, binary, sourcebare-metal, source
GitHub stars★ 5,632★ 553
First released20172014
ReplacesSlack, DiscordDiscord, Slack

Why pick each one

Choose Dendrite if…

  • Much lighter than Synapse
  • Active development by Matrix.org
Dendrite details

Choose Miaou if…

  • Released under the MIT license
  • Written in JavaScript
  • Tiny footprint — runs in 256 MB RAM
Miaou details

Frequently asked questions

Is Dendrite or Miaou better?

Neither is universally better. Dendrite has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.

Are Dendrite and Miaou free and open-source?

Yes. Dendrite is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Miaou under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Dendrite and Miaou with Docker?

Dendrite: yes. Miaou: check the project docs for container support.

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