Zettlr vs SiYuan
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted notes & knowledge base options
— licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one
replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Compare Zettlr with
choose an app… AppFlowy AFFiNE Memos Mark Text Joplin Logseq Outline Trilium Notes TriliumNext Notes Khoj Wiki.js Focalboard Notable Docmost Obsidian BookStack Foam Docs by Suite Numerique Notesnook Gollum Quartz VNote MarkText Workspace Self-hosted LiveSync Leantime Blinko Laverna TiddlyWiki Anytype Reor nb Notes Athens Research org-roam SilverBullet zk NoteDiscovery Outline Desktop Many Notes Notabase mdSilo Tangent Notes
Compare SiYuan with
choose an app… AppFlowy AFFiNE Memos Mark Text Joplin Plane Logseq Paperless-ngx Outline Trilium Notes TriliumNext Notes Khoj Wiki.js Karakeep ArchiveBox Focalboard Notable Docmost Super Productivity Wekan Obsidian Linkwarden BookStack Foam Docs by Suite Numerique Omnivore OpenProject Notesnook Gollum Habitica Self-Hosted Quartz VNote Wallabag MarkText Workspace Planka Self-hosted LiveSync Shiori Leantime Linkding Blinko git-bug Kanboard Laverna TiddlyWiki Anytype Reor nb Notes Floccus Dillinger Kaneo Buku Athens Research org-roam Taskwarrior Markor Sync Livebook QOwnNotes SilverBullet TagSpaces Papra DokuWiki Mindforger Web CherryTree Shaarli Pinry Archivy Flatnotes Dnote Trilium Notes Next NoteDiscovery MindForger WizNote BatNoter Notea AppFlowy Cloud Jotty Atomic Server Knowledge RocketNotes QuillPad Beavers Notes Outline Desktop Writing Many Notes Notabase Notesnook Sync Server mdSilo Note Mark Turtl RedNotebook Tangent Notes DailyTxT TeamMapper Standard Notes WiseMapping MyTetra Mindwendel LibreKB Digimindmap memEx QST
Feature Zettlr SiYuan Category Notes & Knowledge Base Notes & Knowledge Base License GPL-3.0 AGPL-3.0 Language TypeScript TypeScript Setup difficulty Easy Medium Min. RAM 256 MB 512 MB Deployment bare-metal, binary docker, binary, source GitHub stars ★ 13,354 ★ 45,670 First released 2017 2020 Replaces Notion, Obsidian Notion, Evernote
Why pick each one
Choose Zettlr if… Strong academic features Plain Markdown files Zettlr details Choose SiYuan if… Powerful block-based model Works offline and self-hosted SiYuan details
Frequently asked questions Is Zettlr or SiYuan better? Neither is universally better. SiYuan has the larger community, while Zettlr is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Zettlr and SiYuan free and open-source? Yes. Zettlr is licensed under GPL-3.0 and SiYuan under AGPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Zettlr and SiYuan with Docker? Zettlr: check the project docs for container support. SiYuan: yes.