Notea vs Outline
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted notes & knowledge base options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | Notea | Outline |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 15 · At risk | 99 · Excellent |
| Status | Archived | Actively maintained |
| Category | Notes & Knowledge Base | Notes & Knowledge Base |
| License | MIT | BSL-1.1 |
| Language | TypeScript | TypeScript |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 1,024 MB |
| Deployment | docker, source | docker |
| GitHub stars | ★ 2,147 | ★ 40,682 |
| First released | 2021 | 2017 |
| Replaces | Notion, Evernote | Notion, Confluence |
What are Notea and Outline?
Notea
Notea is an open-source, self-hosted note-taking application with a Notion-like editor that stores all data on S3-compatible object storage. It runs serverlessly and requires no traditional database.
- Notion-like editor
- Stores data on S3
- No database required
- Markdown support
Outline
Outline is a fast, collaborative knowledge base and wiki for teams with real-time editing and powerful search. It targets organizations that want a self-hosted documentation hub. It is deployed via Docker with PostgreSQL and Redis.
- Real-time collaborative editing
- Fast full-text search
- SSO and team permissions
- Slack and API integrations
Notea vs Outline: key differences
The biggest difference is maintenance: Notea's repository is archived and no longer developed, while Outline is actively maintained. Both projects are written in TypeScript. Licensing differs — MIT for Notea versus BSL-1.1 for Outline. Notea is the lighter option, starting around 256 MB of RAM against 1,024 MB for Outline. Outline is the more established project (first released 2017), while Notea arrived in 2021. Outline has the considerably larger community, at 40,682 GitHub stars versus 2,147.
Why pick each one
Choose Notea if…
- Simple storage model
- Clean editing experience
Watch out for
- Development has slowed
- Single-user focused
Choose Outline if…
- Polished team wiki
- Great search
- Strong integrations
Watch out for
- Requires Postgres and Redis
- BSL is not fully open source
Frequently asked questions
Is Notea or Outline better?
Neither is universally better. Outline has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Notea and Outline free and open-source?
Yes. Notea is licensed under MIT and Outline under BSL-1.1. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Notea and Outline with Docker?
Notea: yes. Outline: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Notea or Outline?
Notea has the smaller minimum footprint at 256 MB of RAM, compared to about 1,024 MB for Outline. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.