Outline vs QOwnNotes
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 Outline with
choose an app… AppFlowy AFFiNE Docusaurus Memos Mark Text Joplin Plane SiYuan Logseq Trilium Notes TriliumNext Notes Khoj Wiki.js Karakeep ArchiveBox Focalboard Notable MkDocs Docmost Super Productivity Wekan Obsidian Linkwarden BookStack Foam Docs by Suite Numerique Omnivore OpenProject Answer Notesnook Gollum Habitica Self-Hosted Zettlr Quartz VNote Wallabag MarkText Workspace Planka Self-hosted LiveSync Shiori Leantime Linkding Blinko git-bug Kanboard Laverna TiddlyWiki Anytype Reor Read the Docs nb Notes Floccus Dillinger Kaneo Dendron Buku Athens Research org-roam Taskwarrior Markor Sync Livebook SilverBullet TagSpaces MediaWiki DokuWiki Mindforger Web CherryTree Shaarli Pinry MDwiki Flatnotes Dnote Trilium Notes Next Raneto NoteDiscovery MindForger WizNote BatNoter Documize Community Notea AppFlowy Cloud Jotty Django Wiki ZenTao Atomic Server Otter Wiki Knowledge RocketNotes QuillPad Beavers Notes XWiki Outline Desktop Writing Many Notes LeafWiki Notabase Notesnook Sync Server mdSilo Daux.io Realms Wiki Note Mark Turtl RedNotebook Tangent Notes DailyTxT TeamMapper Standard Notes WiseMapping MyTetra Mindwendel LibreKB Digimindmap memEx QST
Compare QOwnNotes with
choose an app… AppFlowy AFFiNE Memos Mark Text Joplin SiYuan Logseq Paperless-ngx Trilium Notes TriliumNext Notes Khoj Notable Obsidian Notesnook VNote Laverna TiddlyWiki Reor nb Notes Markor Sync TagSpaces Papra Mindforger Web CherryTree Archivy Flatnotes Dnote Trilium Notes Next MindForger WizNote Zim QuillPad Beavers Notes Notesnook Sync Server OutWiker Tiddloid MyTetra WikidPad
Feature Outline QOwnNotes Category Notes & Knowledge Base Notes & Knowledge Base License BSL-1.1 GPL-2.0 Language TypeScript C++ Setup difficulty Medium Easy Min. RAM 1,024 MB 256 MB Deployment docker binary, source GitHub stars ★ 40,034 ★ 5,836 First released 2017 2014 Replaces Notion, Confluence Evernote, OneNote
Why pick each one
Choose Outline if… Polished team wiki Great search Strong integrations Outline details Choose QOwnNotes if… Pairs well with Nextcloud Notes remain plain files QOwnNotes details
Frequently asked questions Is Outline or QOwnNotes better? Neither is universally better. Outline has the larger community, while QOwnNotes is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Outline and QOwnNotes free and open-source? Yes. Outline is licensed under BSL-1.1 and QOwnNotes under GPL-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Outline and QOwnNotes with Docker? Outline: yes. QOwnNotes: check the project docs for container support.