Outline vs Shiori

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?
FeatureOutlineShiori
CategoryNotes & Knowledge BaseBookmarks & Read-It-Later
LicenseBSL-1.1MIT
LanguageTypeScriptGo
Setup difficultyMediumEasy
Min. RAM1,024 MB128 MB
Deploymentdockerdocker, binary
GitHub stars★ 40,034★ 11,574
First released20172017
ReplacesNotion, ConfluencePocket, Raindrop.io

Why pick each one

Choose Outline if…

  • Polished team wiki
  • Great search
  • Strong integrations
Outline details

Choose Shiori if…

  • Released under the MIT license
  • Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
  • First-class Docker support for quick deployment
  • Mature project with 11.6k GitHub stars
Shiori details

Frequently asked questions

Is Outline or Shiori better?

Neither is universally better. Outline has the larger community, while Shiori is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.

Are Outline and Shiori free and open-source?

Yes. Outline is licensed under BSL-1.1 and Shiori under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Outline and Shiori with Docker?

Outline: yes. Shiori: yes.

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