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Quivr vs SurfSense

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted self-hosted ai options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

Not the right match-up?
QU Quivr Opinionated RAG framework for your second brain VS SU SurfSense Customizable AI research agent connected to your knowledge
FeatureQuivrSurfSense
Deploy effortUnder-an-hour setupUnder-an-hour setup
Health score84 · Excellent95 · Excellent
CategorySelf-Hosted AISelf-Hosted AI
LicenseApache-2.0Apache-2.0
LanguagePythonPython
Setup difficultyMediumMedium
Min. RAM2,048 MB2,048 MB
Deploymentdocker, bare-metaldocker, source
GitHub stars★ 39,553★ 16,255
First released20232024
ReplacesNotebookLMNotebookLM, Perplexity

What are Quivr and SurfSense?

Quivr

Quivr is an open-source RAG framework that helps developers build personal knowledge assistants over documents. It focuses on making retrieval-augmented generation simple and embeddable into products.

  • RAG framework
  • Document ingestion
  • Embeddable into apps
  • Many file types

Read the full Quivr guide →

SurfSense

SurfSense is a self-hosted AI research assistant that connects to your documents, browser history, and external sources to answer questions with citations. It functions as a private alternative to NotebookLM and Perplexity.

  • Cited research answers
  • Connectors for many sources
  • Local and cloud LLM support
  • Podcast generation

Read the full SurfSense guide →

Quivr vs SurfSense: key differences

Both projects are written in Python. Quivr has the considerably larger community, at 39,553 GitHub stars versus 16,255.

Why pick each one

Choose Quivr if…

  • Developer-friendly RAG core
  • Embeds into products
  • Many file formats

Watch out for

  • Requires LLM API keys
  • Project scope shifted often
Quivr details

Choose SurfSense if…

  • Answers with citations
  • Many source connectors
  • Private NotebookLM alternative

Watch out for

  • Young project
  • Multi-service stack
SurfSense details

Frequently asked questions

Is Quivr or SurfSense better?

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

Are Quivr and SurfSense free and open-source?

Yes. Quivr is licensed under Apache-2.0 and SurfSense under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Quivr and SurfSense with Docker?

Quivr: yes. SurfSense: yes.

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