SHSelfHostIndex

Coldsweat vs selfoss

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

Not the right match-up?
CO Coldsweat Web RSS aggregator and reader with a Fever API VS SE selfoss Multipurpose RSS reader and web scraping aggregator
FeatureColdsweatselfoss
Deploy effortUnder-an-hour setupUnder-an-hour setup
Health score5 · At risk68 · Good
CategoryRSS & News ReadersRSS & News Readers
LicenseMITGPL-3.0
LanguageSCSSHTML
Setup difficultyMediumEasy
Min. RAM128 MB128 MB
Deploymentbare-metal, dockerdocker, bare-metal
GitHub stars★ 146★ 2,470
First released20132012
ReplacesGoogle Reader, FeedlyGoogle Reader, Feedly

What are Coldsweat and selfoss?

Coldsweat

Coldsweat is a self-hosted, web-based RSS aggregator and reader designed as a Google Reader replacement. It implements the Fever API so that compatible mobile clients can connect.

  • Fever API compatibility
  • Works with mobile apps
  • Lightweight aggregator

selfoss

selfoss is a multipurpose RSS reader and aggregation web application. It pulls in content from feeds, Twitter, and other sources, presenting them in a clean unified stream.

  • Unified content stream
  • Mobile-friendly interface
  • Plugin sources beyond RSS

Coldsweat vs selfoss: key differences

Coldsweat is written in SCSS, while selfoss is built with HTML. Licensing differs — MIT for Coldsweat versus GPL-3.0 for selfoss. Selfoss has the considerably larger community, at 2,470 GitHub stars versus 146.

Why pick each one

Choose Coldsweat if…

  • Released under the MIT license
  • First-class Docker support for quick deployment
  • Written in SCSS
  • Tiny footprint — runs in 128 MB RAM
Coldsweat details

Choose selfoss if…

  • Released under the GPL-3.0 license
  • Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
  • First-class Docker support for quick deployment
  • Active community (2.5k GitHub stars)
selfoss details

Frequently asked questions

Is Coldsweat or selfoss better?

selfoss is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler easy setup. Consider Coldsweat if its specific feature set fits your needs better.

Are Coldsweat and selfoss free and open-source?

Yes. Coldsweat is licensed under MIT and selfoss under GPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Coldsweat and selfoss with Docker?

Coldsweat: yes. selfoss: yes.

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