Snippet Box vs paste

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

Not the right match-up?
FeatureSnippet Boxpaste
CategoryPastebins & SnippetsPastebins & Snippets
LicenseMITMIT
LanguageTypeScriptJavaScript
Setup difficultyEasyEasy
Min. RAM128 MB64 MB
Deploymentdocker, bare-metaldocker, binary, bare-metal
GitHub stars★ 1,091★ 578
First released20212018
ReplacesGitHub Gist, Pastebin.comPastebin.com, GitHub Gist

Why pick each one

Choose Snippet Box if…

  • Released under the MIT license
  • Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
  • First-class Docker support for quick deployment
  • Active community (1.1k GitHub stars)
Snippet Box details

Choose paste if…

  • Extremely lightweight
  • Trivial to deploy
paste details

Frequently asked questions

Is Snippet Box or paste better?

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

Are Snippet Box and paste free and open-source?

Yes. Snippet Box is licensed under MIT and paste under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Snippet Box and paste with Docker?

Snippet Box: yes. paste: yes.

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