Wallabag vs Shiori
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted bookmarks & read-it-later options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | Wallabag | Shiori |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 86 · Excellent | 81 · Excellent |
| Category | Bookmarks & Read-It-Later | Bookmarks & Read-It-Later |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Language | PHP | Go |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 512 MB | 128 MB |
| Deployment | docker, bare-metal | docker, binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 12,983 | ★ 11,650 |
| First released | 2013 | 2017 |
| Replaces | Pocket, Instapaper | Pocket, Raindrop.io |
What are Wallabag and Shiori?
Wallabag
Wallabag is a self-hosted read-it-later application that saves web articles in a clean, distraction-free format for later reading. It targets readers who want to own their reading list. It is deployed via Docker or a PHP stack.
- Clean article extraction
- Tagging and annotations
- Mobile apps and extensions
- Export to ePub and PDF
Shiori
Shiori is a simple bookmark manager that lets you save and organize web pages with offline archiving. It is distributed as a single portable binary with both a web UI and a CLI.
- Single portable binary
- Offline page archiving
- Web UI and CLI
Wallabag vs Shiori: key differences
Wallabag is written in PHP, while Shiori is built with Go. Shiori is the lighter option, starting around 128 MB of RAM against 512 MB for Wallabag. Wallabag is the more established project (first released 2013), while Shiori arrived in 2017.
Why pick each one
Choose Wallabag if…
- Great read-it-later experience
- Own your reading list
- Apps available
Watch out for
- Requires a database
- Article parsing occasionally fails
Choose Shiori if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Mature project with 11.7k GitHub stars
Frequently asked questions
Is Wallabag or Shiori better?
Neither is universally better. Wallabag 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 Wallabag and Shiori free and open-source?
Yes. Wallabag is licensed under MIT and Shiori under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Wallabag and Shiori with Docker?
Wallabag: yes. Shiori: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Wallabag or Shiori?
Shiori has the smaller minimum footprint at 128 MB of RAM, compared to about 512 MB for Wallabag. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.