Private and open-source alternatives to Vercel
13 app hosting platforms rated against the same public privacy criteria as Vercel, with our picks first.
Why look for an alternative?
- Open source: no. Closed source. The Vercel CLI and the Next.js framework are open source, but the platform is not.
- No trackers or telemetry: no. The privacy policy describes third-party cookies and tracking technologies for targeted advertising and analytics.
- No ads or data sales: partial. Funded by paid plans, but the privacy policy says data is shared with third-party advertising networks to advertise Vercel's services.
- Independent audit: partial. SOC 2 Type 2 and ISO 27001 reports are only available on request.
- Transparency report: no. No transparency report or government request policy is published.
- Tells users about requests: no. No published policy on notifying users about data requests.
- Security headers: partial. Grade B (75/100+)
The alternatives
Dokku Grade B
Open-source, self-hosted platform that deploys apps to your own server with git push, using Heroku-compatible buildpacks or Dockerfiles.
Dokku scores 80 out of 100 (grade B) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 3 of 4 criteria: open source, no trackers or telemetry and no ads or data sales.
Kamal Grade B
Open-source command-line tool from 37signals that deploys containerized web apps to your own servers over SSH, with zero-downtime deploys through kamal-proxy.
Kamal scores 80 out of 100 (grade B) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 3 of 4 criteria: open source, no trackers or telemetry and no ads or data sales.
Coolify Grade C
Open-source, self-hosted platform for deploying apps, databases and one-click services to your own servers over SSH. A paid hosted Coolify Cloud dashboard is also available.
Based in Hungary. Coolify scores 65 out of 100 (grade C) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 2 of 4 criteria: open source and no ads or data sales.
CapRover Grade D
Open-source, self-hosted platform for deploying apps and databases on Docker Swarm, with nginx load balancing, Let's Encrypt certificates, a web dashboard and one-click apps.
CapRover scores 50 out of 100 (grade D) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 2 of 4 criteria: open source and no ads or data sales.
Dokploy Grade D
Self-hosted platform for deploying apps and databases with Docker, Docker Swarm and Traefik, managed from a web dashboard. A hosted Dokploy Cloud is also available.
Based in the United States (Five Eyes). Dokploy scores 50 out of 100 (grade D) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 2 of 4 criteria: open source and no ads or data sales.
GitHub Pages Grade D
Static website hosting from GitHub repositories, with custom domains, HTTPS, and builds through GitHub Actions or Jekyll.
Based in the United States (Five Eyes). GitHub Pages scores 50 out of 100 (grade D) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 4 of 8 criteria: transparency report, tells users about requests, TLS configuration and security headers.
Cloudflare Workers Grade D
Serverless platform that runs JavaScript, TypeScript, Python and WebAssembly on Cloudflare's global network, and hosts static sites and full-stack apps, including those formerly on Cloudflare Pages.
Based in the United States (Five Eyes). Cloudflare Workers scores 47 out of 100 (grade D) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 3 of 8 criteria: transparency report, tells users about requests and TLS configuration.
Fly.io Grade F
Platform that runs apps as lightweight virtual machines on its own hardware in regions around the world, deployed with the flyctl command-line tool.
Based in the United States (Five Eyes). Fly.io scores 38 out of 100 (grade F) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 2 of 8 criteria: tells users about requests and TLS configuration.
Railway Grade F
Cloud platform for deploying apps, databases and services from Git repositories or Docker images, with usage-based billing.
Based in the United States (Five Eyes). Railway scores 36 out of 100 (grade F) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 2 of 7 criteria: no ads or data sales and tells users about requests.
Render Grade F
Cloud platform for hosting web services, static sites, background workers, cron jobs and managed Postgres and Key Value databases, deployed from Git or container images.
Based in the United States (Five Eyes). Render scores 29 out of 100 (grade F) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 1 of 7 criteria: tells users about requests.
Koyeb Grade F
Serverless platform for deploying apps, APIs, databases and GPU workloads from Git or Docker images in regions around the world.
Based in France (Nine Eyes). Koyeb scores 28 out of 100 (grade F) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 2 of 8 criteria: no ads or data sales and TLS configuration.
Northflank Grade F
Platform for deploying services, jobs, databases and GPU workloads on Northflank's cloud or in a customer's own cloud account, built on Kubernetes.
Based in the United Kingdom (Five Eyes). Northflank scores 28 out of 100 (grade F) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 1 of 8 criteria: TLS configuration.
Deno Deploy Grade F
Serverless hosting from Deno Land for JavaScript and TypeScript apps, running on the Deno runtime with deploys from Git or the command line.
Based in the United States (Five Eyes). Deno Deploy scores 22 out of 100 (grade F) on the app hosting platforms criteria. It meets 1 of 8 criteria: TLS configuration.