Self-hosted alternatives to Algolia

Instant search for sites and apps, hosted by you. Below are 12 open source options you host on your own server — with no monthly per-user fee and full control of your data.

ElasticSearch

★ 77,493

Distributed, RESTful search and analytics engine.

Search Engines SSPL-1.0

MeiliSearch

★ 58,477

Meilisearch is an ultra-fast, typo-tolerant search engine that's easy to add to any site or app. Self-hosted, it delivers instant search without relying on paid services like Algolia.

Search Engines MIT

SearXNG

★ 33,668

SearXNG is a metasearch engine that aggregates results from many services without tracking you. Self-hosted, it's the private alternative to Google Search, with no profiling or ads.

Search Engines AGPL-3.0

Typesense

★ 26,280

Blazing fast, typo-tolerant open source search engine optimized for developer happiness and ease of use.

Search Engines GPL-3.0

ZincSearch

★ 17,869

Search engine that requires minimal resources (alternative to Elasticsearch).

Search Engines Apache-2.0

OpenSearch

★ 13,380

Distributed and RESTful search engine.

Search Engines Apache-2.0

Manticore Search

★ 11,889

Full-text search and data analytics, with fast response time for small, medium and big data (alternative to Elasticsearch).

Search Engines GPL-3.0

bitmagnet

★ 4,199

BitTorrent indexer, DHT crawler, content classifier and torrent search engine with web UI, GraphQL API and Servarr stack integration.

Archiving and Digital Preservation (DP)File Transfer - Peer-to-peer Filesharing MIT

Yacy

★ 3,977

Peer based, decentralized search engine server.

Search Engines GPL-2.0

Aleph

★ 2,393

Tool for indexing large amounts of both documents (PDF, Word, HTML) and structured (CSV, XLS, SQL) data for easy browsing and search. It is built with investigative reporting as a primary use case.

Search EnginesKnowledge Management Tools MIT

Apache Solr

★ 1,640

Enterprise search platform featuring full-text search, hit highlighting, faceted search, real-time indexing, dynamic clustering, and rich document (e.g., Word, PDF) handling.

Search Engines Apache-2.0

Hister

★ 1,600

Personal web search engine with automatic indexing of visited websites. Supports offline local result previews, local files, multi-user handling and optional semantic search.

Search Engines AGPL-3.0

Frequently asked questions

Is there a free self-hosted alternative to Algolia?

Yes. We've gathered 12 self-hosted, open source alternatives to Algolia — including ElasticSearch, MeiliSearch, SearXNG. You run all of them on your own server.

What is the best open source alternative to Algolia?

ElasticSearch is one of the most popular (77,493 GitHub stars). The "best" depends on your case — compare the options below.

Do I need a server to replace Algolia?

Yes. You can use a home server (homelab) or a cheap VPS (from ~€4/mo). See the hosting suggestions on this page.