Save $2,152/year. Use these free tools instead.
12 paid tools and a free, self-hostable alternative for each — $179.31 a month, $2,152 a year between them.
All 12 tools, with prices and links
01Load testing
k6
Instead of
BlazeMeter“A modern load testing tool, using Go and JavaScript”
- BlazeMeter costs
- $79/mo · Small planPrinted as “$79” on their pricing page, read 11 Oct 2026.
- Over a year
- $948Computed: $79 × 12.
- k6 costs
- $0 licence, self-hostedYour server and your time are not free.
- Maintenance
- 31.9k stars · 295 contributorsLast commit 11 Oct 2026, per GitHub on 11 Oct 2026.
02Files
rclone
Instead of
odrive“"rsync for cloud storage" - Google Drive, S3, Dropbox, Backblaze B2, One Drive, Swift, Hubic, Wasabi, Google Cloud Storage, Azure Blob, Azure Files, Yandex Files”
- odrive costs
- $20/user/mo · Standard planPrinted as “$20 /user/month” on their pricing page, read 14 Oct 2026.
- Over a year
- $240 per userComputed: $20 × 12.
- rclone costs
- $0 licence, self-hostedYour server and your time are not free.
- Maintenance
- 60.3k stars · 1,246 contributorsLast commit 14 Oct 2026, per GitHub on 14 Oct 2026.
03Music
Mixxx
Instead of
rekordbox“Mixxx is Free DJ software that gives you everything you need to perform live mixes.”
- rekordbox costs
- $19/mo · Core + Cloud Option planPrinted as “$19USD/month” on their pricing page, read 14 Oct 2026.
- Over a year
- $228Computed: $19 × 12.
- Mixxx costs
- $0 licence, self-hostedYour server and your time are not free.
- Maintenance
- 7.3k stars · 466 contributorsLast commit 14 Oct 2026, per GitHub on 14 Oct 2026.
04Dashboards
Metabase
Instead of
Microsoft Power BI“The easy-to-use open source Business Intelligence and Embedded Analytics tool that lets everyone work with data:bar_chart:”
- Microsoft Power BI costs
- $14/user/mo · Power BI Pro plan · billed yearlyPrinted as “$14” on their pricing page, read 11 Oct 2026.
- Over a year
- $168 per userComputed: $14 × 12.
- Metabase costs
- $0 licence, self-hostedYour server and your time are not free.
- Maintenance
- 49.7k stars · 522 contributorsLast commit 11 Oct 2026, per GitHub on 11 Oct 2026.
05Web
frp
Instead of
ngrok“A fast reverse proxy to help you expose a local server behind a NAT or firewall to the internet.”
- ngrok costs
- $10/mo · Hobbyist planPrinted as “$10 of monthly included usage” on their pricing page, read 15 Oct 2026.
- Over a year
- $120Computed: $10 × 12.
- frp costs
- $0 licence, self-hostedYour server and your time are not free.
- Maintenance
- 110k stars · 152 contributorsLast commit 15 Oct 2026, per GitHub on 15 Oct 2026.
06AI
Upscayl
Instead of
Let's Enhance“Upscayl - #1 Free and Open Source AI Image Upscaler for Linux, MacOS and Windows.”
- Let's Enhance costs
- $9/mo · Starter planPrinted as “$9/month” on their pricing page, read 14 Oct 2026.
- Over a year
- $108Computed: $9 × 12.
- Upscayl costs
- $0 licence, self-hostedYour server and your time are not free.
- Maintenance
- 50.6k stars · 49 contributorsLast commit 5 Oct 2026, per GitHub on 14 Oct 2026.
07Publishing notes
Quartz
Instead of
Obsidian Publish“a fast, batteries-included static-site generator that transforms Markdown content into fully functional websites”
- Obsidian Publish costs
- $8/site/mo · Publish plan · billed yearlyPrinted as “$8” on their pricing page, read 12 Oct 2026.
- Over a year
- $96Computed: $8 × 12.
- Quartz costs
- $0 licence, self-hostedYour server and your time are not free.
- Maintenance
- 13.4k stars · 252 contributorsLast commit 3 Oct 2026, per GitHub on 12 Oct 2026.
08Productivity
Thunderbird
Instead of
Mailbird“Thunderbird for Android – Open Source Email App for Android (fka K-9 Mail)”
- Mailbird costs
- $5.75/user/mo · Premium Yearly Plan plan · billed yearlyPrinted as “$5.75” on their pricing page, read 14 Oct 2026.
- Over a year
- $69 per userComputed: $5.75 × 12.
- Thunderbird costs
- $0 licence, self-hostedYour server and your time are not free.
- Maintenance
- 14.1k stars · 472 contributorsLast commit 14 Oct 2026, per GitHub on 14 Oct 2026.
09Productivity
Karakeep
Instead of
Readwise“A self-hostable bookmark-everything app (links, notes and images) with AI-based automatic tagging and full text search”
- Readwise costs
- $5.59/mo · Readwise Lite planPrinted as “$5.59” on their pricing page, read 14 Oct 2026.
- Over a year
- $67Computed: $5.59 × 12.
- Karakeep costs
- $0 licence, self-hostedYour server and your time are not free.
- Maintenance
- 29.7k stars · 204 contributorsLast commit 13 Oct 2026, per GitHub on 14 Oct 2026.
10Git hosting
Gogs
Instead of
Atlassian Bitbucket“The painless way to host your own Git service”
- Atlassian Bitbucket costs
- $3.65/user/mo · Standard planPrinted as “$3.65 per user” on their pricing page, read 11 Oct 2026.
- Over a year
- $44 per userComputed: $3.65 × 12.
- Gogs costs
- $0 licence, self-hostedYour server and your time are not free.
- Maintenance
- 47.9k stars · 578 contributorsLast commit 10 Sep 2026, per GitHub on 11 Oct 2026.
11Home
ntfy
Instead of
Pushbullet“Send push notifications to your phone or desktop using PUT/POST”
- Pushbullet costs
- $3.33/mo · Pushbullet Pro planPrinted as “$3 33 /mo” on their pricing page, read 14 Oct 2026.
- Over a year
- $40Computed: $3.33 × 12.
- ntfy costs
- $0 licence, self-hostedYour server and your time are not free.
- Maintenance
- 34.8k stars · 424 contributorsLast commit 14 Oct 2026, per GitHub on 14 Oct 2026.
12Home
Pi-hole
Instead of
NextDNS“A black hole for Internet advertisements”
- NextDNS costs
- $1.99/mo · Pro planPrinted as “$1.99/month or” on their pricing page, read 14 Oct 2026.
- Over a year
- $24Computed: $1.99 × 12.
- Pi-hole costs
- $0 licence, self-hostedYour server and your time are not free.
- Maintenance
- 61.3k stars · 264 contributorsLast commit 11 Oct 2026, per GitHub on 14 Oct 2026.
Free of licence, not free of cost.
Self-hosting means a server and the time to run it. The free tools here cost $0 to license; the paid prices are the cheapest paid tier in US dollars on the day shown, and they change. “Open source” is only shown where the repository declares an OSI-approved licence.
How these were checked
Every price was read off the vendor's own pricing page, rendered in a real browser on 2026-10-11 and 2026-10-12 and 2026-10-14 and 2026-10-15, taking the cheapest paid tier in US dollars. The page and the date are listed against each one below, so you can check any of them yourself.
Quoted or computed. Each entry shows the price as the page prints it. 12 of 12 appear on the vendor's page word for word. Anything worked out from those figures is labelled computed and shows its arithmetic, so a number we calculated cannot be mistaken for one a vendor published. The only computed figures here are the yearly costs and the totals.
0 of the 12 free tools describe themselves, in their maintainers' own words, as an alternative to the tool they sit beside. The other 12 do not name theirs, so those pairings are not their maintainers' claim, and each one says so. Every description is quoted underneath its tool. Stars, contributors and last commit came from the GitHub API on the same day as the prices.
All 12 free projects had been committed to within the last 90 days.
Self-hosting is not free of cost — it is free of licence. A server and the time to run it are yours to pay either way, and nothing below pretends otherwise.
