Paperless-ngx alternatives
Short answer
We track 6 self-hosted alternatives to Paperless-ngx: PaddleOCR, MinerU, Paperless-AI, paperless-gpt, Docling Serve and Unstract.
PaddleOCR (same category): fewer license conditions (Permissive vs Copyleft (GPL)) and larger community (92.0k vs 47.3k GitHub stars).
MinerU (same category): larger community (82.8k vs 47.3k GitHub stars).
Paperless-AI (same category): fewer license conditions (Permissive vs Copyleft (GPL)).
Last updated · how we rank · sources
Paperless-ngx alternatives compared
| # | App | Advantages over Paperless-ngx | Est. server cost | Official hardware | License | Stars | Last commit | Compare |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| — | Paperless-ngx (this app) | Active | not estimated (no official RAM figure) | not published | GPL-3.0 | 47.3k | Oct 29, 2026 | — |
| 1 | PaddleOCR Same category | fewer license conditions (Permissive vs Copyleft (GPL)); larger community (92.0k vs 47.3k GitHub stars) | not estimated (no official RAM figure) | not published | Apache-2.0 | 92.0k | Sep 16, 2026 | Paperless-ngx vs PaddleOCR |
| 2 | MinerU Same category | larger community (82.8k vs 47.3k GitHub stars) | from €11.99/mo | minimum 2 GB RAM | MinerU Open Source License (Apache-2.0 with additional terms) | 82.8k | Oct 30, 2026 | Paperless-ngx vs MinerU |
| 3 | Paperless-AI Same category | fewer license conditions (Permissive vs Copyleft (GPL)) Trade-off: Paperless-ngx has an actively maintained project (Paperless-AI is stale); larger community (47.3k vs 6.0k GitHub stars) | not estimated (no official RAM figure) | not published | MIT | 6.0k | Mar 31, 2026 | Paperless-ngx vs Paperless-AI |
| 4 | paperless-gpt Same category | fewer license conditions (Permissive vs Copyleft (GPL)) Trade-off: Paperless-ngx has larger community (47.3k vs 2.8k GitHub stars) | not estimated (no official RAM figure) | not published | MIT | 2.8k | Oct 16, 2026 | Paperless-ngx vs paperless-gpt |
| 5 | Docling Serve Same category | fewer license conditions (Permissive vs Copyleft (GPL)) Trade-off: Paperless-ngx has larger community (47.3k vs 1.9k GitHub stars) | not estimated (no official RAM figure) | not published | MIT | 1.9k | Oct 27, 2026 | Paperless-ngx vs Docling Serve |
| 6 | Unstract Same category | None in our data (differs in features) Trade-off: Paperless-ngx has fewer license conditions (Copyleft (GPL) vs Network copyleft (AGPL)); larger community (47.3k vs 7.4k GitHub stars) | from €35.99/mo | minimum 8 GB RAM | AGPL-3.0 | 7.4k | Oct 30, 2026 | Paperless-ngx vs Unstract |
Ranked by the number of objective advantages each alternative has over the app (cheaper estimated server cost, lighter official RAM figure, no GPU needed, fewer license conditions, better maintenance status, at least 1.5× the GitHub stars, simpler deploy). Ties: same-category apps first, then more GitHub stars. License order used: Permissive (MIT/Apache) → Open core → Copyleft (GPL) or Custom conditions → Network copyleft (AGPL) → Source-available. Archived projects are not listed as alternatives.
What each alternative is
- PaddleOCR (Document processing): OCR toolkit and document AI engine that turns scans, images and PDFs into LLM-ready text, Markdown or JSON.
- MinerU (Document processing): Document parser that converts PDFs, scans and Office files into clean Markdown or JSON for LLMs and RAG.
- Paperless-AI (Document processing): AI auto-tagging and document chat for Paperless-ngx (currently unmaintained).
- paperless-gpt (Document processing): LLM add-on for paperless-ngx that does better OCR and writes titles, tags and correspondents.
- Docling Serve (Document processing): Docling document conversion (PDF, Office, images to Markdown/JSON) as a self-hosted API with a demo UI.
- Unstract (Document processing): No-code LLM platform that turns invoices, forms and other documents into structured JSON.
Paperless-ngx alternatives: FAQ
What is the best self-hosted alternative to Paperless-ngx?
By our objective ranking: 1. PaddleOCR (fewer license conditions (Permissive vs Copyleft (GPL)); larger community (92.0k vs 47.3k GitHub stars)) 2. MinerU (larger community (82.8k vs 47.3k GitHub stars)) 3. Paperless-AI (fewer license conditions (Permissive vs Copyleft (GPL))). "Best" depends on the features you need; the ranking only counts cost, hardware, license, maintenance, community size and deploy complexity.
Is there a cheaper alternative to Paperless-ngx?
Not by our estimate. Paperless-ngx: not estimated (no official RAM figure). Alternatives: PaddleOCR (not estimated (no official RAM figure)), MinerU (from €11.99/mo), Paperless-AI (not estimated (no official RAM figure)), paperless-gpt (not estimated (no official RAM figure)), Docling Serve (not estimated (no official RAM figure)), Unstract (from €35.99/mo).
Which Paperless-ngx alternative has the most permissive license?
PaddleOCR: Apache-2.0 (Permissive); Paperless-AI: MIT (Permissive); paperless-gpt: MIT (Permissive); Docling Serve: MIT (Permissive). Paperless-ngx is GPL-3.0 (Copyleft (GPL)). Not legal advice.
Related
Sources
- Paperless-ngx GitHub repository: github.com/paperless-ngx/paperless-ngx
- Paperless-ngx documentation, Paperless-ngx deploy instructions: github.com/paperless-ngx/paperless-ngx/blob/main/docs/setup.md
- Paperless-ngx license: github.com/paperless-ngx/paperless-ngx/blob/dev/LICENSE
- Paperless-ngx hardware requirements: github.com/paperless-ngx/paperless-ngx/blob/main/docs/faq.md
- PaddleOCR GitHub repository: github.com/PaddlePaddle/PaddleOCR
- MinerU GitHub repository: github.com/opendatalab/MinerU
- Paperless-AI GitHub repository: github.com/clusterzx/paperless-ai
- paperless-gpt GitHub repository: github.com/icereed/paperless-gpt
- Docling Serve GitHub repository: github.com/docling-project/docling-serve
- Unstract GitHub repository: github.com/Zipstack/unstract
- Hetzner Cloud pricing used for cost estimates (read 2026-10-25): www.hetzner.com/cloud/regular-performance
- GitHub stars and commits: GitHub REST API, refreshed daily