Dokku vs gitea
Is it time to switch? We break down the differences so you can stop bleeding money.
Choose gitea.
If you want to own your data, save money, and avoid vendor lock-in, gitea is more popular among developers.
What Actually Matters
No fluff — just the differences that affect your decision
Both are open source under MIT. No lock-in on either side — pick based on fit, not fear.
Both can run on your own metal with Docker. Full data ownership, no cloud dependency. We have deploy guides for each.
gitea leads at 58.5k stars vs 32.2k, but both have solid communities. You won't be alone with either choice.
Both written in Go. Same ecosystem, same talent pool — makes switching easier if you ever need to.
Try both — most offer free tiers. The right pick depends on your stack size, team, and tolerance for DevOps.
Dokku
A docker-powered PaaS that helps you build and manage the lifecycle of applications
Why Choose Dokku
- ✓Rock-solid stability — battle-tested since 2013
- ✓Heroku-compatible buildpacks and Procfile workflow
- ✓Zero-downtime deploys with simple git push
Drawbacks
- ×CLI driven
gitea
Self-hosted Git service with code review, team collaboration, package registry, and CI/CD, written in Go. Provides a lightweight, all-in-one software development platform.
Why Choose gitea
- ✓Built with Go — lightweight and highly performant
- ✓Single binary — easy to deploy and manage
- ✓Supports code review, team collaboration, and CI/CD — all-in-one platform
Drawbacks
- ×Self-hosting can be complex
- ×Smaller ecosystem compared to GitHub or GitLab
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