Editorial take
Why it stands out
Quote hosting and backup hours honestly—free software still needs an ops owner.
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Tool profile
Lightweight backend with auth, database, file storage, and realtime APIs in a single deployable package.
Internal admin tools and agency client portals
Single Go binary backend: SQLite datastore, realtime subscriptions, admin UI, and auth—self-hostable BaaS for small teams.
PocketBase is distributed under the MIT license with no per-seat vendor fee. Production economics are entirely yours: a single VM or container, disk snapshots, TLS certificates, and bandwidth for realtime clients. Compare that TCO to managed Firebase, Supabase, or Appwrite contracts when finance asks for apples-to-apples numbers.
SQLite concurrency limits remain the architectural ceiling—plan migrations before you outgrow single-writer assumptions.
Quick fit
Editorial take
Quote hosting and backup hours honestly—free software still needs an ops owner.
What it does well
Primary use cases
Fit notes
Compare with
Pressure-test this pick against nearby alternatives.
Pricing snapshot
PocketBase is MIT-licensed open-source software with no license fee. The software cost is $0, and actual spend comes from hosting, storage, backups, monitoring, and the operational work required to run it yourself.
Alation
PaidEnterprise data catalog
Enterprise data intelligence and catalog platform for search, governance, trust, and AI-ready knowledge layers over organizational data.
Choose Alation when the buying problem is enterprise trust, governance, and discoverability across data assets.
