AppFlowy vs Gollum
| Tagline | Open-source Notion alternative built on Flutter and Rust | Simple Git-backed wiki with Markdown support and a local web frontend |
| Category | Notes & Knowledge Base | Notes & Knowledge Base |
| Replaces | Notion, Confluence | Notion, Confluence |
| GitHub stars | 73k | 14k |
| Language | Dart | Ruby |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Self-host difficulty | 3/5 Moderate | 2/5 Easy |
| Deploy options | Docker Docker Compose | Docker Manual |
| Managed hosting | ||
| Last updated | today | 6 months ago |
| View repo | View repo |
Where each falls short
The honest trade-offs — what you give up with each, versus the proprietary tools they replace.
AppFlowy
- Self-hosted AppFlowy Cloud setup is involved and less polished than the local desktop app.
- Fewer database view types and formula capabilities than Notion.
- Limited third-party integrations and public API.
- Real-time multiplayer collaboration is newer and less battle-tested.
Gollum
- No real-time collaboration; concurrent edits require Git merge conflict resolution.
- Access control is all-or-nothing unless fronted by a reverse proxy with auth.
- No rich media embeds, databases, or kanban views that modern note tools offer.
- Search is basic file-content grep; no full-text index for large wikis.
Bottom line
Choose Gollum if you want the lower-effort setup; choose AppFlowy for the larger community and ecosystem. AppFlowy has seen more recent development. Open each guide below for deploy steps and the full feature gap.