Outline

A fast, collaborative knowledge base for teams, built with React and Node.js, offered as a hosted service or for self-hosting under the Business Source License.

41.1k stars, 3.6k forks TypeScript On GitHub since May 2016

Visit website View on GitHub How to run it

What is Outline?

Outline gives a team a clean place to write and organize documents: collections, nested pages, real-time collaborative editing, comments, and fast search. It integrates with Slack and other tools, signs users in through providers like Google, Microsoft or OIDC, and has an API. The company runs a hosted version at getoutline.com, and this repository contains everything needed to run your own copy. 23 translations of the interface are available.

Good fit if

  • You want a polished internal wiki that people actually enjoy writing in.
  • You need real-time collaboration and good search for a growing team.

Look elsewhere if

Before you adopt it

Outline uses the Business Source License 1.1, so it is not open source by the OSI definition: you may run it, but not offer it as a commercial document service, and each release converts to Apache 2.0 later, in 2030 for the current version. A plugins/enterprise directory holds paid features. One developer writes almost all of the commits.

Drafted with AI from the project's README and repository data, then checked against that data on 30 October 2026. Report a correction

Outline health: is it still maintained?

79 of 100, actively developed

  • Activity
    825 commits in the last 90 days, the latest on 31 October 2026.
    30 / 30
  • Contributors
    2 people wrote the latest 100 commits; the most active wrote 99% of them.
    4 / 20
  • Releases
    15 releases in the last 12 months; the latest, v1.12.0, on 23 October 2026.
    19 / 20
  • Replies to issues
    Maintainers answered 100% of recent issues, with a median first reply after 4 hours.
    20 / 20
  • Security practices
    OpenSSF Scorecard 5.7 of 10.
    6 / 10

Read from GitHub on 1 November 2026. How the score works

Outline license: is it open source?

Outline uses Business Source License. It is source-available, not an OSI-approved open-source license: the code is public, but the license restricts how you may use it, usually commercially. Some features sit under a separate paid license inside the same repository.

  1. May 2016First published on GitHub.
  2. TodayBusiness Source License, with paid parts: directory plugins/enterprise/.

How to run Outline yourself

Docker
Dockerfile or compose file in the repository
Compose file
docker-compose.yml: 2 services (redis, postgres)
Setup effort
2 of 5, judged from the compose file
Kubernetes
No Helm chart in the repository
Desktop and mobile
No app builds in GitHub releases
Interface languages
23 languages

Install instructions: getoutline.com or the README on GitHub.

Alternatives to Outline

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  • Wiki.jsWiki.js | Next Generation Open Source Wiki 58 health · AGPL-3.0 · 29.1k stars
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All 34 projects in Notes & knowledge bases

Questions about Outline

Is Outline open source?

Not by the OSI definition. Outline uses Business Source License, which makes the code public but restricts how it may be used.

Is Outline still maintained?

Its health score is 79 of 100 (actively developed). It had 825 commits in the last 90 days, the latest on 31 October 2026, and its latest release came out on 23 October 2026.

How do I run Outline?

You can run it with Docker. The README on GitHub has the exact steps.

What are the alternatives to Outline?

Close alternatives in the Notes & knowledge bases category include Joplin, Memos, TiddlyWiki.