Last verified: 2026-07-27 · How we score · Disclosure
Open source project management tools let you self-host your work tracker, audit the code, and avoid per-seat pricing that grows with your team. The trade-off is that you take on hosting, upgrades, and backups yourself.
If you want a fast, modern issue tracker that feels like Linear and you're happy self-hosting, Plane is the best place to start. If you need Gantt charts, budgets, and formal project governance, OpenProject is the stronger choice. And if you want your tasks in the same app as your email, chat, and docs, Macro is open source under AGPLv3 and covers all of it.
Below we compare the main options on licensing, hosting, features, and who each one suits.
A note on licenses. Several tools marketed as open source use source-available licenses like BSL or vendor-specific licenses that aren't OSI-approved. That affects whether you can genuinely self-host, modify, or use them commercially. Check the current license in the repository before you commit to anything on this page.
| Plane | OpenProject | Taiga | Vikunja | Redmine | Macro | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| License | AGPLv3 | GPLv3 | AGPLv3 | AGPLv3 | GPLv2 | AGPLv3 |
| Who it's for | Software teams who want Linear, self-hosted | Orgs needing formal project governance | Teams running scrum or kanban | Individuals and small teams | Teams wanting a mature, stable tracker | Teams who want tasks plus email, chat and docs in one app |
| Self-host | Yes, Docker | Yes, Docker or packages | Yes, Docker | Yes, single binary | Yes | Yes |
| Managed cloud | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Third-party only | Yes |
| Gantt / timeline | Yes | Yes, strong | Basic | Basic | Via plugin | No |
| Sprints / cycles | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Via plugin | No |
| Time tracking | Yes | Yes, with budgets | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
| Built-in chat | No | No | No | No | No | Yes |
| Built-in email client | No | No | No | No | No | Yes |
| Native AI | Limited | Limited | No | No | No | Yes, workspace-wide |
| Setup effort | Moderate | High | Moderate | Low | Moderate | Low, or self-host |
Plane is a modern issue tracker built for software teams. It borrows heavily from Linear's model, with issues, cycles, and modules, and it's the closest thing to Linear you can run on your own servers.
It's licensed AGPLv3 and ships as a Docker Compose stack, so you can be running in an afternoon. There's also a hosted cloud version if you'd rather not manage it.
- Issues, cycles, and modules that map onto how software teams actually plan
- A fast, clean interface that engineers don't complain about
- Multiple views per project, including list, kanban, calendar, and Gantt
- An active project with frequent releases
- Both self-hosted and cloud options, so you can move between them
- It's younger than the alternatives, so you'll hit rough edges
- The plugin and integration ecosystem is small
- Self-hosted upgrades occasionally need manual intervention
- Permissions are simpler than OpenProject's
Choose Plane if you're an engineering team that wants Linear's workflow without Linear's per-seat cost, and you have someone who can run Docker.
OpenProject is a mature, GPLv3 project management platform aimed at organisations that need real project governance. It's the open source tool most likely to satisfy a procurement process.
- Genuine Gantt charts with dependencies and baselines
- Budgets and cost reporting, which almost nothing else here has
- Work package hierarchies for programme-level planning
- Granular, role-based permissions per project
- Long track record, with a company behind it and paid support available
- Runs on-premise, which matters for regulated environments
- Setup and configuration take real time, and you'll want an administrator
- The interface is functional rather than pleasant, and engineers tend to resist it
- Slower than the newer tools
- Some enterprise features are in the paid edition rather than the community one
Choose OpenProject if you need Gantt charts, budgets, and formal governance, and you're willing to spend a couple of weeks configuring it.
Taiga is an AGPLv3 tool designed specifically for agile teams. Where Plane is Linear-inspired and OpenProject is governance-inspired, Taiga is built around sprints, backlogs, and story points.
- Backlog grooming, sprint planning, and burndown charts that work out of the box
- Clean separation between scrum and kanban project types
- Straightforward Docker deployment
- Good wiki and issue modules alongside the board
- Development pace has slowed compared to Plane
- The interface feels older
- Fewer integrations than the larger tools
Choose Taiga if your team runs textbook scrum and you want a tool that assumes it.
Vikunja is a lightweight, AGPLv3 to-do and project app that ships as a single binary. It's the easiest tool here to self-host.
- One binary, minimal dependencies, very low resource use
- Lists, kanban, calendar, and Gantt views
- Good keyboard shortcuts and a fast interface
- Genuinely pleasant for personal and small-team use
- No sprints, story points, or agile tooling
- Reporting is basic
- Not built for large organisations or complex permissions
Choose Vikunja if you want structured task management for yourself or a handful of people, without running a Docker stack.
Redmine has been around since 2006 and is licensed GPLv2. It's a Ruby on Rails application with a large plugin ecosystem, and it's still widely deployed.
- Extremely stable and well understood, with two decades of documentation
- A large plugin library covering Gantt, agile boards, and time tracking
- Runs comfortably on modest hardware
- Flexible issue tracking and per-project permissions
- The default interface is dated
- Much of the useful functionality requires third-party plugins
- Plugin quality varies, and upgrades can break them
- No modern AI or agent support
Choose Redmine if stability matters more than experience, or you already have Redmine expertise in-house.
Macro is an open source workspace under AGPLv3 that includes tasks, email, chat, docs, calls, and CRM in one application, over one database. We build it, so treat this section accordingly and read the disclosure.
The difference from everything else on this page is scope. The other tools here manage projects. Macro manages projects in the same app as the conversations and documents that produce them.
- Tasks link bidirectionally to the message, email, or document that created them
- Search covers tasks, email, chat, docs, and call transcripts in one query
- AI reads across all of those surfaces, not just the tracker
- Keyboard-first throughout, with a Rust backend and SolidJS frontend
- Self-hostable under AGPLv3, so you can run it yourself or use the hosted version
- Task management is simpler than Plane's or OpenProject's. No Gantt charts, no budgets, no capacity planning
- The hosted version is $40 per seat, which is more than self-hosting anything else here
- The integration ecosystem is small
- Self-hosting a full workspace is more work than self-hosting a task tracker
Choose Macro if the problem isn't your tracker specifically, it's that work is scattered across five tools.
Self-hosting these tools is free in licence terms, but not free in total. Budget for a server, backups, TLS certificates, upgrades, and the time of whoever maintains it. For a small team, a modest VPS at $20 to $40 a month plus a few hours a quarter is realistic.
The managed cloud versions are where the real numbers are:
| Tool | Self-hosted | Managed cloud |
|---|---|---|
| Plane | Free, AGPLv3 | Free tier, then paid per seat |
| OpenProject | Free community edition | Paid per user, Enterprise edition adds features |
| Taiga | Free, AGPLv3 | Paid per user |
| Vikunja | Free, AGPLv3 | Low-cost hosted option |
| Redmine | Free, GPLv2 | Third-party hosts only |
| Macro | Free, AGPLv3 | $40 per seat, everything included |
We have not verified current cloud pricing for Plane, OpenProject, Taiga, or Vikunja. Check their pricing pages directly.
Choose Plane when you're a software team, you want a Linear-like experience, and you can run Docker.
Choose OpenProject when you need Gantt charts, budgets, and governance, and you have an administrator.
Choose Taiga when your team runs scrum and you want a tool built around it.
Choose Vikunja when you want something small, fast, and easy to host.
Choose Redmine when stability and maturity matter more than interface quality.
Choose Macro when tasks are only part of the problem and you want email, chat, and docs in the same system.
For most software teams evaluating open source project management, Plane is the right first thing to try. It's modern, it's AGPLv3, it self-hosts cleanly, and engineers will actually use it.
If your requirements include Gantt charts, cost tracking, or a procurement review, OpenProject is the more serious tool and worth the extra setup time.
And if what's actually broken is that your tasks, conversations, and documents live in different applications, no dedicated tracker will fix that. That's the case for an open source workspace like Macro instead.
Plane. It's the closest match to Linear's model, with issues, cycles, and modules, a fast modern interface, and an AGPLv3 licence you can self-host. It's younger than Linear and the ecosystem is smaller, but for a team that wants Linear's workflow on their own infrastructure, it's the strongest option available.
OpenProject for most organisations. It's the only tool on this page with comparable governance, permissions, Gantt charts, and cost tracking, and it runs on-premise. Redmine is the alternative if you want something older and more plugin-driven. Plane is a better choice if what you actually liked about Jira was the issue tracking and not the process enforcement.
The software is free. Running it is not. You'll pay for hosting, and you'll spend time on upgrades, backups, and monitoring. For a small team that's usually cheaper than per-seat SaaS. For a large team it's almost always cheaper. For a team with nobody to maintain it, the hosted version of the same tool is often the better deal.
Yes. Macro is AGPLv3 and self-hostable, and covers tasks, email, chat, docs, and CRM. Odoo is another option if your focus is business applications rather than team collaboration. Expect more operational work than self-hosting a single-purpose tracker.
Support is limited across the board. Most tools on this page have a REST API you can point an agent at, but few have a first-party MCP server. Macro has a full MCP surface. If agent access matters, check for an MCP server rather than assuming an API is enough, and confirm whether agents can authenticate as a user rather than as a workspace-wide bot.