This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.
The original was posted on /r/selfhosted by /u/LuayKelani on 2025-02-18 09:17:18+00:00.
TL;DR: Discussing how and why self hosting is better than managed services.
I'm a software engineer and was spending yesterday with my other software engineer friend and I was trying to explain why self host is better than managed services but during the discussion he pointed some things that I felt he was right about so I wanted to discuss it with you here. I'm not that experienced in self hosting so I might say some beginners things.
- Open Source: ===============
I was trying to say that there is an open source alternative for everything but I couldn't prove it. Is this a fact or just an assumption we self-hosters convincing our selves with? I know that I don't need an open source project that clones 100% of GitHub to say that I have an alternative. I just need an open source that covers my needs of GitHub to say I can replace GitHub with open source alternative and self hosted. (Btw GitHub is example here not the main point)
- Maintenance and Setup: =========================
Is it true that to gain enough experience and maintenance your self hosted services is a lot of pain? I don't feel it is but when we think about how much effort the owners of the managed services spent and how much problems they've faced thus they gained so much experience can't be replaced easily but still I feel it's not that hard.
- Cost: ========
I know that self hosting has a lot of advantages makes it superior to another managed services even if self hosting will cost more time & resources but still when we talk about tech businesses resources and time are their main profit when they decrease them to the minimal so can self hosting be considered as equal in terms of costing or even less or is it always higher in terms of money and effort?
I'm writing this because I'm really convinced that self hosting is the superior and this discussion will help me and a lot of beginners like me to improve their self hosting skills and know the strong points of this topic so thanks in advance.
Edit: despite the topic I love how much this community loves to help. I really didn't expect this much interactions and knowledge sharing. Thank you everyone.