Dokku
MIT Docker-powered mini-Heroku on one server
DevOps / Infrastructure · OSS/MIT · 32.2k
Reviewed 2026-10-18 · last push 2026-10-16 · repo checked 2026-10-19
What's Good
MIT (dokku/dokku), release v0.38.31 (2026-09-27), maintained since 2013. Runs on Ubuntu 22.04/24.04/26.04 and Debian 11+ (amd64 and arm64). Apps deploy with `git push`, and a long-lived plugin ecosystem adds Postgres, Redis, Let's Encrypt and more. Everything is driven from the `dokku` CLI over SSH, so it scripts well. ★~32.2k.
The Catch
It is a single-host PaaS by design: no built-in multi-node scheduling or high availability, so one VM is one failure domain. There is no web dashboard in the core project; you work in the CLI. Database plugins are convenient, but you still own backups and upgrades on that box.
Verdict
The simplest self-hosted Heroku for one server — boring in the good way.
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