Open-source

12 Open Source Self-hosted Social Media Network Alternatives

Social Media Network

Have you ever thought about building your own small social network for you, your family, relatives, community, or team? Let's say, something like Facebook but on a small scale for private use!

Well, all you need is a self-hosted social network software and a server, and this article is to choose from the best open-source self-hosted social medial solutions.

fits for communities, companies, and teams

Protect your data and privacy
A small focused network for your community
Easier to manage
Own your data
Free to customize

Open-source solutions to build your own social network

1- Humhub

Humhub is an open-source enterprise, private social network kit suitable for groups, teams, small to huge businesses. The main aim of it is to boost your business, support your customers, teach your students, organize your football club.

HumHub's installation requires Apache or Nginx server, MySQL or MariaDB database, and 64 MB memory allocated for PHP.

It offers a self-hosted solution that gives full control over your social network. The software was developed on the PHP framework and licensed under the AGPL version 3.

Humhub Features:

lightweight
powerful
comes with a user-friendly interface
it comes with a user-friendly interface
open- source
Flexible
Secure
Overview and fast access to the most important information
It has social tools (post, comment, follow, like…)
With it, you can share documents, media files
you can customize social network

2- Elgg

Elgg is an enterprise social networking engine agile platform that is free to download and use. This is a rapid development framework written in PHP. As the main focus of Elgg is the software development project and that’s why it has main support for agile.

It can manage, govern, protect, and promote the Elgg open-source social network engine. Besides, it provides a stable, commercially and individually independent organization. The application is also available including the Bug Tracker, It provides a robust framework and more.

Elgg is released under the GNU General Public License (GPL) Version 2 and written with PHP.

Elgg Key Features

Well-documented core API
Composer
Flexible system of hooks and events
Extendable system of views
Cacheable system of static assets
User authentication
Security
Client-side API
Flexible entity system
Opinionated data model
Access control system
File storage

3- Oxwall

Oxwall is a free and open-source social marketplace business platform with a simple plugin to keep your Google Analytics tracking without messing with HTML/JavaScript code. It also has a simple interface like Facebook-style.

With it, you can create online and offline events to engage with users. The Oxwall offers private on-site communication, image slideshow, it helps you to built and create your own customized social network.

The Oxwall is a flexible system which offers a Real-time chat for friends written by you.

Oxwall platform is licensed under Common Public Attribution License 1.0. It is written with PHP and uses MySQL as a database.

Oxwall Features

Groups, forums, blogs
Activity notifications
Advertisement
Facebook-like newsfeed
Photo sharing
User roles, permissions, paid upgrades
Profile/content moderation
Contact importer to invite friends
Groups
Photo sharing

4- Buddypress

Buddypress is a complete WordPress plugin for free business applications. It is software for online communities, teams, and groups. It is aimed to power your community sit.

If you want to use Buddypress easily, it will automatically adapt, showing only the menu items, pages, and buttons for the features you have enabled.

It helps you build any kind of community website, fun and flexible software for online communities

It is based on PHP, MySQL, and JavaScript and runs on macOS, Windows, and Ubuntu

Buddypress Features:

All WordPress features and plugins
Flexible
user profiles
groups
activity streams
notifications

5- Mastodon

Mastodon is a self-hosted and open-source social network server for thousands of communities, not like Twitter or Facebook. It is used by more than 4.4M people, individuals, and organizations.

For individuals, It allows them to consume content and Host their own social media platform on your own infrastructure for organizations.

MASTODON ISN’T A SOCIAL NETWORKING WEBSITE — IT’S A WAY TO HOST ONE YOURSELF

It is released under the AGPL-3.0 license and written with Ruby.

Mastodon Features:

comes with effective anti-abuse tools
You can use custom emojis
You can adjust the thumbnails of your pictures with focal points
It hides things behind spoiler warnings
You can delete and redraft for quick corrections.

6- Wallstant

Wallstant is a tool that helps you to create your own social network. It has a real-time messaging system with a powerful dashboard that allows the admin to edit, remove, and see statistics about all databases. It is also written with PHP language.

Wallstant Features:

Open source
Fast and Secure
Messaging system
Emoji system
Verify badge
Multi-Language
Powerful dashboard
fast
secure
easy to install and use

7- Dolphin

The dolphin is another best open-source social network software with Fast, smart, personal. It browses for small businesses.

It offers multiple modules such as Ads, Payments, Photos, Polls, Profile Customizer, Profiler, Chat, Profiler, Desktop, Facebook Connect, and more.

It has wonderful mobile apps, good support for multimedia file types.

Dolphin is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license and written in PHP language and uses MySQL for the database. You can download it from the app store and google play.

Dolphin features:

Open multiple tabs for all-in-one browsing
Quickly access bookmarks and options with a swipe
You can sync your data across compatible devices
smart voice search
Share and sync with Facebook, Evernote, Box, and more
customizable
Support flash (Android only)

8- Hotaru CMS

Hotarucms is a free and open-source CMS software that helps you to run your own social media site. It is used by developers, designers, and many users.

It is released under GPLv3 and written with PHP and uses MySQL as a database.

HotaruCMS Features:

It has Free Themes
HotaruCMS has over 100 plugins
multi-language support
It has a great admin interface

9- Anahita

Anahita is an open-source social networking platform for developing open science and knowledge-sharing applications.

Anahita Features:

It provides a graph architecture
It has design patterns for developing social apps
used for real-time analysis
You can also build your custom apps
Super easy to install and use

10- Minds

Minds is a free, open source social network dedicated to privacy and freedom. It is an anti-Facebook that pays you for your time.

It helps you to get paid for creating content driving traffic and referring friends

You can download it from the Android App or App store.

Minds Features:

Post videos, blogs, images, and statuses
Message and video chat securely with groups or directly with friends
Discover great content through trending feeds and hashtags
You can also receive direct payments in USD, Bitcoin, and Ether from your fans
Take back control of your social media

11- Mono

Mono is an open-source implementation of Microsoft that builds outstanding software. It allows developers to easily create cross-platform applications.

It is a .NET Framework based on the ECMA standards for C# and the Common Language Runtime.

Mono Features:

Customizable
It provides design and development services
It is transforming big ideas into exceptional products.

12- Jcow

Jcow is an open-source software to create a social website. It is written in PHP and the database uses MySQL.

It has a Facebook-like interface and with it, you can create a social app with no need to learn app programming, build your iOS/Android apps, submit to App Store and Play Store.

Jcow Features:

Free
Handle large traffic
Mobile Friendly
Post Boosting system
Deeply Google Map integrated
URL-preview in the Share box
AdSense Optimized
We use our own product
User and Group suggestions
Cross-platform Chat box

Conclusion

So, we have seen in this list many open-source form builders that are more than enough to be a Self-hosted Social Media Network.

If you have any additional software you would like to see in this list, then we would love to hear about them in the comments.

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Why do you need your own social network?