Open-source Photobucket alternatives

Immich is a self-hosted photo and video management server with companion mobile apps and a web interface. Your media stays on hardware you control while you still get automatic phone backup, a timeline view, albums and sharing, which is the role many people otherwise hand to Google Photos.

Search works on metadata, recognized objects, faces and CLIP-based natural language queries, and face recognition groups people into clusters. Other features include shared albums and partner sharing, a global map, memories, archive and favorites, RAW format support, LivePhoto and MotionPhoto handling, duplicate prevention, OAuth login, API keys and a user-defined storage structure. Background backup and selective album backup keep the mobile app flexible.

Immich is released under AGPL-3.0, and its documentation includes installation guides, a roadmap and a public demo. The maintainers stress following a 3-2-1 backup plan, since a self-hosted library is only as safe as the backups behind it. It suits households and small groups who want private, searchable photo storage.

PhotoPrism is a photo management application that uses machine learning to help you browse, organize and share photos and videos. It tags and classifies media automatically, so you can search and rediscover pictures without sorting them by hand. The project says it was built to run wherever you need it without compromising privacy, and its topics place it as a Google Photos alternative.

The web interface is a progressive web app that can be installed on a phone, tablet or desktop home screen and feels like a native app. It handles RAW images and many video formats, and offers search filters that can be combined across many properties. A public demo lets you try it first, with a warning not to upload private material. PhotoPrism is written in Go and uses TensorFlow for image analysis.

You can self-host PhotoPrism or use a cloud-hosted setup. Its license is listed as 'Other' on GitHub, so check the terms if you plan to redistribute it. It suits photographers and families who want a private, searchable photo library on hardware they own.

Ente is a service built on an open-source, end-to-end encrypted platform that lets you keep data in the cloud without having to trust the provider. Three apps run on it: Ente Photos, an alternative to Google Photos and Apple Photos; Ente Locker, for important documents and credentials; and Ente Auth, a two-factor authentication app positioned as a replacement for Authy. The monorepo contains the clients and the server.

Ente Photos includes triple data replication, face detection, semantic search, private sharing, collaborative albums, family plans, background uploads and straightforward import and export, all encrypted across platforms. Clients exist for iOS, Android, F-Droid, web, Linux, macOS and Windows, built with Flutter, Go and TypeScript. The README says the source code and cryptography have had external audits. The server can be self-hosted, and the code is under the AGPL-3.0 license.

Pixelfed is photo sharing software that takes part in the fediverse. It lets people share casual shots and creative photography with an audience without algorithmic barriers, and because it speaks ActivityPub it can interact with other federated platforms.

Pixelfed is built with PHP and Laravel. The README lists officially supported databases as MySQL 9 or newer and MariaDB 11 or newer, with PostgreSQL 14 or newer supported on a best-effort basis but not recommended. As of September 2026 the maintainers recommend running instances with Docker Compose, while non-Docker installs remain supported. A YunoHost package exists, and some unofficial cloud providers offer hosting.

The project is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and publishes documentation on its own site, with Matrix for chat. It has a firm policy against contributions that are substantially generated by generative AI, including code, documentation, translations and issues.

Photoview is a photo gallery for self-hosted personal servers, made for photographers who need to navigate directories containing thousands of high-resolution images. You configure it to look for photos and videos in a folder on the file system, and it takes care of the rest.

A scanner picks up the media automatically and generates thumbnails so browsing stays fast. Once scanning finishes, the media appear on the website organized the same way they are on disk. Repository topics point to support for RAW files and EXIF metadata, and the project is distributed as a Docker image that is commonly deployed on NAS devices. The README gives migration notes about a new Docker registry and a move to PostgreSQL 18 on the master branch.

Photoview is written in Go and licensed under AGPL-3.0. It is meant to be run on your own hardware, there is a Discord server for setup and development questions, and its approach of mirroring the folder structure suits people who already keep photos neatly organized on disk.

Lychee is a free, open-source photo management tool that runs on your own server or web space. You can upload, manage and share photos through a web interface that is meant to feel like a native application, with the aim of keeping the photos stored securely.

Installation is described as quick, and the project provides Docker images, with version 7.0 bringing significant changes to the Docker image and an upgrade guide. Lychee requires PHP 8.4 or 8.5 and has documentation, a changelog and a Discord community. It is built with PHP, TypeScript and Vue.

Lychee is licensed under MIT. A Supporter Edition adds extra functionality for people who want more than the free version, and users can also support the team directly. Topics on the repository describe it as a photo gallery and photo management application.

Piwigo is open-source photo gallery software for managing and sharing a photo library on the web. It is designed for individuals, teams and organizations that want to publish and organize pictures on their own site, and it is tagged with privacy, photography and self-hosting topics.

The project advertises more than 200 plugins and themes to extend and restyle the gallery, and its website provides feature lists, demos, forums, documentation and news. To install it you need a web server such as Apache or nginx, PHP 7.4 or later, MySQL 5 or MariaDB, and ImageMagick or the PHP GD library. The code is written in PHP.

Piwigo is licensed under GPL-2.0. You can install it on your own server, or choose the Piwigo Cloud ready-to-use hosted service if you do not have one. It suits photographers, families, clubs and companies that want a self-controlled alternative to commercial photo sharing sites.

Slink is a self-hosted image sharing platform that gives you control over how your pictures are stored and shared, without depending on a third-party host. It is built with Symfony and SvelteKit, and the project tags it as an Imgur alternative for people who want private galleries and links.

Shares are private by default and reachable only through their link, with optional password protection and expiry times, plus a page for listing, editing, publishing and revoking them. Collections group images under one link, and an Explore page shows publicly visible images. It handles many image formats, parallel multi-file uploads, compression and duplicate detection, supports guest uploads, and integrates with ShareX for screenshots. Storage can use S3 or SMB.

Slink is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and delivered as a Docker deployment, with documentation and a live demo online. It supports OIDC single sign-on, which makes it practical for homelabs and small teams. The README says it suits artists, developers sharing screenshots and anyone who wants image privacy under their own control.