What is Backstage used for?

Backstage is an open-source framework for building internal developer portals around a software catalog, templates and technical docs. It is a good fit for internal developer portal for a platform team, standardizing how new services are created, and central catalog of microservices and owners.

Is Backstage open source?

Yes. Backstage is open source under the Apache-2.0 licence. Its source code is on GitHub at backstage/backstage and is written mainly in TypeScript.

Yes. Backstage is open source, so the software itself is free to use.

Can I self-host Backstage?

Yes. Backstage can be self-hosted on your own server or infrastructure.

What is Backstage an alternative to?

Backstage is an open-source alternative to Port, OpsLevel, Humanitec and Atlassian Compass. Other open-source alternatives to Humanitec include KubeVela.

Is Backstage actively maintained?

Yes. The most recent commit to Backstage was on 2 October 2026, and the latest release is v1.55.3, published on 29 September 2026. The project has 35k stars on GitHub.

Backstage: open-source alternative to Port, OpsLevel

About Backstage

Backstage is a framework, published openly, for creating developer portals. It was created at Spotify and is now a Cloud Native Computing Foundation project at the incubation level. Centered on a software catalog, it brings order to microservices and infrastructure so product teams can ship code quickly while keeping their autonomy. It is written in TypeScript and released under the Apache-2.0 license.

Out of the box it includes a Software Catalog for tracking services, libraries, data pipelines, websites and machine learning models, Software Templates for starting new projects with organization-approved defaults, and TechDocs for a docs-like-code approach to documentation. A growing ecosystem of open-source plugins extends what the portal can show and do. Because it is a framework rather than a finished product, organizations build and host their own Backstage instance, guided by the getting started documentation and roadmap.

Key features

Software Catalog for services and libraries
Software Templates for new project scaffolding
TechDocs with docs-like-code workflow
Plugin ecosystem to extend the portal
CNCF incubation project
TypeScript framework you host yourself

Good fit for

→Internal developer portal for a platform team
→Standardizing how new services are created
→Central catalog of microservices and owners

Built with: TypeScript
Tags: developer-portal; platform-engineering; software-catalog; cncf; microservices; typescript; plugins; documentation

Backstage: questions and answers

What is Backstage used for?: Backstage is an open-source framework for building internal developer portals around a software catalog, templates and technical docs. It is a good fit for internal developer portal for a platform team, standardizing how new services are created, and central catalog of microservices and owners.
Is Backstage open source?: Yes. Backstage is open source under the Apache-2.0 licence. Its source code is on GitHub at backstage/backstage and is written mainly in TypeScript.
Is Backstage free?: Yes. Backstage is open source, so the software itself is free to use.
Can I self-host Backstage?: Yes. Backstage can be self-hosted on your own server or infrastructure.
What is Backstage an alternative to?: Backstage is an open-source alternative to Port, OpsLevel, Humanitec and Atlassian Compass. Other open-source alternatives to Humanitec include KubeVela.
Is Backstage actively maintained?: Yes. The most recent commit to Backstage was on 2 October 2026, and the latest release is v1.55.3, published on 29 September 2026. The project has 35k stars on GitHub.