What is Readthedocs.org used for?

Readthedocs.org is a documentation building and hosting platform that connects to Git repositories and handles builds, previews, and access control. It is a good fit for hosting documentation for open-source projects and hosting documentation for commercial or non-free projects.

Is Readthedocs.org open source?

Yes. Readthedocs.org is open source under the MIT licence. Its source code is on GitHub at readthedocs/readthedocs.org and is written mainly in Python.

Is Readthedocs.org free?

Yes. Readthedocs.org is open source, so the software itself is free to use. A managed cloud version is also available.

Can I self-host Readthedocs.org?

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

What is Readthedocs.org an alternative to?

Readthedocs.org is an open-source alternative to GitBook, ReadMe, Mintlify and GitHub Pages. Other open-source alternatives to GitBook include GitBook, Gramax and PandaWiki.

Is Readthedocs.org actively maintained?

Yes. The most recent commit to Readthedocs.org was on 14 October 2026, and the latest release is 2026.10.13post2, published on 13 October 2026. The project has 8.4k stars on GitHub.

Readthedocs.org: open-source alternative to GitBook, ReadMe

About Readthedocs.org

Read the Docs is a documentation building and hosting platform. It connects to Git repositories and handles builds, previews, and authentication so developers can focus on writing documentation. The platform supports Sphinx, MkDocs, Docusaurus, and other documentation tools.

It offers versioned documentation, integrated search, pull request previews, and access control with SSO via GitHub or GitLab. There is a free community edition for open-source projects and a paid business edition for commercial projects starting at $50 per month.

Key features

Connects to Git repositories and builds documentation from code
Supports Sphinx, MkDocs, Docusaurus, and other documentation tools
Versioned documentation that matches product release cycles
Pull request previews with visual diff against production
Access control with SSO via GitHub or GitLab
AI agent integration via llms.txt and Markdown content negotiation

Good fit for

Hosting documentation for open-source projects
Hosting documentation for commercial or non-free projects

Built with: Python tools
Tags: documentation; hosting; sphinx; mkdocs; docusaurus; open-source

Readthedocs.org: questions and answers

What is Readthedocs.org used for?: Readthedocs.org is a documentation building and hosting platform that connects to Git repositories and handles builds, previews, and access control. It is a good fit for hosting documentation for open-source projects and hosting documentation for commercial or non-free projects.
Is Readthedocs.org open source?: Yes. Readthedocs.org is open source under the MIT licence. Its source code is on GitHub at readthedocs/readthedocs.org and is written mainly in Python.
Is Readthedocs.org free?: Yes. Readthedocs.org is open source, so the software itself is free to use. A managed cloud version is also available.
Can I self-host Readthedocs.org?: Yes. Readthedocs.org can be self-hosted on your own server or infrastructure.
What is Readthedocs.org an alternative to?: Readthedocs.org is an open-source alternative to GitBook, ReadMe, Mintlify and GitHub Pages. Other open-source alternatives to GitBook include GitBook, Gramax and PandaWiki.
Is Readthedocs.org actively maintained?: Yes. The most recent commit to Readthedocs.org was on 14 October 2026, and the latest release is 2026.10.13post2, published on 13 October 2026. The project has 8.4k stars on GitHub.