Bitly Engineering Blog
Best alternatives to Pygmy in 2026
Public URL shorteners are convenient, but every link you create tells a third-party service where your traffic is going and who's clicking it — data you might prefer to keep for yourself. Pygmy is a self-hosted alternative: a small app you run on your own server that shortens links and tracks clicks, more like keeping your own mailroom instead of routing every letter through a courier that reads the address labels. Pygmy is a free, open-source (MIT) URL shortener built in Python with a Flask-based REST API and a Django UI layer, supporting PostgreSQL, MySQL, or SQLite as the backend. It lets you create customizable short codes, set auto-expiring links, protect links with a secret key, and track clicks through a user dashboard with analytics and geo-location tracking derived from visitor IPs. Its loosely coupled architecture is meant to make custom integrations straightforward for developers who want to extend it.
Quick comparison of Pygmy alternatives
| # | Tool | Best for | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Développeurs | — | |
| 2 | Grand public | — | |
| 3 | Développeurs | — | |
| 4 | Développeurs à l'aise avec Cloudflare voulant une boîte mail sur leur propre domaine sans payer un hébergeur email | — | |
| 5 | Particuliers auto-hébergeant des services (homelab, NAS, Docker/Kubernetes) qui veulent un tableau de bord central | — | |
| 6 | Utilisateurs homelab et particuliers qui veulent un suivi de dépenses simple, sans budgétisation complexe | — | |
| 7 | Développeurs et utilisateurs techniques qui veulent partager du code ou du texte rapidement, sans compte ni service tiers | — | |
| 8 | Particuliers voulant suivre leurs finances personnelles sans partager leurs données bancaires avec un tiers, ex-utilisateurs de Maybe Finance | — | |
| 9 | Particuliers soucieux de leur vie privée voulant la synchronisation bancaire réelle sans dépendre d'un service tiers | — | |
| 10 | Utilisateurs self-hosting cherchant une alternative pérenne à Pocket, développeurs, techies soucieux de la propriété de leurs données | — | |
| 11 | Lecteurs de flux RSS voulant garder le contrôle de leurs données, développeurs, sysadmins, self-hosters | — | |
| 12 | Foyers/particuliers multi-comptes et multi-devises voulant un outil de budget self-hosted gratuit | — |
A free, self-hosted email inbox for a custom domain — deploy it to your own Cloudflare account and get a working mailbox for you@yourdomain.com, without renting inbox space from Gmail or a paid email host.
- ✓ Completely free, running on Cloudflare's free tier instead of a paid email host
- ✓ Built on Cloudflare primitives, avoiding the classic pain points of self-hosting mail (IP reputation, blacklists)
A free, self-hosted start page that puts every app running on your home server or homelab — Plex, your router, your download manager — onto one clean screen with live status at a glance.
- ✓ Free, open source, and very actively maintained (32k+ GitHub stars)
- ✓ 100+ ready-made service integrations covering most homelab stacks
A free, open-source, self-hosted expense tracker that turns your spending into simple monthly pie charts — no budgeting complexity, no cloud account, just quick entry and a clear picture of where your money goes.
- ✓ Super-simple Docker install, choice of JSON or PostgreSQL backend
- ✓ Clear, immediate monthly pie-chart visualization
A free, open-source, self-hosted pastebin you can deploy on Cloudflare's free tier in about a minute — share code snippets and text with a simple memorable link, no account required.
- ✓ Deploys in about 60 seconds on Cloudflare Workers' free tier
- ✓ Includes a CLI alongside the web interface, handy for scripting
A free, self-hosted personal finance app that tracks your accounts, budgets, and net worth without sending your bank data to a company's servers.
- ✓ Polished UI inherited from Maybe Finance
- ✓ Multi-platform access (web, macOS, mobile)
A self-hosted personal finance manager with real bank sync, built for people who want the convenience of an app like Mint without handing their data to a company.
- ✓ Real bank sync via Pluggy, Enable Banking, SimpleFIN
- ✓ Multi-currency automatic FX conversion
A free, self-hosted bookmark manager that saves a permanent, searchable copy of every page you bookmark, on a server you control.
- ✓ Full offline archive of every bookmarked page
- ✓ Single portable binary, easy to self-host
A self-hosted RSS reader that lets you follow news sites and blogs from your own server, with no ads, no algorithm, and no third party reading your feed list.
- ✓ Mature, very active project with 15.8k GitHub stars
- ✓ Multi-user support on a single install
A free, self-hosted budgeting app for tracking spending across several bank accounts and currencies, run entirely on your own server.
- ✓ Strong multi-currency and multi-account support
- ✓ REST API for integrations and scripting
FAQ about Pygmy alternatives
- What is the best alternative to Pygmy in 2026?
- Based on our selection, Bitly Engineering Blog is the best alternative to Pygmy in 2026. Bitly Engineering Blog. See our full ranking above to compare all options.
- Is Pygmy free?
- Pygmy is a paid tool. Several alternatives in our selection offer free or freemium versions.
- How many alternatives to Pygmy are there?
- mySelectas has listed 12 alternatives to Pygmy in the Open Source & Self-hosting category. Our selection is updated regularly to include the best options available.