Coolify open-source PaaS (52k stars): self-hosted Heroku/Vercel alternative with Docker Swarm support and 280+ one-click templates on Liquid Web VPS.
Coolify is an open-source PaaS that turns a VPS into a self-hosted Heroku or Vercel, with Docker support and hundreds of one-click templates. These guides cover deploying it on a Liquid Web VPS.
It gives you push-to-deploy convenience without vendor lock-in or per-seat pricing. Below you will find setup guides and template walkthroughs for Coolify.
Coolify and Dokploy both turn a VPS into a Heroku-style platform: push code, get a URL, forget about Nginx configs and SSL certificates. Both are Apache-2.0 licensed, both install with a single command, and both support Docker Compose deployments, Let's Encrypt TLS, Git webhooks, and database provisioning. The difference is scale, maturity, and complexity tolerance.
Heroku's free tier was discontinued in 2022 and paid plans now start at $5/dyno/month — with no included databases, storage billed separately, and costs that compound quickly as you add apps and workers. Self-hosted PaaS tools replicate the Heroku experience (Git push to deploy, automatic SSL, web UI, database provisioning) on a VPS you control, at a fraction of the cost.
Vercel Pro costs $20/month per team member — and that's before you add bandwidth overages, concurrency limits, or a second project. If you're running more than a handful of apps, the bill grows faster than your team. Self-hosting a deployment platform on a $3.50/month VPS lets you deploy unlimited apps, keep your code and environment variables off a third-party cloud, and pay a flat monthly rate that doesn't scale with your headcount.
TL;DR
docker-compose.yml deploys Authentik (SSO) + Outline (wiki) + shared PostgreSQL + Redis + Caddy; Coolify installs separately via its own scriptMost engineering teams pay three separate vendors with no shared identity layer tying them together: Okta handles SSO, Vercel handles deployments, and Notion holds documentation. Each has its own login, its own access controls, and its own billing. This guide deploys the open-source equivalents — Authentik for identity, Coolify for self-hosted PaaS deployments, and Outline for team wiki — on a single Liquid Web 8 GB VPS, connected through OIDC so all three share one set of credentials.
TL;DR
docker-compose.yml deploys Authentik (SSO) + Plausible (analytics) + Postal (SMTP) + shared PostgreSQL + MySQL + ClickHouse + RabbitMQ + Redis + Caddy; Coolify installs separately via its own scriptThis is the "meta stack" — the infrastructure layer you deploy before anything else. Every other self-hosted app you run needs a place to live (Coolify), a way to log users in (Authentik), a way to measure traffic (Plausible), and a way to send email (Postal, the open-source SMTP platform). This guide wires all four together on a single Liquid Web 16 GB VPS as a reusable foundation.
Coolify is an open-source PaaS with 52k+ GitHub stars that turns a VPS into a Heroku-style deployment platform. It supports Docker Compose, Docker Swarm, and 280+ one-click application templates. Run it on a Liquid Web 8 GB Managed VPS for a self-hosted alternative to Vercel or Heroku.
Coolify has more features (Docker Swarm support, larger template library, more integrations) and a larger community. Dokploy is lighter and simpler — a better fit for smaller teams that just need Docker Compose deployments without the full PaaS feature set. Both run well on a Liquid Web 8 GB VPS.