AFFiNE

Judgement

What it is

Complete system

What it does

A workspace combining Notion-style documents and Miro-style whiteboards on the same content, local-first with sync and self-hosting.

Adopt it when

You want an open alternative to Notion that also does visual whiteboarding and can run offline.

Watch out

Still pre-1.0, the license is not a standard open-source one, and self-hosted sync lags the cloud version.

Ready for

Usable

Runs as

Desktop app, self-hosted server, cloud service and mobile app

Built with

TypeScript, Rust, Electron and Swift

How established

Established: started 4 years ago, latest release v0.27.4.

What the license allows

GitHub could not read the license. Check it in the repository before reusing any code.

Judged on 2026-11-03 from the project's README and GitHub data. The license and age lines are worked out directly.

Compare AFFiNE

Built from

Follow it down: AFFiNE → TypeScript → Go → runs on a microchip

How compilers were built, back to punched paper tape

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