Dokku
Hacker ApprovedRanked 3 of 19 deployment tools by recommenders
Lets people run Docker apps on their own cheap server with little devops work, though critics note a steep learning curve from its CLI.
Lets people run Docker apps on their own cheap server with little devops work, though critics note a steep learning curve from its CLI.
27 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 22
- criticize it
- 5
- approval share
- 81%
Recommended in 10 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Owned for 10 years
Median of the 3 owners who said how long they have had it.
Each square is one year.
Why it carries the badge
- 22 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 4.4 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 10 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Cheap to run on own server
“it's really easy to setup something like Dokku self-hosted and run a few dozen apps on a decent rented server”
Comment from 11 Feb 2026 in “Vercel's CEO offers to cover expenses of 'Jmail'” “A small VPS + LetsEncrypt + Dokku is a fantastic way to run personal side projects/hustles at minimal cost.”
Comment from 10 Dec 2025 in “10 Years of Let's Encrypt” “I deploy at my leisure with stuff like Dokku, or Kamal, directly on a 5 bucks VM”
Comment from 6 Feb 2026 in “An Update on Heroku” - Comment from 20 May 2026 in “Railway GCP Account Suspension Incident Report”
- Comment from 6 Feb 2026 in “An Update on Heroku”
Simple with little devops overhead
“Using pixi + docker + dokku for my data processing projects lets me push an identical environment to a cloud instance with basically no devops overhead.”
Comment from 4 Nov 2025 on Hacker News “I deploy everything to my homelab using Dokku, where I push a Dockerfile, mount a volume (on setup), and it's good to go.”
Comment from 26 Mar 2026 in “Moving from GitHub to Codeberg, for lazy people” “spinning up quick apps on Dokku without setting up DNS, GitHub, etc. for each one”
Comment from 8 Oct 2026 in “Throwaway Apps with Dokku and a Wildcard Domain” - Comment from 4 Dec 2025 in “Uncloud - Tool for deploying containerised apps across servers without k8s”
Self-hosted, customizable, open source
“made it have longevity for folks as they can mold the system to work as they'd like”
Comment from 22 Dec 2025 in “Show HN: Mushak – Zero config zero downtime Docker/Compose to server deployment” “people will move back to their own hardware with OSS deployment like dokku”
Comment from 30 Oct 2026 in “Northflank Breached” “The self hosted alternative.”
Comment from 6 Feb 2026 in “An Update on Heroku” Runs many self-hosted apps well
“it's really easy to setup something like Dokku self-hosted and run a few dozen apps on a decent rented server”
Comment from 11 Feb 2026 in “Vercel's CEO offers to cover expenses of 'Jmail'” “Ubuntu+dokku and it runs all my self hosted stuff”
Comment from 15 Jun 2026 in “Hetzner increased dedicated server prices 3-4x” “I'm still happy with Dokku at this point”
Comment from 4 Dec 2025 in “Uncloud - Tool for deploying containerised apps across servers without k8s”
Other deployment tools people recommend
The four most recommended other deployment tools, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
See all 19 deployment tools, rankedWhat people said
26 of the 32 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“people will move back to their own hardware with OSS deployment like dokku”
“spinning up quick apps on Dokku without setting up DNS, GitHub, etc. for each one”
“there is value in that - maybe not for everyone, but at least for folks busy with building product on a budget”
“Ubuntu+dokku and it runs all my self hosted stuff”
“Hetzner (or any VM provider) + Dokku works best.”
“After the initial learning curve it's been great.”
“Great, but locked us to single servers and required managing SSH access for teams.”
“Dokku being very easy to integrate via MCP but also good for building tools on top of”
“I deploy everything to my homelab using Dokku, where I push a Dockerfile, mount a volume (on setup), and it's good to go.”
“it's really easy to setup something like Dokku self-hosted and run a few dozen apps on a decent rented server”
“I think that Dokku is actually the closest to what you are building.”
“The self hosted alternative.”
“I deploy at my leisure with stuff like Dokku, or Kamal, directly on a 5 bucks VM”
“Significantly cheaper but pretty robust.”
“I stuck with Postgres because it was easy to run it on my Dokku installation.”
“the steep learning curve we mentioned is because of the cli and commands”
“As a longtime Heroku user, I’d have to disagree.”
“there are a lot of vestigal parts (e.g. .web.1)”
“Buy a cheap VPS and use something like Coolify, Dokploy, or Dokku if you don't need a UI”
“made it have longevity for folks as they can mold the system to work as they'd like”
“Dokku comes with the plugin system when it comes to DBs etc. which I don't like.”
“A small VPS + LetsEncrypt + Dokku is a fantastic way to run personal side projects/hustles at minimal cost.”
“I'm still happy with Dokku at this point”
“The simplicity of Dokku is hard to beat”
“Dokku feels a bit too light”
“Using pixi + docker + dokku for my data processing projects lets me push an identical environment to a cloud instance with basically no devops overhead.”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.