Pocket is shutting down. Your read-it-later queue lived in Mozilla's cloud for a decade. Now you're exporting 2,400 links to a CSV and wondering which self-hosted app actually shows you what you saved — not just a bare URL in a list.
Karakeep (formerly Hoarder) is built for that migration. ~26k GitHub stars, AGPL-licensed, and a "bookmark everything" app — links, notes, images, PDFs — with link previews, full-text search, AI auto-tagging, and optional full-page archival. Pocket replacement energy, but you own the database.
What it actually does
Save from the web app, browser extension (Chrome, Firefox, Safari), iOS/Android apps, or REST API. Karakeep fetches titles, descriptions, and preview images automatically. Sort into lists, collaborate on shared lists, highlight text on saved pages, subscribe to RSS feeds for auto-hoarding.
AI tagging. LLM-based automatic tags and summaries — OpenAI API key, or local models via Ollama if you don't want article text leaving your network. Rule engine for custom automation on top.
Search that works. Meilisearch indexes full page content, not just titles. Find that article about Canadian privacy law you saved six months ago without remembering the domain.
Archive, don't just link. Full-page archival via Monolith protects against link rot. yt-dlp archives videos. OCR pulls text from images. Importers for Chrome, Pocket, Linkwarden, Omnivore, and Tab Session Manager — the Pocket exodus path is first-class.
Stack: Next.js, Drizzle ORM, NextAuth, Puppeteer for crawling, Meilisearch. AGPL-3.0. Still under heavy development — pin your Docker version if you want predictable upgrades.
Karakeep vs Memos vs ArchiveBox
We've covered adjacent tools:
- Memos — quick notes and micro-posting; great dump box, weak link previews and tagging
- ArchiveBox — heavy-duty web preservation (WARC, PDF, multi-format dumps) for researchers and legal archives
- Trilium / SiYuan — knowledge bases with wikis and hierarchies, not read-it-later UX
Karakeep sits in the personal hoarding lane — the creator built it because Memos lacked link previews and auto-tags for Twitter/HN links saved from a phone. ArchiveBox when you need forensic archival; Karakeep when you want a pretty timeline you'll actually scroll through.
Why self-host?
Your hoard is private. Bookmarks reveal what you read, who you follow, what you're researching. Self-hosted on a Canadian VPS beats another US SaaS with a sunset announcement.
Pocket died; who's next? Read-it-later apps come and go. AGPL + Docker means you can keep running the version you trust even if the project pivots — and Karakeep's managed cloud funds development if you want someone else on ops duty.
Local AI option. Point Karakeep at Ollama on the same box — tags and summaries without sending page content to OpenAI. Useful for client research or anything you'd rather not log on a third-party API.
What running it takes
Docker Compose from the official repo:
mkdir karakeep-app && cd karakeep-app
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/karakeep-app/karakeep/main/docker/docker-compose.yml
# Add .env: KARAKEEP_VERSION, NEXTAUTH_SECRET, MEILI_MASTER_KEY, NEXTAUTH_URL
docker compose up -dWeb UI on port 3000. Generate secrets with openssl rand -base64 36. Set NEXTAUTH_URL to your public HTTPS URL behind a reverse proxy.
Optional OPENAI_API_KEY for AI tagging — or configure Ollama per their AI providers guide. Enable full-page archival and screenshots in config if you want Monolith and Puppeteer chewing more RAM.
Plan 2 GB RAM for a comfortable homelab install; Puppeteer + Meilisearch + web app add up. Back up the Docker volumes — that's your entire hoard.
Who it's for (and who should skip it)
Good fit: Pocket refugees, phone bookmarkers who read on a laptop later, researchers who want AI tags without mymind.com's subscription, homelabbers who already run Memos but want richer link handling.
Maybe skip it: you need team wikis and note hierarchies — Trilium or SiYuan fit better. You need legal-grade web archives at scale — ArchiveBox. You save three links a year — browser bookmarks are fine.
Hosting it in Canada
We run Karakeep stacks on Canadian Docker hosting — RAM for Meilisearch and Puppeteer, TLS, volume backups, and optional Ollama on the same network for local tagging.
Tell us your hoard size — we'll size disk before your Pocket import lands.
