Best Open-Source Alternatives to Google Workspace

Google Workspace is $6-18/user/month depending on the plan. For a family or small team, that’s real money — and it buys you productivity tools that are excellent but lock you into Google’s ecosystem, pricing, and privacy policies.

The self-hosted alternatives have matured significantly over the last few years. None of them are drop-in replacements that require zero adjustment. But they’re viable, and for users who value control over convenience, they’re worth knowing about.

Email: Stalwart or Maddy

Email is the hardest component to self-host. The technical setup isn’t terrible, but deliverability — making sure your emails don’t land in spam — requires correct DNS configuration (SPF, DKIM, DMARC) and a clean IP reputation. If you’re sending from a residential IP, most major providers will block or filter your mail regardless of setup.

Stalwart Mail Server is the current front-runner for modern self-hosted email. It’s written in Rust, handles SMTP, IMAP, JMAP, and CalDAV/CardDAV in a single binary, and has reasonable documentation. If you’re on a VPS with a clean IP, it’s worth trying.

The practical alternative: Use a mail hosting service for the delivery layer and self-host everything else. Migadu, Fastmail, or Proton Mail for Business handle the deliverability problem for $10-20/month, and you keep the self-hosted apps for everything else.

File Storage and Sync: Nextcloud

Nextcloud is the most feature-complete self-hosted alternative to Google Drive + Google Docs. It handles file sync, sharing, and collaboration, and it has a large ecosystem of apps for calendar, contacts, notes, video calls, and more.

The base setup via Docker Compose is straightforward. Nextcloud Office (powered by Collabora or OnlyOffice) adds browser-based document editing compatible with DOCX and XLSX formats. It’s not Google Docs in terms of polish, but it handles real-world document collaboration.

Mobile clients exist for iOS and Android, and the desktop sync client works on Mac, Windows, and Linux.

Setup with Docker Compose:

version: "3.8"
services:
  nextcloud:
    image: nextcloud:latest
    container_name: nextcloud
    ports:
      - "8080:80"
    volumes:
      - nextcloud_data:/var/www/html
    environment:
      - MYSQL_HOST=db
      - MYSQL_DATABASE=nextcloud
      - MYSQL_USER=nextcloud
      - MYSQL_PASSWORD=changeme
    restart: unless-stopped
    depends_on:
      - db

  db:
    image: mariadb:latest
    container_name: nextcloud-db
    volumes:
      - db_data:/var/lib/mysql
    environment:
      - MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD=rootchangeme
      - MYSQL_DATABASE=nextcloud
      - MYSQL_USER=nextcloud
      - MYSQL_PASSWORD=changeme
    restart: unless-stopped

volumes:
  nextcloud_data:
  db_data:

For a more polished Nextcloud experience with faster performance, the Nextcloud AIO (All-in-One) image handles installation and maintenance more automatically.

Calendar and Contacts: Radicale or Nextcloud

If you already run Nextcloud, its built-in CalDAV and CardDAV servers handle calendar and contact sync. Both iOS and Android support these protocols natively — you can add a CalDAV account in Settings and your Nextcloud calendar shows up alongside iCloud or Google.

Radicale is a standalone, minimal CalDAV/CardDAV server if you don’t want Nextcloud. It’s a Python application that handles the sync protocol without the full Nextcloud overhead. Good for users who only need calendar/contact sync.

Documents and Spreadsheets: OnlyOffice or Collabora

Neither of these are as fast or as polished as Google Docs. That’s the honest truth. But both handle real collaboration — multiple users editing simultaneously, change tracking, comments.

OnlyOffice Community Server has a standalone Docker image:

docker run -d --name onlyoffice-document-server \
  -p 8083:80 \
  onlyoffice/documentserver

It integrates directly with Nextcloud and has a decent interface. For light document collaboration, it works.

Collabora Online is the more actively developed option and has better DOCX compatibility. It’s what many Nextcloud deployments use for built-in office.

Video Calls: Jitsi Meet

Google Meet is arguably the hardest thing to replace functionally. Jitsi Meet is the best open-source option — it runs in a browser, requires no account for guests, and works reasonably well for small groups.

Self-hosting Jitsi requires more resources than most services on this list (you want at least 4GB RAM for a video server under real load), but it’s doable. The official Docker deployment guide is solid.

For personal/family use where “send them a link” video calls are needed, Jitsi is workable. It won’t handle a 50-person team meeting as well as Google Meet.

The Realistic Picture

Replacing all of Google Workspace with self-hosted alternatives means:

Google Service	Self-Hosted Alternative	Maturity
Drive	Nextcloud	Solid
Docs / Sheets	OnlyOffice or Collabora	Decent
Calendar	Nextcloud CalDAV / Radicale	Good
Contacts	Nextcloud CardDAV	Good
Gmail	Stalwart + VPS	Complex
Meet	Jitsi	Workable

Most people end up doing a hybrid: Nextcloud for files, a managed email provider for deliverability, and tolerating Google Meet for video because the alternatives still have friction. That’s a reasonable position.

The value of going this route isn’t just cost. It’s owning your data, understanding your infrastructure, and not being subject to feature changes, price hikes, or privacy policy updates you didn’t agree to.

Whether that trade-off is worth it depends on how much you value those things versus convenience. But the tools exist and they work.