{"slug": "monica", "name": "Monica", "category": "selfhosted", "category_name": "Self-hosted and home server", "description": "Open-source personal CRM for tracking friends, family, and relationships, self-hosted or hosted.", "recommenders": 5, "commenters": 12, "warners": 2, "score": 4.211, "rising": 3.67, "first": "2026-03-05", "latest": "2026-10-20", "why": "Liked as a self-hostable personal CRM for birthday reminders, notes about friends, and CardDAV/CalDAV contact sync.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 5, "neutral": 6, "compare": 0, "warn": 2}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 3, 0], "listed": true, "loved": ["Birthday reminders", "The concept"], "caveat": "Project direction", "short_quote": "I use Monica https://www.monicahq.com/ which does advertise itself as a personal CRM.", "icon": false, "domain": null, "github_repo": "github.com/monicahq/monica", "official_url": "https://www.monicahq.com/", "pricing": "open source", "aliases": ["Monica", "Monica CRM"], "verdict": [{"text": "Liked as a self-hostable personal CRM", "cites": [{"id": 756153888, "item_id": 47259618, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47259618", "by": "bobbiechen", "date": "2026-03-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use Monica https://www.monicahq.com/ which does advertise itself as a personal CRM.", "excerpt": "Not sure if it's top 3, but I use Monica https://www.monicahq.com/ which does advertise itself as a personal CRM. I certainly underutilize its features but things like birthday reminders + a place for a few notes (where do they live again? who's their partner?) is nice", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM, birthday reminders", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Poppy \u2013 a simple app to stay intentional with relationships"}, {"id": 792381024, "item_id": 49523814, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523814", "by": "alibrarydweller", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I'm a happy self-hosted Monica user", "excerpt": "I'm a happy self-hosted Monica user, I like that I have alerts set to remind me of birthdays and other events, and that there's a place to list, e.g. everyone who got a Christmas card from me last year. I recommend it to people. I'm agnostic about a rewrite, I never used Chandler and as far as I'm concerned it's perfectly serviceable for me the end user as it is. I rarely use the UI. I have been contemplating interac", "context": "self-hosts it", "use_case": "birthday reminders, contact notes", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}]}, {"text": " for birthday reminders, notes about friends, and CardDAV/CalDAV contact sync.", "cites": [{"id": 792511840, "item_id": 49531990, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49531990", "by": "LelouBil", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it is at least a good carddav server to synchronize your contacts and auto add birthday reminders", "excerpt": "I have been using it for a couple of years. Not always using all the features but it is at least a good carddav server to synchronize your contacts and auto add birthday reminders to your calendar via caldav as well.", "context": "", "use_case": "contacts sync and birthday reminders", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 756153888, "item_id": 47259618, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47259618", "by": "bobbiechen", "date": "2026-03-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use Monica https://www.monicahq.com/ which does advertise itself as a personal CRM.", "excerpt": "Not sure if it's top 3, but I use Monica https://www.monicahq.com/ which does advertise itself as a personal CRM. I certainly underutilize its features but things like birthday reminders + a place for a few notes (where do they live again? who's their partner?) is nice", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM, birthday reminders", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Poppy \u2013 a simple app to stay intentional with relationships"}, {"id": 792381024, "item_id": 49523814, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523814", "by": "alibrarydweller", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I'm a happy self-hosted Monica user", "excerpt": "I'm a happy self-hosted Monica user, I like that I have alerts set to remind me of birthdays and other events, and that there's a place to list, e.g. everyone who got a Christmas card from me last year. I recommend it to people. I'm agnostic about a rewrite, I never used Chandler and as far as I'm concerned it's perfectly serviceable for me the end user as it is. I rarely use the UI. I have been contemplating interac", "context": "self-hosts it", "use_case": "birthday reminders, contact notes", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}]}, {"text": " The most common complaint is the project's direction,", "cites": [{"id": 792372000, "item_id": 49523250, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523250", "by": "skinfaxi", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "They lost me when they threw everything out and moved to Chandler. Now they're throwing everything out again.", "excerpt": "They lost me when they threw everything out and moved to Chandler. Now they're throwing everything out again. I love the idea, maybe it's time to vibecode an alternative.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 792403264, "item_id": 49525204, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49525204", "by": "mtlynch", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I tried using Monica self-hosted for about a year and felt like the authors of Monica had totally different priorities from me.", "excerpt": "I like the idea of Monica and having a way to remember things about friends and acquaintances. I tried using Monica self-hosted for about a year and felt like the authors of Monica had totally different priorities from me. This post captures it well: > Relationships are a good example. Storing that Monica is Ross's sister doesn't seem particularly complicated. But if Monica is Ross's sister, Ross is also Monica's bro", "context": "self-hosted user for a year", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}]}, {"text": " with long-time users put off by slow development and the journaling-focused Chandler rewrite.", "cites": [{"id": 787867857, "item_id": 49241741, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49241741", "by": "0XAFFE", "date": "2026-08-10", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I'm a long-time user of Monica", "excerpt": "I'm still working on Freundebuch, a personal CRM. I'm a long-time user of Monica (https://github.com/monicahq/monica/) but was unhappy that not much was happening. There is Chandler which is the next-gen version of Monica, but it has taken a direction which I don't like, as it is geared more to journaling. I required a tool where I can put my contacts with all their details and also map out their relationships and pu", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What are you working on? (August 2026)"}, {"id": 776622321, "item_id": 48538895, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48538895", "by": "0XAFFE", "date": "2026-06-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I'm a long-time user of Monica", "excerpt": "I'm working on Freundebuch, a personal CRM. I'm a long-time user of Monica (https://github.com/monicahq/monica/) but was unhappy that not much was happening. There is Chandler which is the next-gen version of Monica, but it has taken a direction which I don't like, as it is geared more to journaling. The thing that moved me to implement something myself was that the carddav interface duplicated the contacts in my add", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What are you working on? (June 2026)"}, {"id": 792372000, "item_id": 49523250, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523250", "by": "skinfaxi", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "They lost me when they threw everything out and moved to Chandler. Now they're throwing everything out again.", "excerpt": "They lost me when they threw everything out and moved to Chandler. Now they're throwing everything out again. I love the idea, maybe it's time to vibecode an alternative.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Birthday reminders", "summary": "Users value automatic reminders for birthdays and other events.", "quotes": [{"id": 792511840, "item_id": 49531990, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49531990", "by": "LelouBil", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it is at least a good carddav server to synchronize your contacts and auto add birthday reminders", "excerpt": "I have been using it for a couple of years. Not always using all the features but it is at least a good carddav server to synchronize your contacts and auto add birthday reminders to your calendar via caldav as well.", "context": "", "use_case": "contacts sync and birthday reminders", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 792381024, "item_id": 49523814, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523814", "by": "alibrarydweller", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I'm a happy self-hosted Monica user", "excerpt": "I'm a happy self-hosted Monica user, I like that I have alerts set to remind me of birthdays and other events, and that there's a place to list, e.g. everyone who got a Christmas card from me last year. I recommend it to people. I'm agnostic about a rewrite, I never used Chandler and as far as I'm concerned it's perfectly serviceable for me the end user as it is. I rarely use the UI. I have been contemplating interac", "context": "self-hosts it", "use_case": "birthday reminders, contact notes", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 756153888, "item_id": 47259618, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47259618", "by": "bobbiechen", "date": "2026-03-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use Monica https://www.monicahq.com/ which does advertise itself as a personal CRM.", "excerpt": "Not sure if it's top 3, but I use Monica https://www.monicahq.com/ which does advertise itself as a personal CRM. I certainly underutilize its features but things like birthday reminders + a place for a few notes (where do they live again? who's their partner?) is nice", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM, birthday reminders", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Poppy \u2013 a simple app to stay intentional with relationships"}]}, {"label": "The concept", "summary": "Even critics say they like the idea of a tool for remembering things about people.", "quotes": [{"id": 792369712, "item_id": 49523107, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523107", "by": "happyrock", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love the concept.", "excerpt": "I'd love to hear experiences of using Monica. I've been hesitant to try it out mostly due to my own ignorance of how to get existing data in there and get it into a usable state. But I love the concept.", "context": "Has not tried it yet", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 792403264, "item_id": 49525204, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49525204", "by": "mtlynch", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I tried using Monica self-hosted for about a year and felt like the authors of Monica had totally different priorities from me.", "excerpt": "I like the idea of Monica and having a way to remember things about friends and acquaintances. I tried using Monica self-hosted for about a year and felt like the authors of Monica had totally different priorities from me. This post captures it well: > Relationships are a good example. Storing that Monica is Ross's sister doesn't seem particularly complicated. But if Monica is Ross's sister, Ross is also Monica's bro", "context": "self-hosted user for a year", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 792372000, "item_id": 49523250, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523250", "by": "skinfaxi", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "They lost me when they threw everything out and moved to Chandler. Now they're throwing everything out again.", "excerpt": "They lost me when they threw everything out and moved to Chandler. Now they're throwing everything out again. I love the idea, maybe it's time to vibecode an alternative.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}]}, {"label": "Notes on people", "summary": "It gives users a place for details like where friends live, who their partners are, or who got a Christmas card.", "quotes": [{"id": 756153888, "item_id": 47259618, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47259618", "by": "bobbiechen", "date": "2026-03-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use Monica https://www.monicahq.com/ which does advertise itself as a personal CRM.", "excerpt": "Not sure if it's top 3, but I use Monica https://www.monicahq.com/ which does advertise itself as a personal CRM. I certainly underutilize its features but things like birthday reminders + a place for a few notes (where do they live again? who's their partner?) is nice", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM, birthday reminders", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Poppy \u2013 a simple app to stay intentional with relationships"}, {"id": 792381024, "item_id": 49523814, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523814", "by": "alibrarydweller", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I'm a happy self-hosted Monica user", "excerpt": "I'm a happy self-hosted Monica user, I like that I have alerts set to remind me of birthdays and other events, and that there's a place to list, e.g. everyone who got a Christmas card from me last year. I recommend it to people. I'm agnostic about a rewrite, I never used Chandler and as far as I'm concerned it's perfectly serviceable for me the end user as it is. I rarely use the UI. I have been contemplating interac", "context": "self-hosts it", "use_case": "birthday reminders, contact notes", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}]}, {"label": "Long-term use", "summary": "Several commenters report using it happily for years.", "quotes": [{"id": 786416881, "item_id": 49151055, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49151055", "by": "benkaiser", "date": "2026-08-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I have loved using Monica CRM for several years", "excerpt": "I have loved using Monica CRM for several years, but often times when clicking around the UI it just felt overly laborious compared to just speaking what I wanted to record. So over the last few months I've been putting together an alternative to Monica but with MCP usage first-class. It's open source under FSL-1.1-MIT, relatively lightweight (Node.js + SQLite) and makes managing your contacts very easy via natural l", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Mob \u2013 A personal CRM as an MCP server"}, {"id": 792511840, "item_id": 49531990, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49531990", "by": "LelouBil", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it is at least a good carddav server to synchronize your contacts and auto add birthday reminders", "excerpt": "I have been using it for a couple of years. Not always using all the features but it is at least a good carddav server to synchronize your contacts and auto add birthday reminders to your calendar via caldav as well.", "context": "", "use_case": "contacts sync and birthday reminders", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 792381024, "item_id": 49523814, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523814", "by": "alibrarydweller", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I'm a happy self-hosted Monica user", "excerpt": "I'm a happy self-hosted Monica user, I like that I have alerts set to remind me of birthdays and other events, and that there's a place to list, e.g. everyone who got a Christmas card from me last year. I recommend it to people. I'm agnostic about a rewrite, I never used Chandler and as far as I'm concerned it's perfectly serviceable for me the end user as it is. I rarely use the UI. I have been contemplating interac", "context": "self-hosts it", "use_case": "birthday reminders, contact notes", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}]}, {"label": "Contact sync", "summary": "It works as a CardDAV server for contacts and adds birthdays to calendars via CalDAV.", "quotes": [{"id": 792511840, "item_id": 49531990, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49531990", "by": "LelouBil", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it is at least a good carddav server to synchronize your contacts and auto add birthday reminders", "excerpt": "I have been using it for a couple of years. Not always using all the features but it is at least a good carddav server to synchronize your contacts and auto add birthday reminders to your calendar via caldav as well.", "context": "", "use_case": "contacts sync and birthday reminders", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Project direction", "summary": "Rewrites, including the move to the journaling-focused Chandler, alienated some users.", "quotes": [{"id": 792372000, "item_id": 49523250, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523250", "by": "skinfaxi", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "They lost me when they threw everything out and moved to Chandler. Now they're throwing everything out again.", "excerpt": "They lost me when they threw everything out and moved to Chandler. Now they're throwing everything out again. I love the idea, maybe it's time to vibecode an alternative.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 787867857, "item_id": 49241741, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49241741", "by": "0XAFFE", "date": "2026-08-10", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I'm a long-time user of Monica", "excerpt": "I'm still working on Freundebuch, a personal CRM. I'm a long-time user of Monica (https://github.com/monicahq/monica/) but was unhappy that not much was happening. There is Chandler which is the next-gen version of Monica, but it has taken a direction which I don't like, as it is geared more to journaling. I required a tool where I can put my contacts with all their details and also map out their relationships and pu", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What are you working on? (August 2026)"}, {"id": 792403264, "item_id": 49525204, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49525204", "by": "mtlynch", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I tried using Monica self-hosted for about a year and felt like the authors of Monica had totally different priorities from me.", "excerpt": "I like the idea of Monica and having a way to remember things about friends and acquaintances. I tried using Monica self-hosted for about a year and felt like the authors of Monica had totally different priorities from me. This post captures it well: > Relationships are a good example. Storing that Monica is Ross's sister doesn't seem particularly complicated. But if Monica is Ross's sister, Ross is also Monica's bro", "context": "self-hosted user for a year", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}]}, {"label": "Slow development", "summary": "Long-time users were unhappy that not much was happening with the project.", "quotes": [{"id": 787867857, "item_id": 49241741, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49241741", "by": "0XAFFE", "date": "2026-08-10", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I'm a long-time user of Monica", "excerpt": "I'm still working on Freundebuch, a personal CRM. I'm a long-time user of Monica (https://github.com/monicahq/monica/) but was unhappy that not much was happening. There is Chandler which is the next-gen version of Monica, but it has taken a direction which I don't like, as it is geared more to journaling. I required a tool where I can put my contacts with all their details and also map out their relationships and pu", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What are you working on? (August 2026)"}, {"id": 776622321, "item_id": 48538895, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48538895", "by": "0XAFFE", "date": "2026-06-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I'm a long-time user of Monica", "excerpt": "I'm working on Freundebuch, a personal CRM. I'm a long-time user of Monica (https://github.com/monicahq/monica/) but was unhappy that not much was happening. There is Chandler which is the next-gen version of Monica, but it has taken a direction which I don't like, as it is geared more to journaling. The thing that moved me to implement something myself was that the carddav interface duplicated the contacts in my add", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What are you working on? (June 2026)"}]}, {"label": "Fragile updates", "summary": "One self-hoster says updates are dicey, with many dependencies and breakage on every major update.", "quotes": [{"id": 792454800, "item_id": 49528425, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49528425", "by": "koralatov", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "My own instance is still on 4.0.0 despite 4.1.2 being out because I don\u2019t see a benefit in updating", "excerpt": "Not the OP, but I use a little Debian machine to self-host. It\u2019s fairly stable when running, but updates are dicey. It has too many dependencies and every major update has had some breakage that takes a while to fix. My own instance is still on 4.0.0 despite 4.1.2 being out because I don\u2019t see a benefit in updating and I don\u2019t want to risk spending three or four hours hunting through yarn dependencies to undo an upda", "context": "self-hosts on a Debian machine", "use_case": "self-hosted CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}]}, {"label": "Laborious UI", "summary": "One user found clicking through the UI to record things overly laborious.", "quotes": [{"id": 786416881, "item_id": 49151055, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49151055", "by": "benkaiser", "date": "2026-08-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I have loved using Monica CRM for several years", "excerpt": "I have loved using Monica CRM for several years, but often times when clicking around the UI it just felt overly laborious compared to just speaking what I wanted to record. So over the last few months I've been putting together an alternative to Monica but with MCP usage first-class. It's open source under FSL-1.1-MIT, relatively lightweight (Node.js + SQLite) and makes managing your contacts very easy via natural l", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Mob \u2013 A personal CRM as an MCP server"}]}, {"label": "Duplicate contacts", "summary": "One user reports the CardDAV interface duplicated contacts in their address book.", "quotes": [{"id": 776622321, "item_id": 48538895, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48538895", "by": "0XAFFE", "date": "2026-06-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I'm a long-time user of Monica", "excerpt": "I'm working on Freundebuch, a personal CRM. I'm a long-time user of Monica (https://github.com/monicahq/monica/) but was unhappy that not much was happening. There is Chandler which is the next-gen version of Monica, but it has taken a direction which I don't like, as it is geared more to journaling. The thing that moved me to implement something myself was that the carddav interface duplicated the contacts in my add", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What are you working on? (June 2026)"}]}, {"label": "Hosted downtime", "summary": "One user says the hosted platform went down many times about eight years ago.", "quotes": [{"id": 786869344, "item_id": 49179334, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49179334", "by": "bharatsuthar", "date": "2026-08-04", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I used their hosted platform about 8 years ago and It went down many times.", "excerpt": "I used their hosted platform about 8 years ago and It went down many times. I just checked it today and to my surprise, my data is still there. Very glad to find it.", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stephen Wolfram's Wife Has Died"}]}], "who": [{"by": "koralatov", "context": "self-hosts on a Debian machine", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49528425", "date": "2026-09-01"}, {"by": "alibrarydweller", "context": "self-hosts it", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523814", "date": "2026-09-01"}, {"by": "happyrock", "context": "Has not tried it yet", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523107", "date": "2026-09-01"}], "tags": ["self-hostable", "personal CRM", "for remembering birthdays", "CardDAV/CalDAV sync"], "use_cases": ["personal crm", "contacts sync and birthday reminders", "self-hosted crm", "birthday reminders, contact notes", "personal crm, birthday reminders"], "compared": [], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49509655", "title": "We are rebuilding Monica", "mentions": 7}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50169363", "title": "Show HN: Contrack \u2013 Self-hosted contact manager and people search", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49233423", "title": "Ask HN: What are you working on? (August 2026)", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49173165", "title": "Stephen Wolfram's Wife Has Died", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49151030", "title": "Mob \u2013 A personal CRM as an MCP server", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48528779", "title": "Ask HN: What are you working on? (June 2026)", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-07": {}, "2026-08": {"recommend": 1, "neutral": 2}, "2026-09": {"recommend": 3, "warn": 2, "neutral": 2}, "2026-10": {"neutral": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 802716128, "item_id": 50169758, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50169758", "by": "mxuribe", "date": "2026-10-20", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I kinda moved away from using Monica CRM, not because it failed me", "excerpt": "I saw this the other day, and seemed pretty cool! I kinda moved away from using Monica CRM, not because it failed me...but more so because i simply no longer needed a CRM per se. Still, the fact that self-hosting Contrack seems that slim is a really great attraction! Also, props to the dev for crafting some comparisons to other popular, known CRMs; well done!", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Contrack \u2013 Self-hosted contact manager and people search"}, {"id": 792511840, "item_id": 49531990, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49531990", "by": "LelouBil", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it is at least a good carddav server to synchronize your contacts and auto add birthday reminders", "excerpt": "I have been using it for a couple of years. Not always using all the features but it is at least a good carddav server to synchronize your contacts and auto add birthday reminders to your calendar via caldav as well.", "context": "", "use_case": "contacts sync and birthday reminders", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 792454800, "item_id": 49528425, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49528425", "by": "koralatov", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "My own instance is still on 4.0.0 despite 4.1.2 being out because I don\u2019t see a benefit in updating", "excerpt": "Not the OP, but I use a little Debian machine to self-host. It\u2019s fairly stable when running, but updates are dicey. It has too many dependencies and every major update has had some breakage that takes a while to fix. My own instance is still on 4.0.0 despite 4.1.2 being out because I don\u2019t see a benefit in updating and I don\u2019t want to risk spending three or four hours hunting through yarn dependencies to undo an upda", "context": "self-hosts on a Debian machine", "use_case": "self-hosted CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 792403264, "item_id": 49525204, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49525204", "by": "mtlynch", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I tried using Monica self-hosted for about a year and felt like the authors of Monica had totally different priorities from me.", "excerpt": "I like the idea of Monica and having a way to remember things about friends and acquaintances. I tried using Monica self-hosted for about a year and felt like the authors of Monica had totally different priorities from me. This post captures it well: > Relationships are a good example. Storing that Monica is Ross's sister doesn't seem particularly complicated. But if Monica is Ross's sister, Ross is also Monica's bro", "context": "self-hosted user for a year", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 792381024, "item_id": 49523814, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523814", "by": "alibrarydweller", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I'm a happy self-hosted Monica user", "excerpt": "I'm a happy self-hosted Monica user, I like that I have alerts set to remind me of birthdays and other events, and that there's a place to list, e.g. everyone who got a Christmas card from me last year. I recommend it to people. I'm agnostic about a rewrite, I never used Chandler and as far as I'm concerned it's perfectly serviceable for me the end user as it is. I rarely use the UI. I have been contemplating interac", "context": "self-hosts it", "use_case": "birthday reminders, contact notes", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 792378544, "item_id": 49523659, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523659", "by": "andrewla", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I tried out Monica when it was posted to hn ages ago and still get the occasional reminder.", "excerpt": "I tried out Monica when it was posted to hn ages ago and still get the occasional reminder. But I've mostly switched to using the contacts app on my iphone for everything. It has primitive features that support 95% of what I need.", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 792372000, "item_id": 49523250, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523250", "by": "skinfaxi", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "They lost me when they threw everything out and moved to Chandler. Now they're throwing everything out again.", "excerpt": "They lost me when they threw everything out and moved to Chandler. Now they're throwing everything out again. I love the idea, maybe it's time to vibecode an alternative.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 792369712, "item_id": 49523107, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49523107", "by": "happyrock", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love the concept.", "excerpt": "I'd love to hear experiences of using Monica. I've been hesitant to try it out mostly due to my own ignorance of how to get existing data in there and get it into a usable state. But I love the concept.", "context": "Has not tried it yet", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "We are rebuilding Monica"}, {"id": 787867857, "item_id": 49241741, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49241741", "by": "0XAFFE", "date": "2026-08-10", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I'm a long-time user of Monica", "excerpt": "I'm still working on Freundebuch, a personal CRM. I'm a long-time user of Monica (https://github.com/monicahq/monica/) but was unhappy that not much was happening. There is Chandler which is the next-gen version of Monica, but it has taken a direction which I don't like, as it is geared more to journaling. I required a tool where I can put my contacts with all their details and also map out their relationships and pu", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What are you working on? (August 2026)"}, {"id": 786869344, "item_id": 49179334, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49179334", "by": "bharatsuthar", "date": "2026-08-04", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I used their hosted platform about 8 years ago and It went down many times.", "excerpt": "I used their hosted platform about 8 years ago and It went down many times. I just checked it today and to my surprise, my data is still there. Very glad to find it.", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stephen Wolfram's Wife Has Died"}, {"id": 786416881, "item_id": 49151055, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49151055", "by": "benkaiser", "date": "2026-08-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I have loved using Monica CRM for several years", "excerpt": "I have loved using Monica CRM for several years, but often times when clicking around the UI it just felt overly laborious compared to just speaking what I wanted to record. So over the last few months I've been putting together an alternative to Monica but with MCP usage first-class. It's open source under FSL-1.1-MIT, relatively lightweight (Node.js + SQLite) and makes managing your contacts very easy via natural l", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Mob \u2013 A personal CRM as an MCP server"}, {"id": 776622321, "item_id": 48538895, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48538895", "by": "0XAFFE", "date": "2026-06-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I'm a long-time user of Monica", "excerpt": "I'm working on Freundebuch, a personal CRM. I'm a long-time user of Monica (https://github.com/monicahq/monica/) but was unhappy that not much was happening. There is Chandler which is the next-gen version of Monica, but it has taken a direction which I don't like, as it is geared more to journaling. The thing that moved me to implement something myself was that the carddav interface duplicated the contacts in my add", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What are you working on? (June 2026)"}, {"id": 756153888, "item_id": 47259618, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47259618", "by": "bobbiechen", "date": "2026-03-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use Monica https://www.monicahq.com/ which does advertise itself as a personal CRM.", "excerpt": "Not sure if it's top 3, but I use Monica https://www.monicahq.com/ which does advertise itself as a personal CRM. I certainly underutilize its features but things like birthday reminders + a place for a few notes (where do they live again? who's their partner?) is nice", "context": "", "use_case": "personal CRM, birthday reminders", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Poppy \u2013 a simple app to stay intentional with relationships"}]}