Forgejo
Self-hosted, lightweight Git forge with issues, pull requests and CI; a community fork of Gitea.
Liked as an easy, lightweight self-hosted Git forge1234 that feels close to GitHub, including its Actions-style CI,567 and as a fast, reliable way off GitHub's outages.891011 Complaints are scattered: GitHub compatibility is close but not complete,1213 and running an instance for outside users takes extra configuration work.1415
Why people recommend it
Easy self-hosting · 3
Commenters say it is lightweight, easy to install and needs little maintenance.
“I personally host a forgejo instance on a private VPS ; so far almost no maintenance”
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“We switched our entire product studio to a self hosted Forgejo https://forgejo.org/ and honestly this has been one of our best decisions”
GitHub-like · 3
Its interface, APIs and Actions-style CI are described as close to GitHub's.
“I recommend giving forgejo a try. The experience is much more similar to what GitHub offers”
“forgejo has the closest compatibility with Github Actions though so it's a good off-Github option”
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“We're moving over to self-hosted forgejo. Interface is roughly similar, featureset is roughly similar enough.”
Speed · 3
Users describe it as snappy and very fast in daily use.
“after I saw how unbelievably fast it was, I’ve moved everything over”
“I moved to a self-hosted Forgejo, with a self-hosted runner on another cheap Hetzner server. It's amazing how clean, snappy, and reliable it is.”
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Smooth migration · 3
Teams and individuals report quick, painless moves from GitHub or Gitea.
“I work at a SMB (~60 employees) and we switched to Forgejo in a couple days”
“I migrated my Gitea instance to Forgejo, it was pretty painless”
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“Forgejo is great if you don't mind hosting yourself.”
Fewer outages · 3
Self-hosters say switching ended the downtime they had with GitHub.
“Ever since I switched to Forgejo (could do Gitea or other self-hosted too), my outages have gone down to basically zero.”
“We moved our repos at work to a self-hosted Forgejo 2 months ago because the regular outages were getting ridiculous, looks like a pretty good call now.”
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“Tangled, Codeberg or self-hosted Forgejo (my approach) or Gitea are all good alternative solutions here.”
Non-profit governance · 3
Some prefer it because it is developed under a non-profit and is working on federation.
“Gitea is developed by a for-profit organisation while Forgejo is developed by a non-profit.”
“is developed in the interest of the general public.”
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“Forgejo is working on federation”
Caveats and dissent
Partial compatibility · 3
GitHub API and Actions compatibility is described as mostly there, not 100%.
“forgejo is more compatible than gitea”
“gitea/forgejo both do an 80% job of covering these needs”
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“forgejo has the closest compatibility with Github Actions though so it's a good off-Github option”
Setup complexity · 1
One commenter found a public multi-user instance required many auth and config decisions.
“I realized this was really only for hobbyists”
No federation yet · 1
Outsiders can't easily file issues on a private instance until federation arrives, and a gh-style CLI is missing.
“forgejo for hosting, woodpecker for CI/CD.”
Security fix · 1
A critical bug let malicious template repositories run processes on the host before it was patched.
“A malicious template repository could be used to read arbitrary data from the Forgejo host, and to execute arbitrary processes on the Forgejo host”
Crawler protection · 1
A self-hoster's main upkeep was protecting the instance from AI crawlers.
“I personally host a forgejo instance on a private VPS ; so far almost no maintenance”
Monolithic design · 1
One commenter dislikes that forges like it bundle everything instead of using separate components.
“I have a pretty bad taste in my mouth from GitHub, GitLab, Forgejo, Gitea, etc.”
Often compared with
16 moved from GitHub to Forgejo
1 moved from Forgejo to GitHubGitea46 comments mention both
5 moved from Gitea to Forgejo
1 moved from Forgejo to Gitea
7 moved from GitLab to ForgejoCodeberg31 comments mention both
1 moved from Codeberg to ForgejoRadicle5 comments mention bothGitHub Actions3 comments mention both
1 moved from GitHub Actions to Forgejo
1 moved from Forgejo to Fossil
Who recommends it in their own words
Threads where it came up
- Ask HN: Alternatives to GitHub 56 mentions
- Forgejo <=16.0.3 Critical RCE 3 mentions
- Disruption with Some GitHub Services – Resolved 3 mentions
- I Regret Migrating to Codeberg 3 mentions
- Why I'm leaving GitHub for Forgejo 3 mentions
- I Like GitLab 3 mentions
Data: forgejo.json. Quotes are verbatim; the verdict and theme labels are written by a model from these comments, and every clause links to its sources.
All comments 51
“Ever since I switched to Forgejo (could do Gitea or other self-hosted too), my outages have gone down to basically zero.”
“forgejo”
“I then sync the files to a git repo (selfhosted forgejo)”
“Forgejo/Gitea as local git server”
“I run the following services / apps.”
“though I'd need one that works with Forgejo”
“Tangled, Codeberg or self-hosted Forgejo (my approach) or Gitea are all good alternative solutions here.”
“I can also recommend hosting your own Gitea/Forgejo instance, it has an automatic repository mirroring feature”
“if like me you run a private forgejo instance with closed signups and limited repository creation”
“If you are self-hosting Forgejo and haven't done it yet, consider creating a Codeberg account”
“A malicious template repository could be used to read arbitrary data from the Forgejo host, and to execute arbitrary processes on the Forgejo host”
“then to my own self hosted forgejo on hetzner”
“code pushed to Forgejo”
“I only use them for a few private repos myself though”
“I work at a SMB (~60 employees) and we switched to Forgejo in a couple days”
“same for all of my self hosted Forgejo instances”
“thinking of upgrading to Forgejo”
“I recommend giving forgejo a try. The experience is much more similar to what GitHub offers”
“run a local Forgejo instance (just like OP) and have the Dockerised Claude instances work in that”
“I currently run a Forgejo instance for a small team”
“the fact that they had cloned Actions is what persuaded me to drop it”
“I switched to Forgejo and there's nothing I miss.”
“if I was an enterprise I would definitely be self hosting with Forgejo or Gerrit or whatever”
“Re Forgejo actions, I'm just toying around.”
“it's best to invest all effort into a decentralized solution, like Radicle[1][2] or federated Forgejo[3][4]”
“Forgejo, and by extent Codeberg, has the punchcard-like feature”
“Works just fine”
“I did and then rolled back.”
“I'm very happy to have invested some time and effort to setup my personal Forgejo instance”
“Have been running self-hosted forgejo for a while now. Work's like a charm.”
“Dead simple to host”
“I accidentally upgraded my Gitea instance beyond the fork which makes this more difficult...”
“this is our stack too”
“We switched our entire product studio to a self hosted Forgejo https://forgejo.org/ and honestly this has been one of our best decisions”
“it's been working fantastically”
“gitea/forgejo both do an 80% job of covering these needs”
“forgejo is great”
“I migrated my Gitea instance to Forgejo, it was pretty painless”
“Have you looked at migrating to Forgejo?”
“if you want full control and to deploy on your own, consider forgejo”
“It's great for lightweight self hosting”
“forgejo for hosting, woodpecker for CI/CD.”
“after I saw how unbelievably fast it was, I’ve moved everything over”
“forgejo has the closest compatibility with Github Actions though so it's a good off-Github option”
“Forgejo/Gitea is lightweight and easy to setup.”
“Forgejo is great to self host.”
“forgejo is more compatible than gitea”
“We're moving over to self-hosted forgejo. Interface is roughly similar, featureset is roughly similar enough.”
“I moved to a self-hosted Forgejo, with a self-hosted runner on another cheap Hetzner server. It's amazing how clean, snappy, and reliable it is.”
“We moved our repos at work to a self-hosted Forgejo 2 months ago because the regular outages were getting ridiculous, looks like a pretty good call now.”
“I realized this was really only for hobbyists”