Self-Hosting
Self-Hosting
What It Is
Running your own services on hardware you control — instead of renting them from cloud providers. Your own Google, running in your home/office.
Not a hobby. It's infrastructure independence.
Why People Don't Do It
| Excuse | Reality |
|---|---|
| "Too complex" | Docker + a good OS makes it one-click now |
| "Too expensive" | One-time ₹57K vs ₹100-300/month forever. Pays for itself in 2-3 years |
| "Can't match cloud reliability" | ZFS snapshots, automated backups, Tailscale VPN. More reliable than "we'll shut down your account" |
| "No support" | Community support is better than most corporate helpdesks. And you can actually see what's going wrong |
The Stack (What We Run)
Full catalog: MoC - App Store & Products
Core self-hosted services replacing 23+ cloud subscriptions:
- Storage: Nextcloud (Google Drive), Syncthing (NAS)
- Media: Immich (Google Photos), Jellyfin (Netflix), Stremio
- Search: SearxNG (Google)
- Security: Frigate NVR (Ring/Nest), AdGuard Home (pi-hole)
- AI: LobeChat (ChatGPT), n8n (Zapier)
- Comms: Zulip (Slack), Jitsi (Zoom), Proton (Gmail)
- Productivity: OnlyOffice (MS Office), GLPI (ServiceNow)
Infrastructure: Proxmox + Docker + Tailscale + OPNSense. Details in Wiki for Homelab & Data.
The Economics
| Cloud | Self-Hosted | |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly cost | ₹100-300/month per service | ₹0/month after hardware |
| Data speed | 100Mbps (ISP limited) | 5,000-20,000Mbps local |
| Privacy | Their servers, their rules | Your hardware, your rules |
| Ownership | Renting. They can change terms anytime | Bought. Yours forever |
| Scaling | Pay more | Add a drive |
Who This Is For
Anyone tired of subscription slavery. Businesses that need data localization. People who've been burned by cloud outages, price hikes, or privacy breaches. R&D firms that can't risk IP on foreign servers.
Not for: people who want someone else to handle everything. Those people stay on cloud and pay the tax.
I self-host everything and sell the same setup. The stack in my house IS the product. 5Gb local network, 20+ services replaced, zero telemetry to foreign servers. The biggest misconception: self-hosting is for nerds. Wrong. With the right OS layer — it's for anyone who can use an app store. That's what ServaLabs OS is building.