Google is hard to leave because it is not one app you delete. It is the plumbing under half your digital life. Gmail handles your email. Drive stores your files. Photos keeps your memories. Docs, Sheets and Slides run your work. Search decides what you see before you even know what you are looking for.
But leaving Google is less dramatic than it looks. Plenty of the services people rely on now have solid self hosted replacements. Not perfect clones. Not privacy theatre. Actual software you can run on a server you control, with your data sitting on infrastructure you own or rent.
Some swaps are easy. Some are mildly annoying. A few are only worth doing if you enjoy arguing with DNS records, storage permissions, cron jobs, and your own life choices.
This is the practical list: what replaces what, what is worth running, and where the pain starts.
What counts here
A tool makes this list only if you can run the server yourself, keep the data on infrastructure you control, and realistically use it for personal or small business work.
This is not a list of privacy friendly SaaS products. Proton, Fastmail, Ente, Tuta, and similar services may be good options, but they are still hosted for you. Useful, yes. Self hosted, no.
The migration order that makes sense
Do not start with Gmail. That path leads to three evenings of DNS debugging, a new hatred of SPF records, and one test email that somehow lands in spam anyway.
Start with the boring wins. Move the services where the swap is clean and the stakes are low. Build confidence before you touch anything that can break your business, your calendar, or your ability to reset passwords.
A sensible order:
- Analytics
- Notes and tasks
- Photos
- Files and documents
- Calendar and contacts
- Passwords
- Video calls and chat
- Search
- Email, last
Google Analytics → Umami or Matomo
This is the low drama migration. If you own a website and still have Google Analytics installed mostly out of habit, start here.
Umami runs on a single Docker Compose file with Postgres. It gives you the numbers most people actually check: page views, referrers, devices, countries, and custom events. The interface is simple enough that a client can open it without needing a guided tour through a dashboard designed by committee.
Matomo covers more ground. Funnels, heatmaps, A/B testing, ecommerce tracking, segmentation. If you are migrating a reporting setup that your team actually uses, Matomo is the closer replacement. It needs PHP, MySQL, and a bit more server headroom than Umami.
Difficulty: Easy (Umami) / Medium (Matomo)
Google Keep → Memos
Memos is a self hosted note-taking app focused on quick capture. Text entries, tags, markdown support, a timeline view. It runs as a single Docker container with SQLite, so there is nothing to configure beyond the container itself.
It is not Notion, and that is the point. Memos is for quick capture: stray ideas, links, reminders, commands, rough notes, and the little scraps of text that normally end up in Google Keep because opening a proper notes system feels like too much ceremony.
Difficulty: Easy
Google Photos → Immich
Immich is the closest thing to a proper Google Photos replacement available. Native iOS and Android backup apps, a timeline layout, facial recognition, semantic search, shared albums, and map view. The mobile apps handle background upload the way Google Photos does.
The catch is hardware. Basic photo backup is easy enough. Face recognition, semantic search, thumbnails, and video transcoding are where the server starts to matter. You can run Immich on modest hardware, but do not expect a tiny VPS to feel like Google Photos once your library gets large.
Nextcloud Photos exists if you are already running Nextcloud and want a simpler option. It is less polished but requires no extra infrastructure.
Difficulty: Easy to install, medium in production if you want ML features working properly
Google Drive → Nextcloud
Nextcloud is the most direct replacement for Google Drive, and if you are going to run one self hosted tool from this list, this is probably it. Desktop sync clients, mobile apps, browser access, file sharing with permissions, and versioning. It covers the core Drive use case.
It can also do calendar, contacts, office documents, chat, video calls, forms, bookmarks, notes, and half a dozen other jobs if you keep adding apps. That is the appeal and the trap. Nextcloud can become the centre of your self hosted setup, but it is not something you install once and forget. Reverse proxy configuration, background jobs, database tuning, file permissions, and updates all matter.
A small VPS with 2GB of RAM can work for light use. For something you actually depend on, give it more room.
Seafile is a lighter alternative if you only need file sync and do not want the full groupware stack.
Difficulty: Medium
Google Docs, Sheets and Slides → ONLYOFFICE or Nextcloud Office
If you are already running Nextcloud, Nextcloud Office with Collabora gives you collaborative editing of documents, spreadsheets, and presentations in the browser.
ONLYOFFICE Docs is the other serious option. It handles .docx, .xlsx, and .pptx formats well, and integrates with Nextcloud or can run standalone. For internal documents, either option can work well. For client work, expect friction. The closer people are to Microsoft Office or Google Docs habits, the more likely they are to notice formatting differences, missing shortcuts, odd comments behaviour, or the general feeling that this is not the tool they normally use.
Difficulty: Medium (as part of Nextcloud) / Medium to hard (ONLYOFFICE standalone)
Google Calendar and Contacts → Nextcloud Groupware
If you have Nextcloud, add the Calendar and Contacts apps. They expose CalDAV and CardDAV endpoints your devices can sync to natively. On Android, DAVx5 handles the sync reliably. iPhone supports both protocols without extra software.
If you do not want the full Nextcloud stack, Radicale is a minimal CalDAV/CardDAV server that runs on almost nothing. It handles the sync use case without any of the file storage overhead.
Difficulty: Easy (with Nextcloud already running) / Easy (Radicale standalone)
Gmail → mailcow
mailcow is a Docker-based email suite that covers SMTP, IMAP, spam filtering, webmail, DKIM, SPF and DMARC management, and a reasonable admin UI. From a software standpoint, it can replace Gmail.
The software is not the scary part. Deliverability is. Running a mail server means dealing with IP reputation, reverse DNS, SPF, DKIM, DMARC, blocklists, rate limits, spam scoring, and the quiet hostility of big inbox providers. A freshly provisioned VPS IP has no reputation. New mail servers get scrutinised. Google and Microsoft’s inbound filters are aggressive. Reliable delivery is achievable, but beginners should not treat it like installing a notes app. You are not just running software. You are trying to persuade Gmail, Outlook, and Yahoo that your little VPS is not a spam cannon.
Run mailcow if you understand what PTR records and DMARC reports are, or if you are willing to learn. Otherwise, the effort is better spent elsewhere on this list first.
Alternatives worth knowing: Mailu for a simpler setup, Stalwart Mail Server if you want something newer and written in Rust.
Difficulty: Hard
Google Search → SearXNG
SearXNG is a self hosted metasearch engine. It queries other search providers and returns results without tracking or profiling you. You can weight sources, disable others, and run it for yourself or a small group.
Important distinction: SearXNG is not crawling and indexing the web for you. It is a privacy layer in front of other search engines. The search quality is similar to whatever sources you configure, which can include Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, and others. The difference is that your queries go through your own server rather than directly to those providers.
Difficulty: Easy
Google Maps → OpenStreetMap stack
This is where the neat comparison breaks. There is no self hosted Google Maps replacement in the same way Nextcloud replaces Google Drive.
What exists is a set of infrastructure pieces: OpenStreetMap data for the underlying map, TileServer GL for serving map tiles, Nominatim for geocoding addresses, and OSRM or Valhalla for routing. Running all of that is a legitimate infrastructure project, not a SaaS swap.
If you want a privacy respecting maps app, Organic Maps and OsmAnd both run on your device using OpenStreetMap data, with no server to maintain. That is the sensible choice for most people.
Self hosting the full mapping stack makes sense if you are building a product that needs maps without a per-request API bill, not if you want to stop using Google Maps on your phone.
Difficulty: Hard (infrastructure project)
Google Meet → Jitsi Meet
Jitsi Meet covers browser-based video calls without accounts. Guests join via link, no software required. It works for small team calls, client meetings, and community calls.
Resource requirements scale with participant count. A $5-10/month VPS handles a few participants. Larger calls need more CPU and bandwidth. Do not make your first test call the important one. Try it with the same number of people, on the same type of connection, before you use it for a client meeting or community event.
Difficulty: Medium
Google Chat → Mattermost or Matrix
Mattermost is the closer replacement for Google Chat inside a team or organisation. Channels, threads, search, integrations, and a reasonable mobile app. It is built for team communication and does not try to federate with the wider internet.
Matrix with the Element client covers more ground, including federation with other Matrix servers. Use Mattermost if you want something your team can understand in five minutes. Use Matrix if federation, open protocols, and interoperability matter more than polish.
Difficulty: Medium (Mattermost) / Medium to hard (Matrix Synapse)
Google Forms → Formbricks
Formbricks handles forms, surveys, and product feedback. The hosted version is well maintained, and the self hosted Docker setup is straightforward. It is better suited to product feedback and lightweight surveys than heavy survey research work.
For more complex survey needs, LimeSurvey has a longer track record and more question types.
Difficulty: Easy
YouTube → PeerTube
PeerTube lets you host and publish video on your own server. It supports federation with other PeerTube instances, comments, playlists, and live streaming.
The hard truth: PeerTube replaces YouTube hosting, not YouTube distribution. It gives you control over the video. It does not give you YouTube’s audience, recommendation engine, search demand, or casual drive by traffic. If your goal is to publish videos that people find organically, YouTube still wins by a margin that no self hosted tool can close. If your goal is to host video for a course, a community, a private library, or an organisation’s internal use, PeerTube is a reasonable choice.
Bandwidth is the practical limit. Video is expensive to serve. A content delivery setup or object storage with a CDN in front of it is worth planning before you start uploading.
Difficulty: Medium (with serious infrastructure caveats for high-traffic video)
Google Password Manager → Vaultwarden
Vaultwarden is a lightweight, self hosted implementation of the Bitwarden server API, written in Rust. It runs in a single Docker container on less than 100MB of RAM and is compatible with all official Bitwarden apps and browser extensions.
The main risk with a self hosted password manager is the server going down or the data getting corrupted. Handle this with regular encrypted backups and test your restore. Lose access to Vaultwarden with no backup and you lose access to every credential it stores.
Worth running, but only after backups are boring. A password manager is not the place to learn that your restore process was mostly vibes.
Difficulty: Easy to install, requires discipline around backups
Starter stacks
For someone starting out: Umami, Memos, SearXNG, Vaultwarden, then Nextcloud or Immich. Start with the services that are easy to restore and annoying rather than catastrophic when they break.
Do not put your family photos, password vault, and work files onto a server you barely understand on day one.
For a small business: Nextcloud with ONLYOFFICE, Mattermost, Jitsi, Matomo, Formbricks, Vaultwarden. More moving parts, but it covers files, documents, communication, calls, analytics, forms, and passwords.
For privacy-first personal use: Nextcloud, mailcow, Immich, Matrix Synapse, SearXNG, Vaultwarden. The mailcow and Matrix pieces require more setup, but this stack keeps the vast majority of personal data off third-party servers.
What you probably should not self host first
Do not self host email first unless you are comfortable managing DNS, IP reputation, and deliverability problems.
Do not self host a maps stack unless you are building a product that actually needs it.
Do not self host public video at scale unless you have storage, bandwidth, and CDN costs worked out.
Do not self host passwords without encrypted backups and a tested restore.
Do not self host anything for non technical family members unless you are happy becoming the help desk forever.
The tradeoff nobody escapes
Self hosting gives you control, but it does not give you freedom from maintenance. The server still needs updates. Containers still break. Databases still need backups. Disk space still fills up at the worst possible time. At some point you will either get an alert from your own uptime monitor or, worse, find out from someone else.
Google’s infrastructure is boringly reliable in a way your cheap VPS will not be. That reliability has value. So does not handing one company your email, files, photos, analytics, calendars, searches, and half your working life.
That is the trade. Self hosting is not about pretending the work disappears. It is about choosing where the work goes, who controls the data, and what kind of inconvenience you are willing to live with.
Start with one boring service. Keep it running. Back it up. Restore it once. Then add the next.
Use the SelfHostTools directory to compare self hosted tools by category, Google replacement, and deployment difficulty before you start turning your digital life into a weekend infrastructure project.