See what Haven (havenweb.org) offers in 2026: private self-hosted blogging, pricing, key features, pros and cons, and the best alternatives to explore.
Researched and fact-checked by Bartu Cavusoglu · Updated July 18, 2026
Haven is an open-source, self-hosted blogging platform built for people who want to share photos and updates privately with a specific group of friends or family rather than post publicly. It was created by an independent developer who was frustrated with WordPress's complexity and spam problems and wanted a simpler, private way to share family photos.
Unlike a public blog, a Haven site has no way to be made visible to the general internet. Every visitor needs an account the owner creates for them, every connection is encrypted, and there is no advertising, tracking or algorithmic feed anywhere in the product.
Haven includes a markdown post editor with live preview, per-account access control so the owner decides exactly who can see the site, a private RSS feed for followers, and a built-in RSS reader so owners can follow other Havens or outside blogs from the same interface.
Because each Haven is single-tenant and runs on infrastructure the owner controls or rents, it can run on hardware as small as a Raspberry Pi or a low-cost cloud virtual machine, and it is most commonly deployed using Docker.
Haven's source code is free and open source under the MIT license, so anyone comfortable with Docker can self-host it at no cost beyond their own server. For people who prefer not to manage infrastructure themselves, Haven also offers an official hosted plan on a dedicated virtual server for five dollars per month, plus a fully managed hosting option for those who want setup and maintenance handled for them.
There are no tiered feature plans; the paid options are purely about who manages the hosting, not about unlocking additional functionality.
Haven is used to run a private, self-hosted blog or photo-sharing site that only people you explicitly invite can see, such as extended family or a close friend group.
Yes, Haven's source code is free and open source under the MIT license. There is also an optional hosted plan starting at 5 dollars a month for people who do not want to manage their own server.
Self-hosting Haven with Docker is easiest for people comfortable with basic server administration. Less technical users can use Haven's paid or fully managed hosting instead.
No. Haven has no public visibility mode; only accounts the owner creates can access the site, and it is not designed to be indexed or discoverable.
Haven was created by an independent developer who wanted a simpler, private alternative to WordPress for sharing family photos, and it has been maintained as an open-source project since.
Substack and WordPress.com are built for public, discoverable publishing and, in Substack's case, monetization. Haven is built for the opposite use case: small, private, ad-free sharing with people you already know.