Managed hosting from
£25/month +VAT
Small resource profile: 1 vCPU, 2 GB RAM, 10 GB SSD storage. Typically suits teams of up to 50 documentation users. Deployment, upgrades, daily backups, monitoring, SSL and UK hosting included, with no per-user fees. How our pricing works
A knowledge base your team will actually keep tidy.
Documentation tools either lock your knowledge in a vendor's cloud and charge per user, or they are free-form wikis that turn into an unsearchable mess within a year. BookStack is the open source alternative that solves both problems: a documentation platform with a deliberately clear structure of shelves, books, chapters and pages, self-hosted so all of your knowledge stays on infrastructure you control. Node deploys and manages BookStack as a production service hosted in the UK, so your team gets a fast, well-organised knowledge base without running it themselves or paying per seat.
What BookStack is
BookStack is an open source wiki and documentation platform designed around one good idea: knowledge is easier to write, find and maintain when it has a clear structure.
That structure is a simple hierarchy of shelves, books, chapters and pages, which keeps even large documentation sets navigable and tidy. On top of it sit a WYSIWYG and Markdown editor that makes writing pages easy for everyone, full-text search and cross-linking so people find answers fast, page version history so every change is tracked and reversible, and role-based permissions down to individual books and pages so you can mix open and restricted content in one place.
The result is a documentation platform that is genuinely pleasant to use, which is the only kind that stays up to date, with the ownership and cost model of open source underneath.
Why BookStack with Node
No per-user subscription - hosted documentation tools charge for every reader and writer, so the cost grows with the size of your organisation. BookStack has no per-user licence. A managed deployment is a predictable cost no matter how many people use it.
Your knowledge stays yours - runbooks, policies, processes and product documentation live on UK infrastructure you control, in open formats, never trapped inside a proprietary tool you would have to migrate out of by hand.
Structure that stays tidy - the shelf, book, chapter and page model gives large documentation sets a backbone, so your knowledge base stays usable rather than decaying into an unsearchable pile.
Single sign-on and control - we integrate BookStack with your identity provider so the team logs in centrally and leavers lose access immediately, with permissions set so the right people see the right content.
What teams use BookStack for
BookStack suits any team that needs a single, reliable home for written knowledge, and a few uses come up again and again.
Internal knowledge base - processes, policies, how-tos and onboarding material in one searchable place, so answers do not live only in people's heads or scattered chat threads.
Technical and operational runbooks - the documentation engineers reach for during an incident, kept structured and versioned so it is trustworthy when it matters.
Product and customer documentation - user guides and reference material, with permissions that let you publish some content while keeping internal notes private.
Compliance and policy records - controlled documents with version history and access control, giving you a clear, auditable record of what was published and when.
How BookStack fits with the rest of your platform
BookStack sits naturally alongside the wider open source platform Node manages for you. It draws on the same identity through Keycloak single sign-on so your team logs in centrally, complements file storage and collaboration in your Nextcloud private cloud, and pairs with Documenso and your document workflows where controlled, signed records are needed. The platform is watched continuously by our Zabbix and Grafana monitoring so the knowledge base your team depends on stays available.
Open source Confluence and Notion alternative
BookStack is the open source alternative to Confluence and Notion. It gives your team the same structured documentation, rich editing, full-text search, version history and access control, but self-hosted, so you own your knowledge base and you do not pay per user.
| Confluence / Notion | BookStack | |
|---|---|---|
| Cost model | Per-user monthly subscription across your whole team | No per-user licence, one predictable managed fee |
| Data location | Vendor cloud on their terms | UK infrastructure you control |
| Feature gating | Permissions and admin features held behind higher tiers | Full platform available, nothing gated |
| Customisation | Limited to what the vendor exposes | Open source, adaptable to your structure and branding |
| Lock-in | Export is awkward and content stays with the vendor | Open formats, your documentation leaves cleanly whenever you want |
Documentation you rent, in a structure that rots - per-user documentation SaaS charges your whole organisation to read and write, and the free-form alternatives decay into an unsearchable mess. A managed BookStack platform from Node gives you a clean, structured, searchable knowledge base, keeps your documentation on infrastructure you own, and replaces per-seat pricing with a predictable managed service on UK infrastructure.
Adoption and community
18k+ GitHub stars The BookStack project does not publish adoption figures, but it has been in continuous open source development since 2015 and is typically adopted by IT teams, schools and small organisations for internal documentation.
“when I tried BookStack I knew I found my solution: Loads amazingly fast, while running in the simplest environments as it's PHP.”
Hacker News
“My favourite PHP product at the moment is BookStack... a really good wiki. I run an instance for my family and it's great.”
Hacker News
“I went with Bookstack for a wiki to be used by a group of people. The interface and fonts are pretty, it's super fast, installation is easy, and automatic updates have been problem free so far.”
Hacker News
Quotes are from public community discussions, linked to their original sources.
Frequently asked questions
What is BookStack?
BookStack is an open source wiki and documentation platform. It organises knowledge into a simple, intuitive structure of shelves, books, chapters and pages, with a WYSIWYG editor, full-text search, page versioning and permissions. It can be self-hosted so all of your documentation stays on infrastructure you control. Node Digital deploys and manages BookStack for UK organisations.
Is BookStack a good alternative to Confluence or Notion?
Yes. BookStack covers the core of team documentation - structured pages, rich editing, search, version history and access control - without the per-user monthly subscription those platforms charge, and without your knowledge living in a vendor's cloud. For teams that want a clean, well-organised knowledge base they fully own, a managed BookStack platform from Node is a strong, cost-predictable alternative.
How does BookStack organise documentation?
BookStack uses a deliberately simple hierarchy: shelves hold books, books hold chapters, and chapters hold pages. That structure makes large documentation sets easy to navigate and easy to keep tidy, which is where free-form wikis often fall down. Full-text search and cross-linking sit on top so people find what they need quickly.
Does BookStack support permissions and version history?
Yes. BookStack provides role-based permissions down to individual books and pages, so you can keep some documentation open and other parts restricted, and every page keeps a full revision history so changes are tracked and can be rolled back. It is well suited to internal knowledge bases, runbooks, policies and customer-facing documentation alike.
Who hosts and supports BookStack in the UK?
Node Digital runs BookStack as a managed service on UK infrastructure or in your own cloud, handling deployment, upgrades, security, backups, monitoring and single sign-on so your team logs in with your existing identity.
Is BookStack a good open source alternative to Confluence and Notion?
Yes. BookStack is a strong open source alternative to Confluence and Notion. It offers structured pages, rich WYSIWYG and Markdown editing, full-text search, version history and role-based permissions, without the per-user subscription those platforms charge, and it can be self-hosted so your documentation stays on infrastructure you control.
Can we migrate from Confluence or Notion to BookStack?
Yes. Content from Confluence and Notion can be exported and imported into BookStack, and Node Digital helps map your existing spaces and pages into the shelf, book, chapter and page structure. Because BookStack stores content in open formats on infrastructure you own, you avoid the lock-in that makes leaving a hosted wiki difficult.
Talk to us about your knowledge base.
Drop us a line and our team will discuss your documentation needs and how a managed BookStack platform can give you a knowledge base you own and your team will keep tidy.
Our heritage
These projects were delivered by Tokyo Digital, acquired by Node in May 2023 and now a wholly owned subsidiary of Node DT Group. The same team builds and runs the Node platform today.