Instead of Canva
Templates and drag-and-drop design for non-designers.
Keep paying
Canva's product is the template library and the stock assets, and neither is something you host. Self-hosting the editor gets you the hard part without the useful part.
You lose: Everything that made it fast.
Start here
Penpot
A real design tool. It assumes you can design.
github.com/penpot/penpotpenpot.app
A compose file, a domain and a reverse proxy.
One alternative is all there is, and it is a stretch. That is what this verdict means.
Facts checked 8 November 2026. Licences, activity and archive status come from each project's own repository; the verdict and the cost lines are the desk's.