Dokploy and Hangar offer a similar way to work: deploy from Git, run databases next to your apps, use Docker Compose when you need it, add domains with HTTPS. The difference is who runs the machines. Dokploy is software you install on servers you own and operate. Hangar is a managed service: the servers, their updates and their capacity are ours to run.
Facts about Dokploy below come from its public pricing page, documentation and GitHub repository as of October 2026. Check dokploy.com for the current state.
At a glance
| Hangar | Dokploy | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Managed deployment platform | Platform you self-host; source on GitHub, with some features under a separate license |
| Who runs the servers | Hangar | You, on any provider |
| What you pay for | Usage: CPU, memory, storage, egress | Your servers, plus Dokploy Cloud per server if you use it |
| Server updates, security patches, capacity | Included | Your job |
| Docker Compose | Yes | Yes |
| Preview per pull request | Yes, on GitHub | Yes, on GitHub |
| Rollbacks | Yes | Yes |
| Point-in-time database recovery | PostgreSQL, MySQL, MariaDB, on plans that include it | Not documented |
| Traces and request metrics | OpenTelemetry traces and HTTP requests per service | Not documented |
| Spend limits | Per organization and per project | Not applicable: you pay for servers |
Who operates what
With Dokploy you install the platform on a server with one command and add more servers over SSH. The deploy workflow is taken care of; the servers are not. Operating system updates, disk space, Docker upgrades, firewall rules and failed nodes are yours to handle.
Dokploy Cloud hosts the dashboard for you. Its documentation is explicit that you connect your own servers and that your code and data never leave them. In October 2026 the Hobby plan costs $4.50 a month per server, for one server and one user, and the Startup plan starts at $15 a month for up to 3 servers, with more at $4.50 each. Enterprise is priced on request.
On Hangar there is no server to connect. You pick a region and deploy.
Pricing
- Dokploy: free to self-host. You pay for servers sized for your peak, busy or idle, plus a per-server fee if you use Dokploy Cloud, plus the time spent operating them.
- Hangar: a plan whose monthly price becomes usage credit, then metered CPU, memory, storage and egress. A quiet service costs little, and you can cap spending per organization and per project. Rates are on the pricing page, with an estimator.
If you already run servers well and your load is steady, self-hosting can cost less in cash. If you would rather not be on call for infrastructure, or your load varies, Hangar usually costs less in total.
Backups and recovery
Both can back up databases on a schedule to S3-compatible storage, and both can back up volumes.
On Hangar, PostgreSQL, MySQL and MariaDB can also be recovered to any second of their history with point-in-time recovery, into a new database so the original is never overwritten. Volumes can be snapshotted as often as every 15 minutes where your plan includes it. See Volumes.
Observability
Dokploy's documentation describes server and container metrics for CPU and memory, with threshold alerts. Hangar keeps log history, charts CPU, memory, network and disk, shows the HTTP requests each service receives with error counts and latency, and receives OpenTelemetry traces with no exporter to configure. Alerts cover CPU, memory, error rate and p95 latency. See Observability.
When Dokploy is the better choice
- You want to own the infrastructure, on a provider of your choice or on-premises.
- You already operate servers and have the time for it.
- Your load is steady and server capacity is cheap for you.
- You need to run where Hangar has no region.
When Hangar is the better choice
- You do not want to patch, monitor or resize servers.
- You would rather pay for what your apps use than for idle capacity.
- You need point-in-time recovery, traces and alerts without setting them up.
- You want hard spend limits per project.
Moving from Dokploy to Hangar
- Create a project on Hangar and add a service from the same repository, with the same builder. A Docker Compose service can be deployed as a compose stack.
- Copy your environment variables. See Environment variables.
- Create the databases, restore a dump into each and update the connection URLs.
- Add your domain on Hangar, then switch the DNS record once the new deploy is healthy.
The quickstart walks through the first deploy.