How much RAM does Karakeep need?

The three containers (Karakeep app, Meilisearch, and headless Chrome) use approximately 800 MB–1.2 GB at idle. A 2 GB ServOrbit VPS is the recommended minimum. If you're also running Ollama on the same VPS, a 4 GB VPS is more comfortable.

Can I import my bookmarks from Pocket, Raindrop or a browser?

Yes. Karakeep supports importing bookmarks from Pocket (export JSON), Netscape bookmark files (exported by all major browsers and Raindrop.io), and its own backup format. Go to Settings → Import in your instance to upload the file.

Can I use Karakeep with Ollama already installed on my VPS?

Yes. If Ollama is running on the same VPS (from the ServOrbit marketplace or installed manually), set `OLLAMA_BASE_URL=http://localhost:11434` in your Karakeep compose environment. Karakeep will use it for tagging and summarisation without any API cost or data leaving your server.

Is Karakeep accessible from my phone?

Yes. Karakeep ships a Progressive Web App (PWA): open your instance URL in a mobile browser, tap 'Add to home screen', and it installs as a native-feeling app. The mobile share sheet integration lets you save any link from any app directly to your Karakeep instance.

Share information and collaborate.

Karakeep

Self-hosted AI bookmark manager — save anything, find everything. Auto-tags and full-text search powered by Meilisearch and Ollama or OpenAI.

2 GB (4 GB recommended if running Ollama on the same VPS) RAM 1 vCPU Port 3000 Available

Tech stack

DockerNode.jsMeilisearchChrome (headless)

Minimum RAM2 GB (4 GB recommended if running Ollama on the same VPS)

Minimum CPU1 vCPU

Default port3000

Compatible OSChoice of Linux distributions

Karakeep (formerly Hoarder, AGPL-3.0, 26 k+ GitHub stars) is a self-hosted bookmark manager built for people who save a lot. Drop a URL and Karakeep crawls the page, takes a screenshot, extracts the full text, and sends it to your AI model — Ollama running on your own VPS, or OpenAI — to generate relevant tags and a summary automatically. The result: a private, searchable archive of everything you've ever saved.

The stack is three Docker containers: the Karakeep application itself, a Meilisearch instance for millisecond full-text search across all your bookmarks, and a headless Chrome browser that crawls pages and captures screenshots. Everything runs on a single 2 GB VPS with no external dependencies — no cloud storage, no SaaS subscriptions, no data leaving your infrastructure.

Beyond links, Karakeep handles notes (Markdown), images (with OCR via the AI model), and PDFs. A progressive web app (PWA) ships with the installation so you can add bookmarks from your phone's share sheet directly to your self-hosted instance. Full-text search, tag filtering, and list views make retrieval fast even with thousands of items.

For developers, Karakeep exposes a REST API that lets external tools — n8n, scripts, browser extensions — push bookmarks and pull tagged content programmatically. Pair it with Ollama (already available in the ServOrbit marketplace) on the same VPS to get fully local, private AI tagging with no OpenAI key required.

Key features

AI auto-tagging and summarization — connect local Ollama (fully private) or OpenAI; no AI key required for basic bookmarking

Full-text search powered by Meilisearch — millisecond queries across page content, notes, PDF text and image OCR

Headless Chrome crawler — captures screenshots and full page text at save time, so pages remain searchable even after they go offline

Multi-format: links, Markdown notes, images (OCR), PDFs — one interface for everything you want to remember

PWA for mobile — add bookmarks from your phone's native share sheet to your self-hosted instance

REST API — push and pull bookmarks programmatically; integrates with n8n, browser extensions and custom scripts

AGPL-3.0, 26 k+ GitHub stars, active weekly releases — community-driven, no vendor lock-in

When to use this solution?

1

Personal knowledge base

Replace Pocket, Instapaper or Raindrop.io with a self-hosted instance that keeps your reading list, dev docs, blog posts and reference links private. AI tags organise everything automatically — open the search bar two weeks later and find that article by its content, not its title.

2

Developer research archive

Save GitHub issues, Stack Overflow answers, RFC documents and technical blog posts as you read them. Karakeep stores the full page text, so your search finds the answer you remember reading even if the original page is gone. Pair with Ollama on the same VPS for fully offline, private AI summaries.

3

AI agent knowledge feed

Use Karakeep's REST API to feed saved and tagged content to n8n workflows or LLM pipelines. Your bookmarks become a curated, searchable dataset that your AI agents can query — a private alternative to scraping the web on every request.

Deploy Karakeep on your VPS

Guide optimized for ServOrbit Cloud VPS.

01

Create the VPS

Order a ServOrbit Cloud VPS with at least 2 GB RAM (Karakeep + Meilisearch + Chrome headless use ~800 MB–1.2 GB at rest). Choose Ubuntu 22.04.

02

Deploy Karakeep

The provisioner starts three containers: the Karakeep application, a Meilisearch search engine, and a headless Chrome browser. The web interface is immediately available on port 3000. You can create your account on the sign-up page at first access.

03

Configure your domain + SSL

Point your domain (e.g. bookmarks.yourdomain.com) to your VPS IP in Cloudflare or your DNS provider. Set up an Nginx reverse proxy with Let's Encrypt, then update the NEXTAUTH_URL environment variable in your docker-compose.yml to match your domain and restart the containers.

04

Connect an AI model (optional)

For local AI tagging, deploy Ollama from the ServOrbit marketplace on the same VPS and set OLLAMA_BASE_URL=http://localhost:11434 in your compose environment. For OpenAI, add OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-.... Without either, Karakeep works fully — just without auto-tagging.

05

Install the browser extension and PWA

Install the Karakeep browser extension (Chrome/Firefox) and point it at your instance URL. On mobile, open your instance in the browser and add it to your home screen as a PWA. You can now save anything from any device with one click.

Frequently asked questions

No. The AI auto-tagging feature is entirely optional. Karakeep works as a full bookmark manager — saving, crawling, screenshotting and full-text indexing — without any AI key. When you add `OPENAI_API_KEY` or `OLLAMA_BASE_URL`, automatic tag and summary generation activates on new saves.