Self-Hosted vs. Cloud
Community and Cloud share source and core REST contracts, but they are different distributions with different operational boundaries.
Comparison
| Capability | Community self-hosted | Genfeed Cloud |
|---|---|---|
| Operations | You operate Docker, storage, backups, and updates | Genfeed operates the hosted service |
| Tenancy | One organization per deployment | Multiple isolated organizations |
| Web product UI | Included | Included |
| Workflow authoring | Included | Included |
| Generation | Local or your configured provider accounts | Managed and configured provider paths |
| Managed inference credits | Optional explicit call to the Cloud API | Available according to current account/plan |
| Storage | Local filesystem and self-hosted PostgreSQL | Genfeed-managed storage |
| Publishing | Manual export and locally configured paths | Managed connectors where supported |
| Analytics | Local insight needed for the self-hosted loop | Managed cross-workflow analytics |
| Team governance | Single-tenant/local account controls | Cloud/Enterprise team and organization controls |
| API | REST and MCP | REST, MCP, and managed endpoints where available |
| License | Repository default is AGPL-3.0-or-later; package notices can differ | Managed service; source retains its repository licenses |
Costs and support
Community costs depend on your infrastructure and model providers. Cloud prices, included credits, and support channels can change; use the current pricing page instead of fixed amounts in documentation.
This repository does not promise a response time or SLA for Community issues. Commercial support terms, when offered, are plan-specific.
Data and migration boundary
Community does not automatically replicate local records to Cloud. A Cloud API key authorizes explicit Cloud calls only. Evaluate export/import support for each resource before planning a migration; do not assume workflows, brands, templates, or assets have a complete bidirectional migration path.
When Community uses an external model provider, the submitted prompts and media leave the local deployment according to that provider’s contract. Fully local processing requires local provider infrastructure.