Best Free & Open Source Alternatives to Miro

Excalidraw is a virtual whiteboard tool that lets you create diagrams and sketches with a charming hand-drawn aesthetic. It runs entirely in the browser with no account required, making it fast and frictionless to start drawing.

It supports real-time collaboration, allowing teams to brainstorm and diagram together simultaneously. Excalidraw supports shapes, arrows, freehand drawing, text, and image embedding — everything you need for quick wireframes, flowcharts, and system diagrams.

Beyond the hosted app, Excalidraw ships as an embeddable React component (@excalidraw/excalidraw), making it easy to integrate into your own applications. With 100k+ GitHub stars and an MIT license, it is one of the most widely adopted open-source diagramming tools available.

AFFiNE is an open-source, privacy-first workspace that merges three tools into one: a rich document editor, an infinite whiteboard, and a database-style organiser. It is designed to replace the combination of Notion for notes and Miro for visual collaboration.

Built with a local-first architecture using CRDT, AFFiNE works offline by default and syncs when connected — meaning your data lives on your device, not just in the cloud. It supports both self-hosted deployment and AFFiNE Cloud for teams that want a managed option.

AFFiNE is highly customisable and supports markdown, block-based editing, kanban views, and edgeless canvas mode for mind-mapping and diagramming. Written in TypeScript and Rust, it is actively developed and positions itself as a next-generation alternative for knowledge workers who want flexibility without vendor lock-in.

ExcaliDash is an self-hosted dashboard and organizer for Excalidraw diagrams that adds storage, organization, and real-time collaboration features on top of Excalidraw. It allows users to centrally manage their drawings instead of keeping scattered .excalidraw files.

Key Features

• Persistent storage for Excalidraw drawings
• Real-time collaboration between multiple users
• Search and collections for organizing diagrams
• Drag-and-drop management interface
• Import/export backup support

Technology Stack

• Frontend: React, TypeScript, Vite
• Backend: Node.js, Express, Prisma
• Database: SQLite (default)
• Deployment: Docker recommended

Usage & Status

ExcaliDash is currently in beta and is best suited for personal or private team environments. It is not yet hardened for exposure to the public internet. The project is actively evolving, with ongoing development focused on collaboration and administrative features.

ExcaliDash is a useful tool for anyone who frequently uses Excalidraw and wants a centralized, self-hosted way to organize, search, and collaborate on diagrams without relying on third-party cloud services.

Draw.io is an online diagramming tool for creating and sharing a wide range of visual diagrams, including flowcharts, architecture diagrams, network maps, wireframes, and entity-relationship diagrams. It works directly in the browser without requiring an account, and a desktop application is available for offline use. Diagram files are stored where the user chooses — in Google Drive, OneDrive, SharePoint, Git repositories, local storage, or other locations — and the platform has no access to that data.

Key features include real-time collaboration with shared cursors, deep integrations with developer and productivity tools such as Confluence, Jira, GitHub, GitLab, and Microsoft Teams, and long-term file format compatibility. A VSCode extension allows diagrams to be edited directly alongside code.

Draw.io suits teams and individuals who need professional-quality diagramming without licensing complexity, as well as organisations that require full control over where their diagram data is stored.