Alternatives to glitch-soc
A friendly fork of the Mastodon server software that adds experimental features on top of upstream. The listings below can replace it for an important use case. Each note says what changes if you switch.
The original
glitch-soc
A friendly fork of the Mastodon server software that adds experimental features on top of upstream.
Replacements
Listings that take over the same core job as glitch-soc.
Mastodon
Federated microblogging server with no algorithmic feed.
Mastodon is the upstream server glitch-soc builds on, likely more stable but without formatted posts, local-only posts, threaded mode or flavours and skins.
Hometown
A self-hosted fork of Mastodon that adds local-only posting for community-focused instances.
Hometown is another AGPL-3.0 Mastodon fork that keeps local-only posts and adds wider content types, aimed at small community instances rather than experimental features.
Sharkey
A federated microblogging server forked from Misskey, with added features and a focus on performance.
Sharkey is a Misskey fork rather than a Mastodon fork, adding its own features and a performance focus while still federating with Mastodon and Akkoma.
Misskey
Feature-rich fediverse server with reactions, drive storage and theming.
Misskey offers custom reactions, quotes, a file drive and deep theming, but it is heavier to run and most documentation is in Japanese.
Akkoma
A self-hostable ActivityPub microblogging server forked from Pleroma, focused on custom expression.
Akkoma is a Pleroma fork with custom emoji reactions and Misskey-Flavoured Markdown, a different codebase from Mastodon that still federates with it.
Pleroma
Lightweight fediverse server that runs on very modest hardware.
Pleroma runs on far more modest hardware than Mastodon and keeps a Mastodon-compatible API, but has a smaller contributor base and weaker moderation tooling.
Iceshrimp.NET
A self-hosted ActivityPub microblogging server written in C#, continuing the Iceshrimp project.
Iceshrimp.NET is a C# microblogging server with a new codebase focused on performance, working with existing Mastodon client apps but with a smaller community.
GoToSocial
A lightweight self-hosted ActivityPub social network server written in Go.
GoToSocial is a lightweight Go server with safety-focused controls, deliberately offering fewer features than Mastodon and not intended for very large follower counts.
Similar software
Related functionality, not a direct replacement.
Elk
A lightweight open-source web client for Mastodon that runs in the browser.
Phanpy
A minimalistic, opinionated web client for reading and posting on Mastodon from a browser.
Tusky
A lightweight open-source Android client for Mastodon and other fediverse servers.
Ivory
A Mastodon client for iPhone, iPad and Mac from the makers of Tweetbot.
Ice Cubes
An open-source Mastodon client for iPhone, iPad and Mac, written in SwiftUI.
