Top 4 Open Source BaaS platforms

What is a BaaS?

Let’s start with some basic concepts, what is a web or mobile application backend?

Most applications today use and need to access some data to provide services, which means that that need a way to access and store that data. Besides that, they also need to provide security so that the stored information is not accessible by the wrong actors.

The backend is the infrastructure that supports a web application (or mobile) and provides several services, like authentication, data storage, or the ability to execute code on the cloud.

BaaS, Backend as a Service is a cloud backend infrastructure that provides all the backend services with simple-to-use interfaces and modules, using API calls or different framework plugins.

Supabase

Supabase claims to be the open-source Firebase alternative and they are building the features of Firebase using enterprise-grade open source tools.

It is available in self-hosted and cloud-hosted versions.

Pricing starts at $0, and there are plans at $25 (Pro) and $25 + usage (Pay as you go). All features all available in all plans with different limits.

The cloud-hosted version provides a Dashboard for ease of configuring the projects.

They provide official libraries for JavaScript but there are community libraries for React, Vue, NextJS, and more.

Main features:

• Hosted Postgres Database
• Realtime subscriptions
• Authentication and authorization
• Auto-generated APIs
• Dashboard
• Storage
• Functions (coming soon)

Parse

Parse platform claims to be the Complete Application Stack and that you can build applications faster with object storage and file storage, user authentication, push notifications, dashboard, and more out of the box.

It is only available as a self-hosted version, although there are commercial services build around it like Back4App.

As such, there are no paid plans directly available from Parse.

There is also a Parse Dashboard to manage your projects.

They provide libraries for iOS, Android, JavaScript, and many more, even including Arduino.

Main features:

• REST API
• Automatic Emails
• Social Login
• Cron Jobs
• WebHooks
• Config Parameters
• ACLs and CLPs
• User Management
• Geo Queries

Appwrite

AppWrite claims to be a secure open-source backend server for Web, Mobile & Flutter developers that provides a set of easy-to-use and integrated REST APIs to manage their core backend needs.

It is only available as a self-hosted version.

As such, there are no paid plans directly available from AppWrite, although they have completed a $10M seed fund, so enterprise plans might be expected in the future.

There is a Console UI to manage all your project needs.

They provide libraries for JavaScript, Flutter, Swift, Android, and many more.

Main features:

• MariaDB Database
• Storage
• User Authentication
• Geo & Localization
• Functions

Strapi

Strapi claims that you can design APIs fast and manage content easily with an open-source headless CMS that is 100% JavaScript, fully customizable, and developer-first.

It is available in self-hosted and cloud-hosted versions, although the cloud hosting packages are provided by partners and not by Strapi, at least not yet, they do have that feature in the pipeline.

As such, there are no paid plans directly available from Strapi.

You can manage your projects from the provided Dashboard.

There are libraries for React, Angular, NextJS, and more.

Main features:

• Multi-database support
• GraphQL or RESTful
• 100% JavaScript
• Webhooks
• Auto-generated documentation
• Authentication & Permissions

Conclusion

Creating a web application or a mobile application is already a big task. A lot of importance nowadays is given to the user interface and its usability.

For developers, there is no need to add to that an additional load of creating and maintaining a backend service for those applications.

Fortunately, the world of open source provides us with solutions that can be self-hosted, allowing us to maintain a high level of data security and privacy.

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