1 Best Open-Source Alternatives to Doodle in 2026
By Noahlast updated pricing verified
Compared: open-source alternatives to Doodle
| Alternative | Best for | Standout | Biggest weakness | Learning curve | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Doodlereference | small teams and client-facing professionals coordinating group availability and 1:1 bookings across multiple calendars | Group polls let an organizer find a time across many invitees' calendars without any invitee needing a Doodle account. | The free plan is capped at a single active poll, booking page, and 1:1 link at a time, so anyone scheduling more than one thing simultaneously has to upgrade to Pro. | Low | Free tier · paid from $11/mo |
| Cal.com | individuals and technical teams who want an open-source, self-hostable Calendly alternative with API-level control over booking flows | The scheduling engine is genuinely self-hostable via Docker, with a fully open community fork (cal.diy, MIT-licensed) that strips out enterprise/commercial code entirely, giving teams a real self-hosted path rather than an open-source demo that funnels users to the paid cloud. | Self-hosting requires ongoing infrastructure maintenance and doesn't include Cal.com's managed support, while advanced features like SSO and fine-grained access control are gated behind the pricier Organizations and Enterprise tiers on the hosted product. | Moderate | Free tier · paid from $12/mo |
Doodle
Cal.com1.Cal.com — best Doodle alternative for individuals and technical teams who want an open-source, self-hostable Calendly alternative with API-level control over booking flows
Doodle and Cal.com both offer group and team scheduling, but Cal.com's scheduling engine is genuinely self-hostable via Docker, with a fully open community fork (cal.diy, MIT-licensed) that strips out enterprise code entirely, letting organizations run their own booking infrastructure instead of depending on a SaaS vendor the way Doodle's platform requires. Cal.com's Free plan covers a single user with unlimited event types and calendars, plus 100+ integrations and Stripe/PayPal payment processing built in even at no cost, versus Doodle's free plan capped at one poll, one booking page, and one 1:1 link. Cal.com holds a 4.8/5 rating from 85 Product Hunt reviews. The honest tradeoff is Doodle's specific group-poll workflow: Cal.com is built around individual event-type booking links rather than Doodle's group-availability polls where invitees respond without an account, and Cal.com's Teams tier ($12/user/month) compounds faster per-user than Doodle's flat per-seat Pro tier for larger groups. Teams that specifically need group availability polls are better served by Doodle.
Compared to Doodle: genuinely self-hostable via Docker with a fully open MIT-licensed community fork, unlimited event types and calendars even on the free plan, Stripe/PayPal payments built in at $0, but no group-poll feature and per-user Teams pricing that compounds faster for larger groups.
Wins:Genuinely self-hostable via Docker with a fully open, MIT-licensed community fork (cal.diy) · Free plan includes unlimited event types and calendars, more generous than Doodle's single-poll, single-page free tier · Built-in Stripe and PayPal payment collection at booking time, even on the free plan
Loses:No group-poll feature; built around individual event-type booking links rather than Doodle's group-availability polls where invitees respond without an account · Teams tier is $12/user/month, which compounds faster per-user than Doodle's flat per-seat Pro pricing for larger groups · SSO and advanced access control are gated to the pricier Organizations and Enterprise tiers
Pros
- Free tier includes unlimited event types and calendars for a single user, with no artificial feature caps.
- Genuinely self-hostable via Docker, with a fully open MIT-licensed community fork (cal.diy) available.
- 100+ integrations and two-way Salesforce/HubSpot sync are available even on the free plan.
- Built-in Stripe and PayPal payment collection at time of booking without a separate add-on.
Cons
- Self-hosting requires ongoing infrastructure maintenance and forgoes Cal.com's managed support and updates.
- SSO and advanced access control are gated to the pricier Organizations and Enterprise tiers.
- Team-oriented features require per-user billing ($12-28/user/month), which adds up faster than Calendly's flat team pricing at small seat counts.
- Self-hosted deployments can lag behind the hosted cloud product on the latest feature releases.
Pricing: Free tier · paid from $12/mo — Cal.com Teams is $12/user/month vs Doodle Pro at $11/seat/month, both billed annually (verified undefined NaN, NaN)