Short answer: if you want to self-host for free, Mixpost's Lite edition (MIT license, 3 platforms) or TryPost (AGPL-3.0, 12 platforms, actively updated today) are the two genuinely maintained open-source schedulers closest to Postiz. If you'd rather not run a server, Buffer, Post Bridge, Blotato, Publer, Metricool, Typefully and seenpaid are the hosted options worth comparing, each with an MCP server for AI agents on at least one plan. And one thing worth knowing before any of that: Postiz itself already ships both a free self-hosted version and a paid hosted cloud — more on that below, because it changes what "alternative" even means here.
I make seenpaid, a scheduler with per-post revenue attribution, and it's on the hosted list below with its actual cons stated, not just its case for existing. Everything else in this piece — pricing, platforms, licenses, GitHub activity — was checked directly against each vendor's own site or repository on 24 September 2026, with the date noted wherever it wasn't.
Why people look for a Postiz alternative
A GitHub issue opened 7 September 2026 lays out the sharpest version of it. A user testing self-hosted Postiz on a personal VPS wrote that a friend who runs Meta ad campaigns had warned him: "Meta can ban/restrict accounts for using Postiz, and you need to create your own Meta app and have it verified… this actually happened to him during a marketing campaign where he was using Postiz: his accounts were banned, so he switched to another tool." That's the self-hosting trade-off in one anecdote — Postiz doesn't hide it (see the next section), but it's the kind of thing you find out from a GitHub issue, not a landing page.
Postiz's Trustpilot profile has 10 reviews total as of 24 September 2026 — 60% five-star, 40% one-star, nothing in between — and the one-star ones name two different failure modes. Rick R., 20 June 2026: "It doesn't work. I paid for the highest plan and my openclaw agent can't post." Erico Maz, 26 July 2026: "I've asked to cancel my suscription. It kept running for 3 months, and still no answers from Rim or from the support." Postiz replies to its negative reviews (100% of them, per its own Trustpilot profile), but the pattern in the complaints — agent posting failures, slow billing support — is worth knowing before you commit an OpenClaw or Claude workflow to it.
And from the open-source side, a Reddit user's title said it plainly in a r/selfhosted thread called simply "Postiz Alternative": "…it has features that I dont need (eg. marketplace) I just want a simple service that automates social media postings. Bonus points if it offers a headless api (I see postiz has one but only on their paid server)." Bloat for a simple job, and the API gated behind the hosted plan, are the two recurring self-hosted complaints; account bans and support response time are the two recurring hosted ones.
First: Postiz already has both a hosted cloud and a free self-hosted version
This is worth stating plainly because it trips up more than casual readers — Postiz's own founder, Nevo David, merged a README update on 23 September 2026 specifically to fix the confusion, adding a full "Postiz Cloud vs. Open-source" comparison table. The two are feature-identical: no gated features, no crippled license. What actually differs is who owns the infrastructure. Postiz Cloud is a subscription (Standard $29/month for 5 channels up to Ultimate $99/month for 100, 7-day trial, $0 due today) where Postiz runs the servers and already has pre-approved developer apps for every platform. Postiz Open-source is the same product under AGPL-3.0, free forever, but you provision your own Postgres/Redis/storage and — per that same README table — "create your own developer apps on each platform and go through their approval (Meta, YouTube, TikTok can take weeks)." So Postiz isn't really absent from a "self-hosted alternatives" list; it's arguably the biggest option on it, at 36,000+ GitHub stars. What follows are the alternatives to it, not a repeat of it.
Self-hosted and open-source alternatives
Genuinely maintained rules out most of what search results surface: a lot of "open-source Postiz alternative" repos have a handful of stars and one commit. These two have real activity behind them.
Mixpost
Mixpost splits into a free Lite edition (MIT license, on GitHub as inovector/mixpost, 3,736 stars) and a paid Pro/Enterprise app built on top of it. Lite covers three platforms — Facebook Pages, Mastodon and X — plus the calendar, media library and post versions, with no account-count cap on those three. At five channels that need Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, YouTube, Pinterest, Threads, Bluesky, Google Business or Pixelfed, it's the Pro license: $299 one time, not a subscription, unlimited accounts and team members, an API/webhooks/MCP integration, and one year of free updates after which the software keeps working but new updates need renewal. Enterprise is $1,199 one time and adds white-label branding and customer subscription billing, for agencies reselling it. One honest flag: the public Lite repository's last push was 16 March 2026 — over six months stale as of this writing — while the separate Pro and Enterprise app repos were both pushed as recently as 4 September 2026. The free edition looks stalled even though the paid product is actively worked on; worth knowing if the free tier specifically is what you're evaluating.
TryPost
TryPost (github.com/trypostit/trypost, AGPL-3.0, 646 stars) is the more actively maintained of the two as of today — its last push was 24 September 2026, the same day this was checked. The self-hosted code and the hosted-cloud product are the same software: self-host it for free ("your servers, your data," per its own README), or let TryPost run it for you at $19/month for one workspace (Socials plan) or $99/month for unlimited workspaces (Workspaces plan), with no free cloud tier. The README lists 12 platforms (Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, X, TikTok, YouTube, Pinterest, Threads, Bluesky, Mastodon, Telegram, Discord); its own pricing page lists a 13th, Google Business Profile. Every plan, self-hosted included, gets a first-class MCP server and REST API — "post from Claude, ChatGPT, or Grok" is included whether you're paying $19, $99, or nothing but your own server.
Hosted alternatives
Price at five connected channels, since that's usually where a free plan stops covering a real workflow. Every MCP/trial detail below is what each vendor states on its own site, checked 24 September 2026 unless noted.
Buffer
Free covers 3 channels; at 5 you're on Essentials, $6/channel/month billed monthly ($30/month total) or $5/channel/month billed yearly ($25/month, $300/year). Buffer shipped a hosted MCP server on every plan including Free on 27 May 2026, works with Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, Perplexity, Zapier and n8n, tool count not published. No card-required trial needed — the free plan just works, plus a 14-day trial of paid tiers. Pick it if 1–3 channels is genuinely enough; past 5, per-channel pricing starts costing more than several of the flat-rate options here. Weakness: no revenue attribution — its own free UTM generator is the closest it gets, and that's manual tagging, not a Stripe connection.
Post Bridge
Starter is $29/month for exactly 5 accounts — the cleanest "price at 5 channels" number in this list. MCP server, 16 tools, included on every plan. 7-day trial, nothing due today. Pick it if you want a clean cross-poster and also need YouTube or Google Business Profile, which most of the rest of this list — seenpaid included — doesn't cover. Weakness: no free tier, and analytics is in beta with no payment-processor connection, so it can tell you a post got engagement but never whether it made money.
Blotato
Starter is $29/month and covers up to 20 accounts, so 5 channels costs the same $29 as one channel would. MCP server, 36 tools, plus a REST API and official n8n/Make nodes — the largest agent tool surface of anything on this page. The catch is the trial: its 7-day trial excludes the API and MCP entirely, and generating an API key ends the trial and starts the paid Starter plan immediately. For a page about agent-friendly alternatives, that's the one to know before you start — you cannot try the agent features free. Pick it if you're wiring posting into a broader automation stack and the trial caveat doesn't matter to you. Weakness: same as most of this list, no payment-processor connection.
Publer
Free covers 3 accounts (X excluded). Professional starts at $5/month for 1 social account, and — per Publer's own help center — "the total price is automatically adjusted based on the number of social accounts," with every 10th account free; it doesn't publish a fixed number for exactly 5 accounts, so unlike the others here I'm not going to guess one. MCP server exists but is officially in beta and, per a support article updated 14 August 2026, limited to Top Ambassadors and Enterprise customers — most paying users don't have it yet, though unofficial community MCP servers exist. Pick it if you want to try before you commit to a card: no card required for the free plan, and 7 days (Professional) or 14 days (Business) as a trial. Weakness: the official MCP gate makes the "agent-ready" pitch weaker in practice than on paper, and there's no revenue attribution.
Metricool
Metricool prices by "brand," not by channel, so a straight 5-channel figure doesn't map cleanly onto its plans — worth saying plainly rather than forcing a number that isn't how it's sold. Free is 1 brand and 20 scheduled posts a month, no card; Starter is €16/month (about $20) for up to 10 brands, with X as a paid add-on. MCP server on every plan including Free, tool count not published on its own pages (Claude's own listing shows 7 tools: 5 read, 2 write). Pick it if analytics depth matters more than publishing breadth — competitor analysis across up to 100 profiles and a Looker Studio connector are real differentiators nothing else here has. Weakness: its Shopify integration shows a post drove store visits, not that it produced a payment — a step short of the Stripe-level attribution this page's audience is usually looking for.
Typefully
Free is 1 "social set" — Typefully's own term for a bundle of accounts across platforms for one person or brand, so one free social set can cover X, LinkedIn, Threads, Bluesky and Mastodon at once for a single identity — capped at 10 posts a month, with Agents/API/MCP included even on that free tier. Creator (annual billing only) and Business (per social set, billed yearly by default) sit above it, but I'm not going to publish a dollar figure for either: its pricing page renders both numbers through a JavaScript counter component that isn't present as static text, and after trying several ways to read it directly on 24 September 2026, I couldn't verify one without guessing, so it's left out rather than borrowed from a third-party estimate. What is confirmed: up to 50 social sets on Business, unlimited users, and MCP with a matching installable skill (`npx skills add typefully/agent-skills`) plus a Claude connector added as a directory partner on 18 September 2026. Weakness: 5 platforms total (X, LinkedIn, Threads, Bluesky, Mastodon) — no Instagram, Facebook, TikTok or YouTube, a real gap if you post video or Meta-first.
seenpaid (that's mine)
Solo is $19.99/month for 5 workspaces (brands), each connecting every platform with no cap on social accounts. 21 platforms, live — meaning a stranger can actually finish connecting them today, not a marketing count that includes ones still in review. MCP server, 50 tools, included in the trial rather than gated behind it, and listed in ChatGPT's plugin directory since 24 September 2026 (Claude's connector directory submission is still pending review, not yet approved). It reads revenue from eight payment processors — Stripe, Gumroad, Lemon Squeezy, Whop, Shopify, Paddle, Polar and Dodo Payments — and matches a payment back to the post that earned it, which is the one thing nothing else on this page does. Pick it if the question you're actually asking is "which post made money," not just "which post got engagement." Weakness, stated plainly: no free tier, the 7-day trial requires a card up front, and it's a newer, smaller product than Buffer or Postiz — no decade of reliability behind it, and nothing like Blotato's built-in DM automation or Postiz's 30+ platform breadth.
All ten, at a glance
- Postiz — self-hosted (AGPL-3.0, free, 30+ platforms) or cloud ($29/mo, 5 channels); MCP 13 tools, self-hosting needs your own developer apps per platform.
- Mixpost — Lite free (MIT, 3 platforms) or Pro $299 one-time (11+ platforms); Lite's public repo hasn't been pushed since March 2026.
- TryPost — self-host free (AGPL-3.0, 12 platforms) or cloud $19–99/mo; pushed today, the most actively maintained OSS pick here.
- Buffer — free (3 channels) or $30/mo at 5 channels billed monthly; MCP on every plan including Free.
- Post Bridge — $29/mo for exactly 5 accounts; MCP 16 tools on every plan, 7-day trial, nothing due today.
- Blotato — $29/mo covers up to 20 accounts; MCP 36 tools, but the trial excludes the API/MCP entirely.
- Publer — from $5/mo for 1 account, scales per account, no published price at exactly 5; official MCP gated to Top Ambassadors/Enterprise.
- Metricool — free (1 brand) or ~$20/mo for up to 10 brands; MCP on every plan including Free, priced by brand not channel.
- Typefully — free covers 1 social set (up to 5 platforms) at 10 posts/month with MCP included; paid pricing not verifiable as static text as of 24 Sep 2026.
- seenpaid — $19.99/mo for 5 workspaces with no cap on accounts, 21 platforms, 50-tool MCP included in the trial, the only one here reading revenue from a payment processor.
How to choose
- You want free and don't mind a server → Mixpost Lite (3 platforms) or TryPost self-hosted (12 platforms).
- You want the most actively developed open-source option → TryPost, pushed the same day this was checked; Mixpost's free Lite repo has gone quiet.
- You want Postiz's breadth without Postiz's self-host setup → Postiz Cloud itself, not a third-party alternative.
- You run 1–3 channels and want free → Buffer.
- You need YouTube or Google Business Profile → Post Bridge.
- You're building on automation infrastructure (n8n/Make) and don't need the trial to include the API → Blotato.
- You want to try without a card → Publer or Metricool, both card-free to start.
- You want the deepest analytics → Metricool.
- You're X/LinkedIn/Threads-first and don't need Instagram or TikTok → Typefully.
- You sell something and want to know which post paid for itself → seenpaid.
FAQ
Is Postiz open source, or is it a paid product? Both, at the same time — the self-hosted GitHub version is AGPL-3.0 and free forever, and Postiz Cloud is the identical product hosted for you starting at $29/month. Neither is a "lite" version of the other.
What's the closest open-source alternative to Postiz? Mixpost for a one-time-payment model and the widest self-hosted platform count once you buy Pro; TryPost if you want AGPL freedom plus a built-in MCP server and the most recent commit activity of the two.
Does self-hosting avoid the cost entirely? No — Postiz's own README is explicit that self-hosting still means your own server, your own Postgres/Redis/storage, and your own developer apps registered with each platform, with Meta, YouTube and TikTok approval taking weeks. "Free" means no subscription, not no setup.
Which Postiz alternative has AI agent (MCP) support? Every option compared here does, on at least one plan — the differences are in what's gated: Blotato's trial excludes the API, Publer's official MCP is Top-Ambassador/Enterprise-only, and seenpaid, Buffer, Metricool, Typefully, Post Bridge and both open-source options include it without a separate gate.
Is there a genuinely free alternative to Postiz? Buffer (3 channels), Metricool (1 brand, 20 posts/month), Typefully (1 social set, 10 posts/month), Mixpost Lite (3 platforms) and self-hosted TryPost (12 platforms, your own server) all have real free tiers with no card required.
Sources
Pricing and platform facts, all checked 24 September 2026 unless noted: postiz.com and github.com/gitroomhq/postiz-app (36,268 stars, AGPL-3.0, pushed 24 Sep 2026) and its README's "Postiz Cloud vs. Open-source" table, added in PR #2121, opened and merged by Nevo David on 23 September 2026; mixpost.app/pricing and github.com/inovector/mixpost (3,736 stars, MIT, last pushed 16 March 2026) plus github.com/inovector/MixpostProTeamApp and MixpostEnterpriseApp (both pushed 4 September 2026); trypost.it/pricing and github.com/trypostit/trypost (646 stars, AGPL-3.0, pushed 24 September 2026); buffer.com/pricing and /mcp; post-bridge.com/pricing and /mcp; blotato.com/pricing and /mcp; publer.com/pricing and publer.com/help/en/article/what-are-publers-plans-and-pricing-15h4yqh (updated 14 August 2026 re: MCP beta access); metricool.com/pricing; typefully.com/pricing and typefully.com/ai-agents. Quotes: github.com/gitroomhq/postiz-app/issues/2036 (7 September 2026), trustpilot.com/review/postiz.com (Rick R., 20 June 2026; Erico Maz, 26 July 2026), reddit.com/r/selfhosted/comments/1htl3oj/postiz_alternative (January 2025).