Remark42 – Privacy-focused lightweight commenting engine | Remark42 | WarmIndex

Remark42 is a self-hosted, lightweight, privacy-focused commenting engine for embedding into blogs, articles, and websites.

🚀 Overview

Remark42 is a self-hosted commenting system designed as a privacy-respecting alternative to services like Disqus. It allows website owners to add threaded comments to their sites without relying on third-party trackers or data harvesters.

What problem does this project solve? It addresses the privacy issues of popular commenting platforms that spy on users through cookies, analytics, and data sharing. Remark42 stores minimal user data (hashed IDs, proxied avatars), supports self-hosting in a single Docker container, and ensures no cross-site tracking.

Who is it built for? Bloggers, developers, and site owners who want full control over comments, easy integration (via JS embed), and features like social logins, moderation, and notifications.

Why did you build it? To create a simple, functional comment engine that prioritizes user privacy and deployability without external dependencies or spying.

✨ Key Features

Multi-level nested comments with tree or plain views, Markdown support, image drag-and-drop uploads
Social logins (Google, GitHub, Facebook, Discord, Telegram, etc.), anonymous access, email login
Moderation tools: voting, pinning, user blocking, admin notifications (email, Telegram, Slack, webhooks)
Import from Disqus/WordPress, JSON export/backups, RSS feeds
Optional: Multi-site support, dark/light themes, automatic SSL

🛠 Tech Stack

Frontend: Preact, Redux, TypeScript, CSS, JavaScript
Backend: Go
Database: Embedded single-file (no external DB required)
Auth: Social OAuth providers, JWT cookies
Hosting: Docker, self-contained binaries (Linux/Windows/macOS), Vercel not applicable (self-hosted)

👥 Who Is This For?

This project is useful for:

Developers who want to add privacy-focused comments to static sites or apps
Bloggers looking for self-hosted Disqus alternatives
Teams building content platforms without vendor tracking

📸 Screenshots / Demo

Live demo: https://remark42.com/demo/
GitHub: https://github.com/umputun/remark42

🔥 Project Status

🟢 Actively building

Last updated: 2026-03-24

❓ FAQ

Is this project free?

Yes / Open Source (Fully free under MIT license, self-hostable with no costs beyond hosting.)

Is the source code available?

Yes — https://github.com/umputun/remark42

Can I contribute?

Yes — follow backend/frontend contributing guides at https://remark42.com/docs/contributing/, open issues or submit PRs on GitHub. Translations also welcome.