How to self-host Grist
Answer data security concerns, meet residency requirements, and own your data.
Docker quickstart
The quickest way to self-host Grist is using containers. Here’s one-liner that can get you started:
docker run -p 8484:8484 -v ~/grist:/persist -it gristlabs/grist
Then, visit: http://localhost:8484.
Start a free 30-day trial of the full edition, or request an activation key for ongoing use. For production-grade configuration (SSO, external storage, sandboxing) see the self-hosted documentation.
Security and data sovereignty
Our foundational software principles flow directly into the features we build.
Principles
- Software should be for the people: to enable and serve them, not limit and control.
- The security and privacy of software users are fundamental and must not be for sale.
- Quality of software is important: functionality, reliability, usability, and performance.
Features
- Grist data is always portable and exportable.
- Grist is built around granular role-based access rules to lower the risk profile of complex documents.
- Grist is built on a feature-packed open source foundation.
What kind of organizations self-host Grist?
Grist is in production across government, aerospace, manufacturing, and utilities. Grist’s flexibility solves specific use cases in many industries, and its emphasis on self-hostability makes it viable in regulated sectors.
DINUM / La Suite Numérique
PUBLIC SERVICE – Multiple deployments
Grist is one of the open source foundations of La Suite Numérique, France’s sovereign digital workspace, operated by DINUM (La direction interministérielle du numérique).
- Grew from 1,000 to 15,000 monthly active users in a year (2024–2025).
- Distributed deployments that service multiple agencies and regions, with hundreds of use cases.
- Bug bounty program for Grist funded by DINUM, benefiting the entire Grist community.
Maddox
Manufacturing – Dedicated server
Maddox builds an intimidating array of industrial transformers. Grist Labs manages a dedicated instance of Grist on their own servers to augment and replace their spreadsheets.
- ~300 employees.
- Use case: KPI tracking and consolidation for production, manufacturing, and sales delivery.
- On-premises deployment a requirement.
E-J Electric
CONSTRUCTION – Dedicated server
E-J Electric is a long-standing, privately-owned electrical contractor. Grist Labs manages a dedicated instance of Grist on their own servers to help their distributed sites collaborate on relational data.
- ~450 employees.
- Use case: Cross-site project management.
- Moved on-premises as their data needs scaled.
How does Grist handle my data?
Grist is built for sensitive data. Your data is deployable on-premise while remaining collaborative. Your data is portable but follows strict role-based access rules when exporting to lower exfiltration risk.
This technical architecture flows directly from our long-standing software principles.
Video walkthrough
Can Grist be deployed on-premises to meet data residency requirements?
Grist is 100% self-hostable for on-premises deployment, or available with managed hosting around the world.
Grist presents a lowered risk profile thanks to comprehensive and highly-customizable role-based access rules, letting you limit access and exporting down to the row. You can also test these roles interactively to make sure access is properly limited.
Grist is built around fully portable data with no lock-in mechanisms. A Grist file is an SQLite database, and always able to be exported elsewhere – subject to access rules, of course.
How else can Grist be deployed?
Secure SaaS
Hosted on getgrist.com and ready to go. The easiest way to start using Grist or to test out features before deploying on-premise.
Managed server
Grist Labs deploys and manages Grist on a dedicated server in a region of your choice. Gives you the customization of self-hosting, but leaves the devops and maintenance to us.
Learn more
Why should my organization self-host Grist?
You don’t have to self-host Grist, but here are some common benefits we see in larger deployments:
Address governance, compliance or data residency requirements.
Integrate into your organization’s SSO.
Run with extra CPU and memory for more power.
Create advanced customizations and integrations.
Grist for Enterprise
All Grist features
Priority support
Security alerts
Frequently asked questions
The graph above is a good summary of Grist’s high-level architecture. For complete technical documentation, please check out our Help Center.
Every Grist document is a separate database, so it is difficult to state absolute minimum requirements without knowing what documents will be used. Memory and CPU requirements will scale with the number of documents simultaneously in use by your team.
See this page for more information on hardware requirements.
Grist data is always portable and exportable, subject to access rules that you define. You can export tables as CSV, TSV and XLSX files, as well an entire Grist documents with or without change history.
Grist documents can be downloaded in their entirety as an SQLite database file with a .grist extension. The downloaded file will contain all your tabular data, any attached files within those tables, metadata about your tables, pages, and widgets, and a history of recent modifications of the document.
Yes. We have detailed authentication documentation, but Grist supports OIDC, SAML and forwarded headers right out of the box, as well as our own OAuth system if you don’t have existing SSO already setup.
Self-hosted Grist also supports the System for Cross-domain Identity Management (SCIM) for managing large organizations with dynamic user bases. Learn more.
Self-hosting the Grist Community edition is free. To run the full edition of Grist requires a paid plan. See this page for a breakdown of the additional features included in the full edition.
Self-hosters can get access to a free trial of all of them by selecting the full edition of Grist on the Admin Panel.
The full edition of Grist is also free for individuals and small orgs with less than US $1 million in total annual funding. Learn more about that here.
Take control of your data
Unlock your data’s true potential with the better spreadsheet
