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Self-hosted Greenhouse alternative: when to run your own ATS

Looking for a self-hosted or open-source Greenhouse alternative? What Greenhouse does that Vekt doesn't, what changes when you self-host, and who should stay.

By 8 min readgreenhouse-alternativeself-hostedcomparison

If you are looking for a self-hosted Greenhouse alternative, the first thing to know is that Greenhouse is a cloud product only: there is no version you can run on your own servers. So the real question is not which tool copies Greenhouse, but whether running your own ATS fits your team better than renting a very complete one. This guide answers that honestly, from the people who build Vekt, an open-source recruiting platform you host yourself.

We read Greenhouse’s own pricing page, ATS page, AI recruiting page, interviewing page, security overview and partner directory on 30 October 2026. Every Greenhouse fact below comes from one of those pages, and every Vekt fact from its repository.

The short answer

  • Stay on Greenhouse if you hire at volume, run structured interview loops across many teams, and rely on scheduling, sourcing, reporting and hundreds of integrations. Vekt does not replace that today.
  • Consider self-hosting if you hire a handful of roles at a time, want candidate data in infrastructure you control, want to choose (or run) the AI model that reads CVs, and want code you can read and change under the MIT licence.

What Greenhouse is

Greenhouse is one of the best-known applicant tracking systems. It sells three plans, Core, Plus and Pro, and does not publish prices: its pricing page says “Greenhouse pricing is customized based on your company’s hiring needs”, and you get a quote after a demo.

Even the entry plan is broad. According to the pricing page, Core includes sourcing and CRM, structured interview kits and scorecards, an AI notetaker, scheduling, reporting and analytics, single sign-on and talent matching. Plus adds texting, a business intelligence connector, sourcing automation and fraud and spam detection. Pro adds an audit log, a developer sandbox and enterprise data configuration.

Greenhouse also takes care with AI. Its AI recruiting page says “the decision is always yours, not handed to an algorithm”, says customers can switch any AI feature on or off for the whole organisation, and describes monthly third-party bias audits and resume review with identifying details redacted. It states that it does not train its AI on personal data.

What Greenhouse does that Vekt doesn’t

Greenhouse is a much larger product, and you should know exactly where before you consider moving. Vekt has none of the following today:

  • Interview scheduling. Greenhouse offers candidate self-scheduling, scheduling links, interviewer limits and AI scheduling suggestions, and works with Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams and Spark Hire (ATS page, interviewing page).
  • Structured interview kits and scorecards. A core part of Greenhouse’s approach to structured hiring. Vekt structures the application (screening questions, an AI-ranked reading order) but not the interviews that follow.
  • Interview notes and AI voice interviews. Greenhouse records and transcribes interviews and maps the notes to scorecard questions, and offers an AI voice first-round interview.
  • Sourcing and CRM. Greenhouse manages prospects who haven’t applied yet and recommends candidates when a role opens.
  • Reporting. Greenhouse lists “40+ pre-built reports and dashboards”, custom reports and BI connectors. Vekt shows applications per job sorted by score and records job page views, but has no reporting module.
  • Integrations. Greenhouse’s partner directory listed 520 entries when we checked, across HRIS and onboarding, job distribution, productivity and candidate experience. Vekt has a documented REST API (Swagger UI at /api-docs) and no ready-made integrations.
  • Job-board distribution, texting and onboarding. Greenhouse has all three; Vekt publishes jobs on its own careers page only and sends candidate emails.
  • Single sign-on and enterprise controls. SSO is in Greenhouse’s Core plan; an audit log and sandbox are in Pro. Vekt signs users in with email and password and has two roles, admin and recruiter.
  • Certifications and a vendor behind it. Greenhouse’s ATS page cites ISO/IEC 42001 and SOC and ISO certifications, and you have a company to call. Vekt is a young open-source project with no certifications and no support contract.

What changes when you self-host instead

Self-hosting moves both control and work to you. Here is what that means with Vekt specifically.

Where the data lives. Greenhouse runs on AWS, with US, EU (Frankfurt, with Ireland for disaster recovery) and APAC silos according to its security overview. With Vekt, the database (SQLite) and uploaded CVs sit in Docker volumes on a server you choose. Candidate data stays on your servers when scoring runs on a local model through Ollama; if you pick OpenAI or OpenRouter, the redacted CV text goes to that provider, and candidate emails are sent through Resend.

Which AI reads the CV. You set AI_PROVIDER to openai, openrouter, ollama or mock. Before any model sees a CV, Vekt removes the name, email, phone, links, date of birth and declared personal attributes. Every evaluation stores the provider, model, prompt hash and evaluator version.

How AI affects decisions. A candidate scoring below the threshold is marked needs review, not rejected, and gets no email until a recruiter decides. Automatic rejection exists only as an admin opt-in (AUTO_REJECT_BELOW_THRESHOLD). Status emails wait 48 hours by default and are cancelled if a recruiter changes the decision. The scores themselves are uncalibrated and have never been measured against hiring outcomes; we explain that in what Vekt’s AI can’t do.

Retention. A daily job deletes candidates and their CV files once the retention period set by the admin has passed. You decide the number; Vekt enforces it.

Cost. The software is free under the MIT licence with no per-seat pricing. You pay for a server, your time to run it, and the AI provider’s usage if you don’t use a local model. With Greenhouse you pay a quoted subscription and the vendor runs everything.

Your new jobs. Updates, backups of the db-data and uploads volumes, HTTPS, and keeping secrets in .env are on you. Self-hosting doesn’t make your hiring lawful on its own either: your privacy notice, lawful basis and answers to candidate requests remain your organisation’s work.

Feature comparison

Built only from the pages listed above (Greenhouse) and the Vekt repository, checked 30 October 2026.

Greenhouse Vekt
Hosting Vendor cloud on AWS (US, EU and APAC silos) Your server, Docker Compose
Licence and source Proprietary MIT, source on GitHub
Pricing Quote only, three plans (Core, Plus, Pro) Free software; you pay hosting and any AI provider
Job posting Multilingual job boards; job-distribution partners in its directory Own careers page with readable job URLs
Screening questions on apply Not checked on the pages we opened Single- and multiple-choice, per job
AI CV review Yes, with identifying details redacted Yes, with direct identifiers removed first
Choice of AI model Not offered on the pages we opened; AI features can be turned off OpenAI, OpenRouter or a local model via Ollama
Low AI score “The decision is always yours” Marked needs review; auto-reject only as an opt-in
Interview scheduling Yes, including self-scheduling No
Interview kits and scorecards Yes No
Sourcing and CRM Yes No
Reporting 40+ pre-built reports, BI connector (Plus) Applications per job, job page views
Integrations 520 entries in the partner directory REST API, no ready-made integrations
SSO Yes (Core) No
Audit log Pro plan Evaluation provenance per score; no general audit log
Automatic data deletion Not checked on the pages we opened Daily purge after the retention period you set
Onboarding Yes No

“Not checked on the pages we opened” means exactly that: the feature may well exist in Greenhouse, but we only list what we could link to.

Who should stay on Greenhouse

  • Teams with recruiting coordinators who live in interview scheduling and scorecards.
  • Companies hiring dozens of roles at once, with sourcing, CRM and reporting in daily use.
  • Organisations whose HRIS, job boards and assessments already connect through Greenhouse’s integrations.
  • Anyone who needs SSO, certifications and a vendor contract on day one, and has no one to run a server.

For those teams, moving to any self-hosted tool would be a step backwards today.

Who self-hosting suits

  • Small and mid-sized teams hiring a few roles at a time, for whom a full Greenhouse plan is more than they use.
  • EU teams that want candidate data on infrastructure they choose, with a local model so CVs never leave it.
  • Teams that want AI to set a reading order while a person makes every rejection.
  • Developers who want to change the hiring logic itself. Vekt is a TypeScript codebase; see our open-source page.

If you want to compare Vekt with other open-source options rather than with Greenhouse, our open-source ATS comparison covers nine of them, including where another project fits better.

Try it before you decide

The Vekt README offers a one-line setup that downloads the files, generates secrets, asks for admin credentials and starts the app and Inngest with Docker:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Behnoudmst/vekt/main/setup.sh | bash

It needs Docker with Compose v2 and openssl. The default AI_PROVIDER is mock, so nothing leaves the machine until you choose a provider. Post one real job, run it next to your current process for a week, and check what you miss. More on what the platform covers is on the Vekt home page.

FAQ

Can you self-host Greenhouse?

No. Greenhouse is sold as a cloud service only. Its security overview describes hosting on AWS in US, EU and APAC regions run by Greenhouse. If you need to run the ATS on your own servers, you need a different product.

Is there an open-source alternative to Greenhouse?

Several open-source ATS projects exist, including OpenCATS, FreeATS and Vekt, and HR suites such as Horilla and OrangeHRM include recruitment. None matches Greenhouse feature for feature; our comparison shows what each covers.

How much does Greenhouse cost?

Greenhouse doesn’t publish prices. Its pricing page says pricing “is customized based on your company’s hiring needs” across the Core, Plus and Pro plans, and a quote comes after a demo.

Does Vekt do interview scheduling like Greenhouse?

Not today. Vekt covers jobs, the careers page, applications with screening questions, AI-ranked review and candidate emails. Scheduling, interview kits and scorecards are not part of it yet.

Does self-hosting keep CVs away from AI providers?

Only if you run the model yourself. With AI_PROVIDER=ollama, scoring happens on your hardware. With OpenAI or OpenRouter, the CV text, with direct identifiers removed, is sent to that provider.