Firecrawl's repo (formerly mendableai/firecrawl) is the source of the hosted Firecrawl API. Self-hosting runs the API, workers, Playwright, Redis, RabbitMQ and PostgreSQL via Docker Compose and covers scrape, crawl, map and search. Licence is AGPL-3.0 (SDKs MIT). The self-hosted stack does NOT include Fire-engine (advanced anti-bot handling), screenshots, page actions or Agent and Interact features; LLM extraction needs an OpenAI-compatible provider or Ollama. The default API has no authentication. Firecrawl respects robots.txt by default.
Cite this pageRepoQuarry. “Firecrawl (self-hosted).” Checked 16 Oct 2026. https://repoquarry.dev/projects/firecrawl
How much of Firecrawl Cloud does it replace?
4 of 4 jobs. Core scrape, crawl, map and search only; no Fire-engine anti-bot handling, screenshots, actions or Agent features when self-hosted.
Partial:Crawl a site to MarkdownPartial replacement
Partial:Scrape pages (JS-heavy and bot-protected)Partial replacement
Partial:Structured data extractionPartial replacement
Partial:Web search with page contentPartial replacement
Facts, with sources
Every answer links to where we found it. We read the documentation; we did not install it.
Runs on my machine?Confirmed:Yes, self-hosted with Docker Compose (API on port 3002)Self-host Firecrawl with Docker Compose when you need source or infrastructure control.docs.firecrawl.dev · self-host ↗1d ago
Code licencePartial:AGPL-3.0 (copyleft); SDKs and some UI components MITThis project is primarily licensed under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0 (AGPL-3.0).github.com · firecrawl#license ↗1d ago
Model weights licenceConfirmed:No separate model weights; LLM features use the provider you connectdocs.firecrawl.dev · self-host ↗1d ago
Commercial usePartial:Yes, under AGPL-3.0 copyleft terms (offer source of modified versions run as a network service)github.com · LICENSE ↗1d ago
Paid services needed?Confirmed:None required for scrape, crawl, map and search; LLM extraction can use Ollama or a paid APIConnect OpenAI, an OpenAI-compatible endpoint, or Ollama when a feature needs it.github.com · SELF_HOST.md ↗1d ago
HardwareUnknown:No minimum host size published; needs Docker capacity for several servicesFirecrawl does not publish a verified minimum host size for this stack.docs.firecrawl.dev · self-host ↗1d ago
Operating systemsUnknown:Self-hosting explicitly requires Docker Engine or Docker Desktop and Compose v2, but does not publish a Windows/macOS/Linux host test matrix or native-build support statementdocs.firecrawl.dev · self-host ↗today
Setup effortConfirmed:Medium, Docker Compose stack of several services; production needs your own auth, TLS and persistenceThis trusted-network quickstart disables API authentication and is not a production architecture.docs.firecrawl.dev · self-host ↗1d ago
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