awesome-privacy

Awesome Privacy

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List of free, open source and privacy respecting services and alternatives to privative services.

About | Contributing | Quotes | Discussions

[!IMPORTANT] Anonymity, Privacy, and Security are often used interchangeably, but they actually represent distinct concepts. It is important to understand the differences between them. Read more in this section below.

The primary focus of this list is to provide alternatives that prioritize privacy. These alternatives give you control over your data and do not collect or sell it.

Contents

💬 Communication & Social
Instant Messaging · Mail Services · Online Phone Providers · Video and Audio Conferencing · Teamworking Tools · Social Networks and Platforms · Commenting Engines · Translation · RSS Readers

🌐 Networking & Web
VPNs · Web Browser · Search Engines · Domains & Hosting · Link Shorteners · Link in Bio Tools · Captchas · Analytics · Routers

🔐 Security & Encryption
2FA · Password Managers · Encryption · Pastebin and Secret Sharing · Privacy Tools · Whistleblowing

📁 Files & Productivity
Cloud Storage · File Management and Sharing · Download Manager · Notes and Tasks · Office · PDF Tools · Calendar · Bookmarking · Forms · Databases

🎬 Media & Creative
Media Streaming Platforms · Music Recognition · Photo Storage · Photo Editing and Management · Video Editing · Screen recording · Design Tools · Creator Tools · Fonts · Games · Ebooks

📱 Mobile & OS
Android · Operating Systems · Home Assistants

🛠️ Developer & Self-hosting
Developer Tools · Version Control · Remote Access and Control · Artificial Intelligence · Automation

💸 Money
Payments · Personal Finances

🧭 Everyday
Maps and Navigation · Fitness and Health · Dating Apps · Location tracking · Utilities

💬 Communication & Social

Instant Messaging

Mainstream messengers collect who you talk to, when and from where, even when the messages themselves are encrypted. Look for end-to-end encryption by default, open source clients, and as little metadata and identifying info (like a phone number) as possible; this site compares many of them.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Decentralized

Many independently run servers talk to each other, so there is no single point of control or failure and you can pick a server or run your own. Federation is more complex and leaves some extra metadata on the servers involved.

Centralized

One provider runs the servers, which is a single point of failure and control. That can still be trustworthy when the protocol and code are open and audited.

P2P

Messages go straight from one device to another, with no server to control or fail. You lose some features and delivery can be slower, but it’s the strongest option for sensitive chats.

Mail Services

Free webmail is paid for with your data. And email itself was never built for privacy: unless both sides use the same encrypted provider or PGP, every message reaches the provider in a readable form, and the sender and their provider keep a copy too. A provider that encrypts your mailbox protects what’s stored there afterwards, from a breach or a later request for your data, not the message on its way in. So pick one that doesn’t profile you, asks for as little as possible about you, and encrypts what it stores, or run your own server. For anything really sensitive, use an encrypted messenger instead.

[!TIP] An old mailbox is an archive of your life on someone else’s server. Moving mail you’ve dealt with to your own encrypted device limits what a breach or a court order can expose. Here’s why and how.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Third-Party owned

Self-Hosted

Clients

Android / iOS
Desktop

Email Alias Services (Anonymous Forwarding)

An alias service gives you a different address for each website, forwarded to your real inbox, so you can cut off spam and see who leaked your address. You can use their hosted service or run your own.

Online Phone Providers

Many sites demand a phone number for verification, which ties your account to your real identity. These paid services give you a number to receive (and sometimes send) SMS without handing over your own.

No email verification, accepting monero

Email verification required, accepting monero

Email verification required, accepting crypto

Video and Audio Conferencing

The big meeting apps log who you call and when, and their apps ship with ad and analytics trackers. Prefer tools you can self-host or that connect participants directly, with encryption you don’t have to trust a company for.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Alternative clients/modifications of Discord

[!WARNING] Discord still sees your IP and your messages, which are not end-to-end encrypted.
Client mods violate the Discord ToS, so your account could be suspended, although this has not been enforced so far.

Teamworking Tools

Workplace chat holds your team’s most sensitive conversations on someone else’s servers. Prefer tools you can host yourself, so the messages and files stay with your organization.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Discord mods and alternative clients, and the risks of using them, are listed under Alternative clients/modifications of Discord.

Social Networks and Platforms

The big platforms profile you from everything you read, watch and like, and their feeds are built to keep you there. Federated networks let you choose your server and still reach everyone, and alternative frontends let you read the big sites without an account or their tracking.

[!NOTE] The fediverse

The fediverse is a network of independent servers and apps that talk to each other over the open ActivityPub protocol. You can follow people on any of them from whichever one you join, and move elsewhere if you’re unhappy. This video by Framasoft explains the idea.

Apps that speak ActivityPub carry the ActivityPub badge.

[!NOTE] Alternative frontends and clients

Frontends let you read these services without an account, ads or their scripts. The service still sees requests for the content you view, and only frontends that route everything through their own server hide your IP address from it. Public instances get blocked often, so expect to switch instances or self-host.

These tools redirect links to alternative frontends automatically:

Blogging platforms (Medium)

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Alternative Medium frontends

Instagram

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

YouTube

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

YouTube alternative frontends (web-based)
YouTube alternative clients (apps)

Twitter

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Self-hosted
Decentralized

[!NOTE] Federated social networks aren’t a single website: they’re thousands of communities run by different people and organizations, which can all follow and reply to each other.

Alternative Frontends

Reddit

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Reddit alternatives
Privacy respecting Reddit clients

Streaming Platforms (Twitch)

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Privacy respecting Twitch clients

Imgur

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

IMDb

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Fandom

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Commenting Engines

Embedded comment widgets load third-party trackers on every page that uses them, profiling your readers across sites. A self-hosted engine keeps comments and reader data on your own server.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Translation

Online translators keep the text you paste in, which often includes private messages and documents. Translating on your own device, or through a self-hosted or proxy frontend, keeps that text away from big providers.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Text translation

Alternative Google Translate frontends

RSS Readers

These services build a profile from everything you read. A local or self-hosted reader fetches feeds directly, so nobody sees your reading list.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

↑ Back to contents

🌐 Networking & Web

VPNs

A VPN doesn’t make you anonymous; it moves the trust from your ISP to the VPN provider. Pick one that asks for no personal details, takes anonymous payment and publishes the source of its apps.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Web Browser

Your browser sees everything you do online, and the big ones are built by ad and data companies. Prefer one that blocks trackers out of the box and doesn’t tie your browsing to an account.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Android / iOS

Desktop

[!TIP] The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Online Anonymity explains how to harden your browser. If you don’t understand a change, leave it alone; it can hurt your privacy more than it helps.

Browser Addons

Anti-tracking

Read what an add-on does before installing it. A badly chosen one can hurt your privacy, and too many slow your browser down.

[!TIP] In uBlock Origin, read about the blocking modes and pick one. Turning on EasyList Cookie under Filter lists > Annoyances hides most cookie banners.

Useful Tools

Browser Sync

Search Engines

Your searches say more about you than almost anything else, and the big engines log them to build ad profiles. These don’t profile you, and several run their own index instead of reselling Google’s or Bing’s results.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Domains & Hosting

Most registrars and hosts want your real identity and a card on file, which ties your site straight back to you. These accept anonymous signup and cryptocurrency payment.

Hosted shorteners sit between every click and its destination, so they can log who opened what. Host your own, or use one that encrypts the target so the service can’t read it.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Hosted link pages put your profile and everyone who visits it on someone else’s platform. These let you host the page yourself, or link your accounts with cryptographic proofs instead.

Captchas

Mainstream captchas tell humans from bots by profiling visitors. These make the visitor’s browser solve a small proof-of-work puzzle instead, with no tracking needed.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Analytics

Analytics from Google, Facebook or Microsoft feeds your visitors’ data into their ad businesses. These tools give you the numbers without profiling visitors, and most can run on your own server.

Routers

Every byte your household sends passes through the router, yet stock firmware is closed and often goes years without security fixes. Open firmware, or a spare PC running a firewall distribution, puts you back in control.

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🔐 Security & Encryption

2FA

Authenticator apps generate the one-time codes that protect an account even after its password leaks. Pick one that encrypts its vault and lets you export your tokens, so you’re never locked in.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Password Managers

A password manager lets you use a strong, different password for every account without remembering any of them. Prefer one that encrypts your vault on your device, so not even its sync server can read it.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Encryption

Encryption keeps your files unreadable to anyone without the key, whether a laptop gets stolen or a cloud provider gets breached. These tools use open, well-reviewed cryptography and keep the keys with you.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

OS Encryption

Pastebin and Secret Sharing

Sending a password or a private note over chat or email leaves a copy in every inbox and backup. These tools encrypt the text in your browser and let it expire, so the server never sees it and nothing lingers.

Privacy Tools

Tools for checking what your devices and apps leak, and for cutting off what you don’t want sent.

Desktop

Android

Whistleblowing

Platforms for receiving leaks and reports without exposing the source. They run on infrastructure the organisation controls instead of a hosted portal or email inbox.

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📁 Files & Productivity

Cloud Storage

Mainstream cloud drives can read everything you upload and scan it on their servers. Prefer storage that encrypts files on your device before upload, or a server you run yourself.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Other useful tools

File Management and Sharing

Upload-and-share services keep a readable copy of your files on their servers and fill their sites with trackers. Prefer tools that send files directly between devices, or encrypt them before they leave yours.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Download Manager

A download manager sees every file you fetch and every site you fetch it from. These resume and speed up downloads without ads or bundled extras, and their code is open to inspect.

Notes and Tasks

Popular note apps store everything you write on their servers, usually readable by the provider and wrapped in trackers. Prefer apps that keep notes on your device or encrypt them end to end before syncing.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Office

Cloud office suites keep your documents on the provider’s servers in a form it can read. Prefer an offline suite, or a collaborative one that encrypts documents end to end or runs on your own server.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

PDF Tools

Most online PDF tools upload your document to their server before working on it, then promise to delete it later. Prefer tools that do the processing on your own device.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Calendar

Your calendar shows where you’ll be, when and with whom. Prefer a calendar that keeps events on your device, syncs over open CalDAV with a server you trust, or encrypts them end to end.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Bookmarking

Bookmarks and read-later lists reveal a lot about what you read and care about. Prefer a manager you host yourself, or one that syncs bookmarks through storage you already control.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Book and web annotations/highlights management

Forms

Hosted form builders collect every answer your respondents give on the provider’s servers. Prefer a form tool that encrypts responses end to end or runs on your own server.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Databases

Hosted backends like Google Firebase keep your app’s data and your users’ accounts on servers you don’t control. These backends can run on your own infrastructure instead.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

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🎬 Media & Creative

Media Streaming Platforms

Streaming services log everything you watch and listen to, and their apps are full of trackers. Host your own media server, or use a client that doesn’t report back, to keep your habits to yourself.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Video and Audio

Audio

Spotify alternative clients

These clients cut out Spotify’s own apps and their tracking, but you still stream from Spotify’s servers, so Spotify still sees what you play.

YouTube Music alternative clients
Deezer alternative clients

Podcasts

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Music Recognition

Song recognition apps listen through your microphone and tend to bundle a lot of trackers. The clients below still ask a recognition service to match the song, but without the official apps’ tracking.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Shazam alternative clients

Photo Storage

Cloud photo services scan your library for faces, places and objects and tie it all to your account. Host your own photo server, or use an end-to-end encrypted service so only you can see your pictures.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Self-hosted

Third-party

Local

Photo Editing and Management

Mainstream photo editors push your work into their cloud and collect usage data along the way. These editors run on your own machine, or entirely in your browser, and keep your files local.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Web

Desktop

Android

Video Editing

Commercial video editors are closed source and often tied to an online account, and Adobe has a long record of anti-user practices. These editors run locally and need no account.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Screen recording

Many screen recorders upload your recordings to their own cloud and ask you to sign in first. These record locally, with no account.

Design Tools

Adobe’s tools collect data through Creative Cloud, its mobile apps carry trackers, there’s no Linux version, and artists worry it may train its AI on their work. These alternatives run on any desktop and keep your files yours.

InDesign

Photoshop / Illustrator

Figma

Maya / 3ds Max / Cinema 4D

Creator Tools

Riverside.fm, Restream and Camtasia are closed source, and the hosted ones route your recordings and guests through their servers. These tools run locally or connect people peer to peer.

Fonts

Loading fonts from Google’s servers hands every visitor’s IP address to Google, which a German court ruled a GDPR violation in 2022. Host the font files yourself, or use a drop-in replacement that doesn’t log.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Google Fonts Replacements

Foundries

Games

Big-name games and engines often come with mandatory accounts, telemetry and paid online plans. These open alternatives play in a similar spirit without any of that.

Mario Kart

Nintendo collects data from Switch owners, and an update turned data sharing back on for people who had disabled it. Online play also needs a paid subscription.

Minecraft

Minecraft needs a Microsoft account, and Microsoft has forced players to hand over a phone number to keep it. Since snapshot 21w38a the game also sends telemetry you can’t turn off.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Plugins for Minecraft

If you still play Minecraft, these mods and tools claw back a little privacy, though you are still supporting Microsoft.

Pokemon

Nintendo collects data from Switch owners, and an update turned data sharing back on for people who had disabled it. Online play also needs a paid subscription.

Sonic the Hedgehog

Unity / Unreal Engine

Ebooks

Commercial ebook platforms track your reading, tie your books to an account that can be revoked, and expect you to stay online. Keep your library on your own devices or your own server instead.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

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📱 Mobile & OS

Android

Apps to replace the Google and manufacturer defaults on an Android phone, and the stores to get them from.

Android App Store

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Alternative Google Play Store clients

Android Debloat Tools

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Android Dialer

🚫 Avoid

Dialers from the Play Store may carry ads or trackers and ask for permissions they don’t need.

✅ Use instead

Android File Manager

🚫 Avoid

Preinstalled file managers and those from the Play Store may carry ads or trackers and ask for permissions they don’t need.

✅ Use instead

Android Keyboard

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Your photos show where you’ve been and who you were with, including friends and family who never agreed to be in anyone’s cloud. Pick a gallery that keeps them on your phone.

[!NOTE] To store and back up your photos privately, see Photo Storage.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Android Launcher

🚫 Avoid

Launchers from the Play Store may carry ads or trackers and ask for permissions they don’t need.

✅ Use instead

Android SMS

Operating Systems

The operating system sees everything you do on a device. These replace or strip down the systems that report back to Google, Apple and Microsoft.

Android

[!NOTE] App compatibility: without Google Mobile Services, some apps won’t work. Plexus collects community reports on how apps run with microG or with no Google services at all.

[!NOTE] Security: a custom ROM can improve your privacy and still weaken security. Pick one that supports verified boot and encryption and doesn’t enable root by default, and avoid userdebug builds. If security matters most, use GrapheneOS on a Google Pixel. More on Privacy Guides.

🚫 Avoid

Avoid Google’s Android and the versions phone makers such as Samsung, Xiaomi or Huawei ship, which send data to their servers. The systems below build on the open source AOSP without that.

✅ Use instead

Android-Based

GrapheneOS is the pick for security: its hardening and exploit mitigations make vulnerabilities much harder to exploit, both in the OS and in the apps running on it.

The other ROMs support many more devices and offer good privacy, but they can be less secure than GrapheneOS, with a larger attack surface.

Based on Linux

Smart TV

🚫 Avoid

Avoid Android TV, LG webOS and the other systems preinstalled on smart TVs.

✅ Use instead

Kodi is an app, not an operating system, so you can also build your own setup: a Raspberry Pi 4 running Linux, plugged into your TV, with KDE Connect to control playback from your phone.

See also Media Streaming Platforms.

PC / MacOS

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

If you stay on Windows, Win11Debloat or W10Privacy can turn off many of its privacy-invasive settings.

GNU/Linux

GNU/Linux is a family of open source operating systems, mostly built by their communities. Good places to start:

[!TIP] To try a distribution without installing it, boot it from a live USB stick, or use Ventoy to keep several on one stick.

[!TIP] To keep your current system, install Linux alongside it with dual boot.

[!NOTE] Distributions differ in how free they are and how well they respect your privacy, so read up before you pick one.

Other OS

Home Assistants

Smart speakers keep a microphone on in your home and send recordings to their maker, where they have been stored and reviewed by staff (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7). Pick one that runs on your own hardware, and don’t give the cloud ones as gifts.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

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🛠️ Developer & Self-hosting

Developer Tools

Many developer tools phone home with usage data and sometimes snippets of your code. These run locally and keep your work on your machine.

IDEs

🚫 Avoid

Proprietary editors often ship with telemetry turned on by default.

✅ Use instead

Version Control

Hosting your code on a big platform hands your activity and your code to one company. A non-profit host or a forge you run yourself keeps you in charge of both.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Remote Access and Control

Remote desktop tools can see and control everything on a machine, so trust matters more here than almost anywhere. Prefer open tools you can run on your own server, with no vendor account in the middle.

Artificial Intelligence

Cloud AI services see everything you type, tie it to your account and payment details, and may keep it or train on it. Running models on your own hardware keeps your prompts with you; when you do need a cloud model, pick tools that let you choose the provider.

ChatGPT

AI Coding

Text to Speech

Speech to Text

Models
Apps and services

Image Generation

Automation

Cloud automation services hold access tokens for every account you connect and run your workflows on their servers. A self-hosted tool keeps those credentials and your data at home.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

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💸 Money

Payments

Cards, PayPal and bank transfers tie every purchase to your name and leave a record with several companies. Cash and private cryptocurrencies like Monero let you pay without that trail.

[!WARNING] Bitcoin is not anonymous or private: it is pseudonymous, and every transaction is public and traceable. For a basic introduction, see aantonop’s video. More advanced users can watch this Bitcoin privacy series.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Wallets

Payment Processors

Where to use Monero and Bitcoin

Personal Finances

Your transactions reveal where you live, shop and travel. These tools keep your financial records on your own device or server instead of a company’s cloud.

Budget Management

Shared Expenses

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Others

Portfolio trackers

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🧭 Everyday

Maps and Navigation

Mainstream map apps log where you go and what you search for. Apps built on OpenStreetMap data can work offline, so your location stays on your device.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Fitness and Health

Health data is among the most sensitive data you have, and the most sought after. Skip the apps from Google, Fitbit, Huawei, Xiaomi and other data-hungry companies, and pick ones that keep your records on your device or your own server.

Fitness trackers

Workout planners

Food

Menstrual cycle trackers

Cycle data is intimate. Rather than mainstream trackers like Clue or Period Tracker, use one that keeps it on your device or encrypts it end to end.

Medical health

Dating Apps

Mainstream dating apps collect intimate data and profit from it. Tinder in particular has been found to charge some users up to five times more for the same service, estimate your intelligence and other traits and pass them to third parties, and keep far more about you than you might expect.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Location tracking

Your location history shows where you live, work and sleep. These tools record it on your own device or server rather than a Google account.

🚫 Avoid

✅ Use instead

Tracking

Find My Device

Utilities

↑ Back to contents

Privacy vs Security vs Anonymity

Privacy, security and anonymity are often used interchangeably, but they mean different things.

Privacy and security don’t always come together. Google’s systems are secure and hard to break into, yet Google still has access to your personal data and uses it.

Privacy and anonymity don’t always come together either. Signal doesn’t collect what you say, who you talk to or how you use the app, so it offers strong privacy, but it isn’t anonymous: you register with a phone number, which is often tied to your identity.

Some services offer all three. This list focuses on privacy: alternatives that give you control over your data and don’t collect or sell it.

Legend

Small text after an entry lists its platforms, features and license, and links its F-Droid build for Android apps. “Play Store version has trackers” means the Google Play build includes ads or analytics libraries, according to Exodus Privacy, while the F-Droid build doesn’t.

Tags point out a trade-off:

🚫 Avoid lists name mainstream services and the main privacy problem with each. The links lead to the evidence: ToS;DR grades privacy policies, Exodus Privacy lists the trackers in Android apps, and Source points to a report.

This site is open source. Improve this page.