DocsHow KHUB compares
Footprint & speed
No formal timed benchmark was run — what follows is the documented, architectural reality of how each product is actually deployed.
No formal timed benchmark was run across all six of these platforms — a precise millisecond comparison between a cloud SaaS product you don't operate and something you self-host isn't something either side can honestly claim. What follows is the documented, architectural reality of how each product is actually deployed, which is what determines how "fast" it feels in practice.
| Platform | Deployment model | Self-hosted footprint | What actually drives speed for you |
|---|---|---|---|
| KHUB | Self-hosted only, by design | ~7 containers via one docker compose up; Node.js/NestJS + PostgreSQL + Redis | Your own hardware and network — no vendor-side seat throttling or CI-minute metering |
| GitHub | Cloud SaaS (Enterprise Server also self-hostable) | Enterprise Server's reference sizing starts around 8+ vCPU / 24GB+ RAM for a small instance | GitHub's own global infrastructure and your path to it; Actions runners are metered by plan |
| GitLab | Cloud SaaS or self-hosted (Omnibus/Helm) | Reference architectures start around 8GB RAM / 4 vCPU and climb fast — Puma, Sidekiq, Gitaly, Postgres, Redis, and Registry all run as separate services | The heaviest self-hosted service count of this group, by GitLab's own documented architecture |
| Gitea | Self-hosted (small official cloud offering also exists) | A single static Go binary + SQLite/Postgres — commonly runs on well under 512MB RAM | The lightest thing on this whole list — Gitea's signature trait |
| Forgejo | Self-hosted, community-governed fork of Gitea | Shares Gitea's Go-binary lineage — comparably light | Same profile as Gitea; the fork diverges on governance and roadmap, not runtime shape |
| Slack | Cloud SaaS only — not self-hostable | N/A — no infrastructure of your own to size | Slack's own infrastructure and client-side rendering; nothing here is in your hands to tune |
| Jira | Cloud SaaS or Jira Data Center (self-hosted, itself a paid product) | Data Center is built around a clustered deployment — multiple app nodes plus a shared database and search index — for its HA story | Cloud: Atlassian's infrastructure. Data Center: a cluster-oriented footprint sized for HA, not minimalism |