Self-hosting is hard. I know this because I self-host as many services as I can.1
2025 was a big year for self-hosting. The good news? It's going mainstream:
- More people are choosing Immich as a backup or as an alternative to cloud options as they show how unreliable they are time and time again.
- Gitea and Forgejo are becoming more relevant after GitHub decided to charge for self-hosted runners.
- Apparently, even non-tech YouTubers with 9-digit subscribers counts are promoting self-hosting.
But it was also the year when self-hosting got way harder in multiple ways.
Hardware is expensive
You've probably heard that already — DRAM prices are insane already, ~3-4x higher compared to September 2025, and flash prices are slowly catching up. Here's a great summary video by GamersNexus.
If you're reading this article and you were planning on getting a new computer, then you better act fast. When I saw the price charts, I ordered a maxed-out Framework Desktop. Not because I needed it immediately, but because I felt that it could be the last chance to cover my abstract hardware needs for next 3 years at reasonable prices.
Just a couple of days ago Framework increased RAM prices to $10/GB across their laptops, I expect Desktop to follow soon. At these prices, 128GB RAM would cost around $1280 — that's almost 65% of total price of Framework Desktop. At $1999 today it's an absolute steal.
I also bought a new NVMe for it, Samsung 990 Pro 1TB. I paid €100 for it in late November, now it goes for around €150 at the same seller — price increased by 50% in a month. It doesn't stop here; consumer GPU prices will be affected too. Nvidia is reportedly cutting production of GeForce series by 40% next year.
SBCs are feeling the pressure too — Raspberry Pi introduced new RPi 5 1GB model and raised prices for other variants. Even old hardware isn't safe: DDR4 prices are also affected, so that tiny ThinkCentre M720 won't save us.
It will get worse before it gets better. I don't expect it to improve in 2026 or even in 2027. Multi-billion companies don't care about ordinary consumers, they'd rather sell their products to other multi-billion companies. That alone has made 2025 a tough year for self-hosting. But there's another issue that's arguably worse: the software is becoming less trustworthy.
Trust is hard
Another notable development in 2025: popular self-hosted software going through enshittification. Let's take a look at some noteworthy examples.
Plex, a popular media streaming software, has been going through similar developments for years, but this year it dropped to a new low. First, Plex added a paid license for remote streaming, a feature that was previously free. And then Plex decided to also sell personal data — I sure love self-hosted software spying on me.
MinIO removed admin UI causing a massive backlash. And then they moved open-source variant into maintenance without any prior announcements, basically killing it and forcing users to look for a replacement2.
Mattermost suddenly introduced 10K messages limit. This comment perfectly captures my thoughts:
Our server, our database, but it's limited to 10K. It seems a joke
Such incidents raise a lot of questions and concerns. What's the point of self-hosting if the software you're hosting can unilaterally decide to limit features, harvest data, or abandon open-source development? The whole appeal was avoiding this exact behavior. And the hardest question of them all — how do I trust new self-hosted software?
Going forward
I expect more of the same. Self-hosting has always been hard, and it's not getting easier. Each year brings fresh challenges — rising costs, projects changing direction, infrastructure complexity. The challenges just never end.
That's the trade-off we make to claw back control and flexibility. The only actionable advice I have: choose your software carefully and be ready to migrate. Because with self-hosting, the question isn't if something will break or change — it's when.