Huginn
Self-hosted system that runs automated agents to watch the web and feeds, then act on what they find.
- Stars
- 50.3k
- Forks
- 4.3k
- Licence
- MIT
- Language
- Ruby
- Last update
- 4 days ago
- Type
- App
What it is
Huginn lets you build small automated helpers called Agents that read websites, watch RSS feeds, email and webhooks, and then send notifications or take actions when something changes. Agents pass events to each other along a chain you design, similar in idea to IFTTT or Zapier but hosted on your own server. The README says it is hackable, so you can write custom logic in JavaScript, Liquid templates, or jq.
- Scrape a website and receive an email when its content changes
- Watch an RSS feed and post new items to Slack or Telegram
- Get an email digest of selected events at set times of day
- Track the weather and get a notification when rain is forecast
- Send and receive webhooks to connect Huginn with other tools
Great for
- People who want IFTTT-style automations without sending their data to a third-party service
- Developers comfortable running a Ruby on Rails web app and a background worker
- Anyone who wants to be alerted when a web page or feed changes
- Users who want to publish their own feeds or JSON endpoints from collected events
Not ideal for
- Non-technical users who want a simple one-click cloud service, since it requires self-hosting or local setup
- Anyone needing guaranteed uptime without maintaining a server, because a worker must keep running and the README notes free tiers usually do not keep one alive
How to get it
- 1
Run with Docker
You'll need: Docker
Run the official image with Docker
docker run -it -p 3000:3000 ghcr.io/huginn/huginn - 2
Run it
- Run the Docker command above.
- Open http://localhost:3000/ in your browser.
- Log in as admin using the password printed once in the container log.
- Create your first Agent and connect it to another Agent.
- 3
Get the most out of it
- Use the Docker documentation for persistent storage and an external database.
- Use the Docker Compose examples in docker/single-process/ for a production-style setup.
- Set environment variables such as APP_SECRET_TOKEN as described in the Docker docs.
- Browse the wiki for usage examples and agent guides.
Downloads
Strengths
- Self-hosted, so you control where your data is stored
- Large library of built-in agent types covering web, feeds, email, messaging and storage
- Extensible: the README points to a wiki guide for creating new agents
Trade-offs
- Setup requires a database (MySQL or PostgreSQL) and a background worker, which is more involved than a hosted automation tool
- The README does not document a specific hardware or cost footprint, so ongoing server cost and maintenance effort should be checked before committing
How it compares
| Project | Stars | Type | Level | Updated | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| huginn (this) | 50.3k | App | intermediate | 4 days ago | People who want IFTTT-style automations without sending their data to a third-party service |
| RD-Agent | 15.2k | AI model / agent | advanced | 15 days ago | Researchers who want to test automated ML engineering agents on benchmark-style tasks |
| UFO | 10.2k | AI model / agent | advanced | 6 days ago | Developers experimenting with LLM-driven Windows desktop automation |
| ai-goofish-monitor | 15.9k | App | intermediate | 27 days ago | People hunting for specific second-hand items on Xianyu over time |
| Octop | 11.5k | App | intermediate | 4 days ago | Households or small teams that want a shared, self-hosted assistant |
| uptime-kuma | 93.2k | App | beginner | 4 days ago | People who want to monitor their own websites or services without paying a hosted monitoring service |
Stats synced from GitHub. The assessment above was drafted with AI from the project's README on 2026-10-29 and may miss recent changes — check the README before relying on a command. MIT licence: free to use, modify and distribute, including commercially, as long as you keep the copyright notice.