Send a PDF for people to fill in and sign online, from your own server.
Ghost
A website, blog and email newsletter for your business, with optional paid memberships.
Small business
MIT
What it does
Ghost gives you a good-looking website with a blog and an email newsletter in one place. Write in a clean editor, publish to your site and send the same post to your subscribers by email. Readers can sign up for free, or pay a monthly fee for members-only posts, with payments handled by Stripe. It is used by independent writers, small businesses, clubs and local news sites, and you can run it on your own server.
- A fast, good-looking website with a clean writing editor
- Send posts as email newsletters to your subscribers
- Free and paid memberships, tips and donations through Stripe
- Themes, code injection, integrations and a full API
Great for: Small businesses, writers, clubs and local news sites who want a website and newsletter they own, without Substack's or Squarespace's fees.
- LicenceMIT
- Where it runsOnline (from $3.30/month) · Your computer (free)
- Built withjavascript, typescript, handlebars
- Your dataStays in your own copy
- SourceTryGhost/Ghost
Ways to use it
Choose one when you tell your AI. It sets everything up with you, in plain words.
- Online with PikaPods from $3.30/monthA small, friendly host just for open-source apps. Pay by the hour, cancel any time, and new accounts get $5 of free credit. Third-party host.
- Online with Elestio from $11/monthFully managed hosting on your own private server, with automatic backups, updates and monitoring. Third-party host.
- On my own computerFreeYour AI installs what it needs and explains each step. It works while your computer is on.
Hosts are independent companies, not BespokeAI. You sign up and pay them directly. We may earn a referral fee, which never changes your price.
How people are using this project
Examples of what people ask their AI to do with Ghost. Start from one, or just tell your AI and it will ask what you'd like.
-
“I run a small bookshop. Help me set up Ghost with our logo and colours, an 'Opening hours' page, and a free monthly newsletter people can sign up for.”
Start with this idea -
“I want readers to pay £4 a month to read my full recipes, with the first paragraph free for everyone. Set it up with Stripe.”
Start with this idea -
“Put my Calendly booking calendar on a 'Book a session' page, without changing the theme files.”
Start with this idea -
“Change the Source theme so the home page shows my three services as big cards above the latest posts, then give me the zip to upload.”
Start with this idea -
“Every time we publish a post, send a message with the title and link to our Slack channel.”
Start with this idea -
“Make an 'Events' page that lists our upcoming workshops by date, using posts tagged 'event', with past events hidden.”
Start with this idea
Can I trust it?
- MIT. Free to use, change and share for any purpose, including commercial use. Keep the copyright and licence notice if you share the code. "Ghost" and the Ghost logo are trademarks, so don't present a changed copy as the official Ghost.
- Your data: stores personal data, on your own device or server. MySQL database (posts, members' names and emails, subscriptions) plus the content folder (images, themes, files), in ./data with ghost-docker.
- Other services: Email (SMTP) for transactional mail (required, free with most providers); Mailgun (optional, pay-per-use (free trial)); Stripe (optional, Stripe's card fees; Ghost takes no cut when self-hosted); Tinybird (optional, free tier, then paid); ActivityPub (Ghost's hosted service or self-hosted) (optional, free)
- Pinned version
db90cf0. Every handover uses exactly this code, which we've reviewed. - Ghost is meant to be public, so run it behind HTTPS (ghost-docker includes Caddy for this) and keep it updated.
- Your members list holds names and email addresses. Limit staff accounts, use strong passwords and keep backups private.
- Admin API keys can publish and delete content. Keep them out of AI chats and shared files.
- Code injection runs on every page for every visitor. Only paste code from sources you trust.
- Sending newsletters needs Mailgun and a properly set-up sending domain, or emails may land in spam.
Did it work for people?
No reports yet
Be the first to tell others how it went.
More for small business
Make invoices and quotes, track who has paid and log expenses for your small business.
See how many people visit your website and where they come from, without cookies.