Open Source Document Management System
A document management system earns its keep long after the people who filed anything have moved on, when someone has to answer which version is current, who approved it, and whether it can legally be destroyed yet. That makes the metadata model, the audit trail, and the retention rules matter far more than the viewer or the upload screen. The open source options here keep your documents as ordinary files on storage you control, with the extracted text, tags, versions, and approval history in a database you can query directly. The practical payoff is that the record survives the software: even if you stop using the tool, the trail and the files remain yours to read and to move.
Logseq
Privacy-first knowledge base for graph notes, Markdown, Org-mode, PDF annotation, and tasks
Paperless-ngx
Self-hosted document management system for scanning, indexing, and archiving paper files
Docmost
Open-source collaborative wiki and documentation software with real-time editing, spaces, and permissions
Zettlr
Markdown publication workbench for researchers, journalists, and writers with citations and Pandoc exports
CKEditor 5
TypeScript rich text editor framework with WYSIWYG editing, plugins, and collaboration support
ONLYOFFICE Docs
Collaborative online office suite for documents, spreadsheets, presentations, forms, PDFs, and diagrams
LibreOffice
Free open source office suite with Writer, Calc, Draw, Impress, and broad document format support
Teedy
Lightweight document management system with OCR, search, and workflow for personal or business use
Docspell
Self-hosted document management system for organizing scanned, emailed, and imported files
Our picks
For records management, the strongest fits are the OCR-driven repositories, not the authoring tools on the list.
Turns paper into a searchable archive: Paperless-ngx Paperless-ngx scans and imports documents into one archive and runs OCR so the text inside scans and PDFs is fully searchable. The community-maintained successor to Paperless-ng, it deploys with Docker Compose. It stores documents unencrypted for a trusted local server, so plan backups; it is the popular default for home or small-office use.
Built for large document collections: Mayan EDMS Mayan EDMS is a mature system for teams handling large volumes of documents, PDFs, and scans. Files run through OCR for indexed, searchable text, and the official setup deploys with Docker Compose, also shipping as a Docker image and PyPI package. Reach for it when scale matters more than a lightweight install.
Automated tagging on intake: Docspell Docspell pulls documents together from scanners, email, and other sources and uses NLP to suggest correspondents, guess tags, and find dates, on top of OCR and full-text search. It exposes a REST and HTTP API and ships a web app plus an Android uploader, cutting manual sorting as papers arrive.
Business DMS with access controls: Teedy Teedy combines OCR and full-text search with a workflow system, file versioning, and nesting tags, plus LDAP authentication, two-factor auth, and audit logs. Stored files use 256-bit AES encryption, and documents share by URL, REST API, and webhooks. It suits a business needing authentication and an audit trail, not a personal scan pile.
Fitting a document system to how records arrive and leave
The first thing to settle is what you mean by a document, because this category mixes records managers with authoring tools. If your problem is scanned paper, invoices, and contracts that must be found years later, you want an OCR-driven system like Mayan EDMS, Paperless-ngx, Papermerge, Docspell, or Teedy, which extract text, attach metadata, and make image piles searchable. If your problem is writing and co-editing documents, ONLYOFFICE Docs and Docmost solve a different job, and LibreOffice and Zettlr are desktop authoring tools rather than repositories. Naming the real workflow first keeps you from evaluating a wiki against a filing cabinet.
For a records system, weigh capture and policy as core architecture. OCR quality decides whether a scanned archive is searchable or just stored, so test skewed scans, stamps, and mixed languages with your own documents; Docspell goes further and suggests correspondents, tags, and dates with NLP. Then look at permissions and retention: document-level access, audit trails, versioning, and rules for who may approve, publish, or destroy a record. Teedy adds LDAP and two-factor auth with audit logs and AES-encrypted storage, while OpenDocMan is built around per-user access control and a review step before files are published.
Finally, check the integration and exit path before importing years of files. A document repository touches email, scanners, accounting, and case systems, so an API and event model matter as much as the web UI; Papermerge and Docspell both expose REST APIs, and Teedy adds webhooks. Prefer systems that store originals as ordinary files and let you export metadata without a proprietary client, since the safest exit preserves the files, extracted text, metadata, versions, and audit log together. Ask how backups cover both the file storage and the database, because a full-text index you cannot rebuild is not a backup.
Related categories
Frequently asked questions
Several of these look like note apps or office suites. Which are actually document management systems?+
The category is broad. Mayan EDMS, Paperless-ngx, Papermerge, Docspell, Teedy, and OpenDocMan are true document management systems that ingest files, run OCR, and add metadata, versioning, and search. Uwazi organizes structured document collections. Docmost is a collaborative wiki, ONLYOFFICE Docs is an office suite, and Logseq, Zettlr, and LibreOffice are authoring tools. Match the tool to whether you are filing records or writing them.
How much does OCR quality matter, and how do I test it?+
A lot. OCR decides whether a scanned archive becomes searchable text or stays a pile of images. Test with your real documents - skewed scans, stamps, faxes, mixed languages, and tables - rather than a clean sample. Good systems let users correct metadata when OCR is imperfect, run it automatically, and rebuild the index after settings change. Docspell adds NLP that suggests correspondents, tags, and dates on top of the extracted text.
How is a document management system different from a shared folder or cloud drive?+
Shared storage is file-centric: folders, links, and basic permissions. A document management system is record-centric, adding metadata, OCR, version history, audit trails, retention rules, and search across document contents. If your only pain is finding the latest file, a shared drive may be enough. If you need controlled intake, traceability, and policy-driven retention, a system like Mayan EDMS or Paperless-ngx does what a folder cannot.
Does open source document management handle retention schedules and legal holds?+
Some do, but check the details. Retention should key off document type, status, and dates rather than folder age, and legal holds should suspend deletion without breaking normal access. Ask whether disposition needs approval and whether destruction is logged. Several tools here focus on capture and search more than formal disposition, so if regulated retention is central, verify the exact rules first, because compliance depends on configuration and process, not just a feature.
Where are my documents actually stored?+
Ask whether files are stored as ordinary documents on disk or object storage, and whether metadata lives in an exportable database. Mayan EDMS and Paperless-ngx keep documents as normal files, and Papermerge lets you download a document with its OCR text overlay. The safest setup preserves originals, extracted text, metadata, versions, and audit logs together, so avoid designs whose only export is a bulk ZIP without the metadata around it.
What is the realistic effort to import an existing file share?+
Expect cleanup, not a clean copy. You will normalize folder names, remove duplicates, map folders to metadata, decide how to treat old versions, and flag files with unclear owners or retention value. Run a pilot on a representative subset before moving everything, and keep the original archive read-only until users validate the new structure. The real work is classification, not moving bytes.
Which permission and audit features matter for sensitive documents?+
Look for document-level permissions, inherited access you can override, groups tied to an identity provider, read-only roles, and audit logs that record viewing and downloading, not just editing. Workflow roles matter too: whoever uploads a document may not be allowed to approve or destroy it. OpenDocMan is built around per-user access and a review step, and Teedy adds LDAP, two-factor auth, and audit logs. Test former-employee and external-reviewer cases.