HumHub is free to download, and a small server costs little. What costs is the work around it: updates, backups, email, security and the night the server fails. This page lists that work task by task, so you can decide who should do it.
The same software on both sides: a CUZY community is the HumHub community edition, and its export runs on your own server unchanged.
| Task | Self-hosted | CUZY Hosting |
|---|---|---|
| Install PHP, a web server, a database, cron jobs, a queue and a cache, and keep them patched | Your team | Included |
| Apply HumHub updates and module updates, test that nothing breaks | Your team, each release | Canary rollout; security fixes within 48 hours |
| Back up the database and uploads, off the server, encrypted | Your team, if configured | Daily, 30 days of history (Team), hourly, 60 days of history (Business) |
| Test that a backup can actually be restored | Usually never | Quarterly, automated (Team), monthly, automated (Business) |
| Send notification emails that do not land in spam (SPF, DKIM, DMARC, reputation) | Your SMTP relay and DNS | Authenticated sending domain, monitored |
| Watch uptime, disk, memory and certificates, and wake up when they fail | Your team | Monitored around the clock, public status page |
| Harden the server: firewall, rate limits, security headers, TLS | Your team | Done, and described on the security page |
| Sign a GDPR processor agreement for the hosting | With your server provider | Included, written for HumHub |
| Buy and renew licenses of paid CUZY modules | Per module | Included on Business and the trial, 50% off on Team |
| Leave | Already yours | Complete export once a day, runs on any server |
CUZY modules work on any self-hosted HumHub, and CUZY offers maintenance of self-hosted instances on request.
A self-hosted HumHub costs a server plus hours. Count them honestly: the initial setup and hardening, a few hours per month for updates and checks, the time lost when an update breaks a module or an email provider blocks your server, and the risk of the backup that was never tested. If those hours are volunteer time or an engineer's time taken from other work, the managed price is often the cheaper line.
Neither choice is final: CUZY imports a self-hosted HumHub, and every subscriber can export theirs and self-host it later.
The license is: the community edition is open source under the AGPL. Running it is not: a server, a mail relay, backup storage, and the hours of someone who installs updates, watches the server and restores it when it fails.
Plan a day to install and secure it, then a few hours a month for HumHub and module updates, server patches, backup checks and email deliverability, plus unplanned time when something breaks. The numbers vary with experience; the work does not disappear.
Yes, both ways. CUZY imports a database dump and the uploads of a self-hosted HumHub, and subscribers can download a complete export once a day that runs on any server. The software is the same.
Yes. Every CUZY module is sold for self-hosted HumHub on the marketplace or on cuzy.app; on CUZY Hosting they are included on Business and the trial, and 50% off on Team.
14 days, every module, no card. Import your self-hosted HumHub when you are convinced.
