Self-hosted / open sourceCMSHeadquarters: DE

Kirby CMS: sovereignty score and 8 European alternatives

Kirby is a flat-file content management system for developers, designers and creators. Content is stored as plain text files in folders, where each folder is a page; images and other media sit alongside. Kirby is built on PHP 8 and Vue.js for its admin panel, and according to its makers content can be delivered headless or in the classic way. You install Kirby on your own web space or server and operate it there yourself.

Kirby is source-available but not free: the source code is public, but the product is covered by its own end-user licence agreement, and every public website needs a paid licence tied to one domain. Development installations and private family use are free. The licensor is Content Folder GmbH & Co. KG in Neckargemünd, Germany; Bastian Allgeier holds the rights. If the software is no longer maintained for one year, the source code becomes available under the MIT licence. Because Kirby works with files rather than a cloud service, you decide where your data is stored.

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Sovereignty score

80 / 1000 = high exposure
100 = sovereign

Jurisdiction SOV-2100
Headquartered in the EU: European law applies
Data residency SOV-3100
EU-only hosting
Cryptographic key sovereignty SOV-380
Closed source, but self-hostable: encryption keys and runtime under your own control
Freedom from lock-in SOV-640
Closed source: switching requires data migration
Source & runtime sovereignty SOV-4 · SOV-680
Closed source, but self-hostable on your own infrastructure

SOV codes: the matching objective in the European Commission's Cloud Sovereignty Framework. Official source

How the score is calculated

Facts and evidence

Last checked October 9, 2026

Headquarters	DE (EU)Verified by hand
Data hosting	Self-hosted, e.g. in EU (your choice)Verified by hand
Open-source	NoVerified by hand
GDPR-compliant	YesVendor-stated
Hosting signal	OVH - OVH SAS, FR (CA)Technically measured
Category	CMS
Type	Product
Website	getkirby.com ↗

The hosting signal shows the network that serves the vendor's website, often a CDN, and not necessarily where the service or your data is hosted. How we verify · Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Top EU-based & GDPR-compliant alternatives to Kirby CMS

The European alternatives to Kirby CMS come from our knowledge base of over 6,800 vendors. We only list vendors headquartered in the EU or the EEA; fully European-owned vendors rank before vendors with a foreign owner. For each alternative you see the country, the open-source status and a short description.

Score per alternative: 0 = high exposure, 100 = sovereign

39 European CMS vendors are in the catalogue. View the whole category · Submit an alternative · View category on the map

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Why digital sovereignty matters with Kirby CMS

Kirby CMS is headquartered in DE and therefore falls under European law: the GDPR, NIS2 and the Data Act. No foreign legislation can compel access to your data.

Kirby CMS runs on infrastructure you choose and control yourself. You decide where the data lives, including fully within the EU if you want — this is not a fixed hosting choice made by the vendor.

Kirby CMS is closed source, but you run the software yourself on your own infrastructure. The encryption keys and the runtime therefore stay under your own control, though you cannot audit or modify the source code. Ask about export options and open standards to limit software-level lock-in.

What this means for your organisation depends on your whole stack and context. The free assessment weighs Kirby CMS together with your other vendors and gives a total score, a heatmap and the main risk drivers.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best European alternative to Kirby CMS?

It depends on your use case. Strong EU alternatives to Kirby CMS include Ametys, Bolt CMS and caisy. On this page you can compare 8 EU alternatives by jurisdiction, data residency and open-source status.

Are there open-source alternatives to Kirby CMS?

Yes. Open-source EU alternatives to Kirby CMS include Ametys, Bolt CMS, Cockpit CMS, Contao and django CMS. These keep your data fully under your own control and let you self-host if you want to.

Is Kirby CMS GDPR-compliant and where is the data hosted?

Kirby CMS is headquartered in DE (EU) and hosts data in EU. That makes Kirby CMS an EU-sovereign choice in its own right; the EU alternatives on this page are comparable European tools.

Details and sources

Verified by handHeadquarters, owner, hosting locations and licence have been checked by us against public sources. Free of charge and for every vendor, not a paid label. Nothing in this knowledge base is taken over automatically. Last checked on October 9, 2026.

Sources

Public sources used in the latest check of this record.

Compliance evidence

The links below point to the vendor's own public documents. We only record what we found: a missing link means "not found publicly", not "not compliant".

No public compliance evidence has been recorded for this vendor yet. Do you know its DPA or subprocessor list? Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Cyber Resilience Act

Public signals that relate to the EU Cyber Resilience Act. They do not count towards the score. A missing line means "not found publicly".

Report a vulnerability: getkirby.com/security
security.txt: getkirby.com/security.txt
Supported versions: getkirby.com/security

For products in scope of the CRA, CE marking is required from 11 December 2027; this cannot be checked yet.

Checked on October 9, 2026. What is the Cyber Resilience Act?

Digital sovereignty in CMS

CMS: Content management systems — websites, headless CMS, digital experience platforms. In this category the choice of vendor determines who has legal access to your data, where that data lives and how easily you can switch later.

Also in this category

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