Ghostfolio
Portainer
| Feature | Ghostfolio | Portainer |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free / from $5.99/mo | Free / from $12/mo |
| Free Plan | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Rating | 4.3 / 5 | 4.4 / 5 |
| Best For | privacy-focused-investors, self-hosters, passive-investors, international-portfolios | devops-engineers, system-admins, small-teams, docker-users |
| Founded | 2021 | 2017 |
| Portfolio Tracking | ✓ | ✗ |
| Performance Analysis | ✓ | ✗ |
| Allocation Views | ✓ | ✗ |
| Multi Currency | ✓ | ✗ |
| Dividends | ✓ | ✗ |
| Benchmarking | ✓ | ✗ |
| Self Hostable | ✓ | ✗ |
| Container Management | ✗ | ✓ |
| Stack Deployment | ✗ | ✓ |
| User Management | ✗ | ✓ |
| Registry Access | ✗ | ✓ |
| Monitoring | ✗ | ✓ |
| Edge Computing | ✗ | ✓ |
✓ Ghostfolio Pros
- Open-source with self-hosting option
- Privacy-focused (no data selling or ads)
- Supports stocks, ETFs, crypto, commodities
- Beautiful portfolio allocation visualizations
✗ Ghostfolio Cons
- Limited broker integrations (manual entry mostly)
- Smaller community than commercial alternatives
- No tax-loss harvesting or advisor features
✓ Portainer Pros
- Visual UI for Docker/K8s management
- Free for up to 5 environments
- Simplifies container deployment
- Role-based access control
✗ Portainer Cons
- Enterprise features are paid
- Can lag behind Docker CLI capabilities
- Limited CI/CD features
The Verdict
Ghostfolio is built for privacy focused investors and self hosters, with a focus on portfolio-tracking and performance-analysis. Portainer targets devops engineers and system admins and leads with container-management and stack-deployment.
On pricing, Ghostfolio is the clear winner for budget-conscious users — starting at $5.99/mo compared to $12/mo for Portainer. That $6.01/mo difference adds up quickly for growing teams.
Both offer free plans, so you can test each with your real workflow before committing to a subscription.
Feature-wise, Ghostfolio offers broader built-in capabilities (7 features vs 6), while Portainer takes a more focused approach — which can mean a simpler, faster onboarding experience.
This is a genuinely close comparison. If you can, sign up for both free trials (where available) and run a one-week test with your actual team tasks before deciding.