livediagram vs Miro
The open-source Miro alternative
Miro is a powerful, sprawling online whiteboard. livediagram is a lighter, open-source take on the same idea: real-time multiplayer diagrams you can open in one click, with no sign-up, and run on your own account if you want to.
| Feature | livediagram | Miro |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free tier, then paid plans |
| Open source | Yes, MIT-licensed | No, proprietary SaaS |
| Self-hostable | Yes, on your own Cloudflare account | No |
| Start without an account | Yes | Sign-up required |
| Real-time multiplayer | Yes | Yes |
| Import + export | Mermaid + Markdown in; PNG, SVG, PDF, Mermaid out | Broad import + export options |
| Programmatic access | REST API + MCP server for AI tools, free | Developer platform + marketplace |
| Focus | Structured diagrams + templates | Freeform whiteboard + workshops |
Why pick livediagram
- It's free and MIT-licensed, so you can self-host it instead of paying per seat.
- Open a link and draw, with no sign-up wall in front of the canvas.
- Real-time multiplayer, live cursors and comments come standard, not gated behind a plan.
- Assign action items to teammates on the diagram itself, tracked in an Actions panel.
- Friction-free editing: tap once to add a shape, drag arrows that snap into place, and a format painter to copy a style across elements.
- Themed templates and one-click whole-canvas themes turn a blank board into a polished diagram fast.
- Walk a team through the board with the built-in present mode (laser pointer + spotlight), no export needed.
- Run a retro or planning session with the built-in per-tab timer and dot-voting, synced live to every participant.
- Import Mermaid or Markdown, export PNG, SVG, PDF, or Mermaid text.
Where Miro is the better pick
- Facilitating very large workshops: breakout-scale sessions and a marketplace of meeting apps around the board.
- A deep template and integration marketplace (Jira, Slack, and more).
- Enterprise admin, SSO, and compliance at large scale.
Built for diagrams, not workshops
Miro grew into a workspace: boards, workshops, docs, video walkthroughs, and a marketplace of apps. That breadth is genuinely useful for facilitation-heavy teams, but if what you actually make is diagrams (architecture sketches, flowcharts, org charts, plans) most of it is surface area you scroll past. livediagram is deliberately narrower: a canvas where shapes, arrows, and structure are the whole product.
That focus shows up in the details. Arrows stay attached to shapes and re-route themselves as you move things, with collision avoidance so lines stop overlapping. Alignment guides and snapping keep layouts tidy without manual nudging. A format painter copies a style across elements, and style presets keep a diagram consistent. Bigger work splits across tabs inside one diagram, tabs group into folders, and each tab has Photoshop-style layers for separating annotation from content.
Free means free, not a free tier
Miro's free tier is real, but it's the top of a pricing funnel: board limits and gated features exist to move teams onto paid seats. livediagram has no paid tier and no plan to introduce one. The hosted version at livediagram.app is free, every user gets every feature, and there is nothing to upgrade to.
That's sustainable because the whole codebase is MIT-licensed and public. If you'd rather not depend on the hosted service at all, you can deploy the same code to your own Cloudflare account: the editor, the API, and the realtime collaboration all self-host, with no license keys and no phone-home checks.
Collaboration without the onboarding
In Miro, collaborating starts with accounts: your teammates sign up, join a team, get assigned to boards. In livediagram, collaborating is a URL. Share a link and anyone who opens it is on the canvas with you, live cursors and all, without creating an account. Share links can carry a password or an expiry date when you need them locked down.
The collaboration tools go beyond cursors: leave comments on elements, assign action items to teammates directly on the diagram (with an Actions panel to track them and optional email notifications), and review the change log to see who did what. Editing is protected by a selection lock, so two people never fight over the same element.
Connected to the rest of your workflow
Diagrams rarely live alone. livediagram imports Mermaid flowcharts (the diagram-as-code format that lives in READMEs and AI output) and Markdown outlines, and exports PNG, SVG, PDF, Mermaid, or Markdown. Any share link can be embedded as a read-only, live-updating iframe in a wiki or doc.
For programmatic use there is a free REST API with personal tokens, and an MCP server that lets AI assistants read and edit your diagrams directly. None of it sits behind a plan.
Miro alternative FAQ
Is livediagram really free?
Yes. The hosted version at livediagram.app is free with every feature included, and there is no paid tier or plan to add one. The code is MIT-licensed, so you can also self-host the whole product on your own Cloudflare account.
Do my teammates need an account to edit with me?
No. Share a link and anyone who opens it can edit in real time, with live cursors and comments, without signing up. Accounts are optional and mainly useful for syncing your diagrams across devices and using teams.
Can I import my existing Miro boards?
There's no direct Miro importer. If your board is structured content (a flowchart, an org chart, a plan), the fastest path is to start from a livediagram template, or to import a Mermaid or Markdown version of the structure and let livediagram lay it out as a themed diagram.
Can livediagram run workshops the way Miro does?
Sessions like retros, brainstorms, and planning work well: every tab has a built-in facilitator-run timer and sticky-note dot-voting synced live to all participants, alongside comments, assigned actions, and the present mode. What livediagram does not have is Miro’s large-scale facilitation ecosystem (breakout-style sessions, estimation apps, a meeting-app marketplace), so for big multi-team workshops Miro is still the deeper toolkit.
Can I self-host livediagram?
Yes. The whole monorepo (editor, API, realtime, marketing site) is MIT-licensed and deploys to a Cloudflare account you control. There are no license checks and no required calls to our servers.
Comparisons reflect each product’s general positioning and may change. Check Miro’s own site for current details.
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