Keila is an open-source newsletter platform designed for individuals and teams who want full control over their email marketing without relying on proprietary SaaS tools. Built with Elixir, it offers a self-hostable solution that supports both simple SMTP setups for small lists and enterprise-grade email services like AWS SES, SendGrid, Mailgun, and Postmark for larger campaigns. Keila provides a WYSIWYG editor for designing emails and tools to create customizable sign-up forms, making it ideal for developers, bloggers, and small businesses seeking privacy-focused, self-hosted newsletter solutions.
Unlike cloud-only platforms, Keila gives you the freedom to choose where your data lives and how emails are delivered. Whether you’re running a personal blog or managing a community newsletter, Keila eliminates vendor lock-in while maintaining the ease of use expected from modern email tools.
What You Get
- WYSIWYG Email Editor - Create professional-looking newsletter campaigns with a visual editor that supports rich text formatting, images, and responsive templates without needing HTML expertise.
- Multiple SMTP Backends - Send emails via your personal inbox for small lists, or integrate with AWS SES, SendGrid, Mailgun, and Postmark for higher volume delivery with better deliverability.
- Custom Sign-Up Forms - Generate embeddable forms to collect subscriber emails directly on your website, with options to customize fields and styling.
- Self-Hostable Docker Deployment - Deploy Keila on your own server using the official Docker image
pentacent/keila or the provided docker-compose.yml file for full data control.
- AGPL-Licensed - Fully open-source under the GNU Affero GPL v3+, ensuring transparency and freedom to modify and distribute the software.
Common Use Cases
- Building a personal blog newsletter - A blogger uses Keila to send weekly updates via their Gmail account, avoiding third-party tracking and keeping subscriber data private.
- Creating a community newsletter for open-source projects - A project maintainer deploys Keila on a VPS to manage 5,000+ subscribers using AWS SES for reliable delivery and detailed analytics.
- Problem: Vendor lock-in with Mailchimp → Solution: Self-hosted Keila - A small business tired of rising Mailchimp prices and data restrictions migrates to Keila using Docker, retaining all subscriber lists and campaign history.
- Team workflow for content creators - A marketing team uses Keila’s self-hosted instance to collaborate on campaigns, schedule sends, and track opens—all without exposing subscriber data to external platforms.
Under The Hood
Keila is an open-source email marketing platform built with a monolithic architecture that emphasizes modularity and extensibility. It combines Elixir and Phoenix for the backend, offering robust handling of mailing, authentication, and account management, while leveraging modern JavaScript tools for a dynamic frontend experience. The system is structured to support both core open-source functionality and optional proprietary extensions, enabling flexible deployment models.
Architecture
Keila adopts a modular monolithic design with clear separation of concerns across backend and frontend components.
- The system uses Elixir/Phoenix for the web backend, ensuring concurrency and fault tolerance through OTP
- Modules are organized around distinct responsibilities such as authentication, mailing, and file handling
- Strategy patterns are applied to mailer adapters, allowing for flexible integration with various email services
Tech Stack
This platform is built using Elixir and Phoenix, with a rich JavaScript ecosystem powering the frontend.
- The backend is powered by Elixir and Phoenix, leveraging the Erlang ecosystem for scalability and reliability
- Frontend tools include ProseMirror and Editor.js for rich text editing, alongside Tailwind CSS and Webpack
- Testing is supported through Ecto, Phoenix’s built-in test suite, and environment-specific configurations
Code Quality
Code quality in Keila reflects a mature development approach with consistent patterns and strong testing practices.
- Comprehensive test coverage and exception handling are evident across both backend and frontend modules
- The codebase maintains consistent naming and structure, aligning with Elixir and JavaScript best practices
- Some technical debt is present in migration files and conditional compilation logic that could be refactored
What Makes It Unique
Keila stands out through its flexible licensing model and extensibility features that support both open and closed-source usage.
- The platform enables a dual-license model by integrating optional proprietary extensions based on deployment context
- Conditional compilation macros are used to inject cloud-specific features only when available, offering unique flexibility in feature delivery