Fjord vs Codeberg.
Codeberg is a different use case: a public, nonprofit, Forgejo-based platform operated by Codeberg e.V. It documents Codeberg Pages and CI paths through limited hosted Actions, Woodpecker CI, or self-hosted runners. Fjord is a private managed Forgejo service for teams that need dedicated tenancy, support, commercial terms, CI, Pages, mobile access, CLI, export, and no-AI-training terms.
The Short Version
Codeberg is not the thing Fjord is trying to replace. Use Codeberg for public Free Software collaboration on a nonprofit Forgejo-based platform. Use Fjord when your team needs a private, dedicated, supported managed Forgejo instance. The deciding question is usually eligibility rather than capability: Codeberg's terms require a free licence on public content and allow private repositories only in support of a FLOSS project.
Fjord And Codeberg, By Capability
| Dimension | Fjord | Codeberg |
|---|---|---|
| Forgejo base | Upstream Forgejo. | Forgejo-based public forge. |
| Tenancy | Dedicated single-tenant VM per customer. | Shared public platform, not a dedicated customer instance. |
| Licence requirement | None. Proprietary, commercial, and closed-source work is in scope. | Public repository content must be licensed so anyone may use it for any purpose, redistribute it, study it, and modify it (Terms of Use § 2 (1) 1). |
| Private repositories | Included on Team and Pro, with nightly encrypted backups. | Allowed only for things required for FLOSS projects, plus small personal material, and explicitly not as a personal cloud or media store (Terms of Use § 2 (1) 2). |
| Project eligibility | Acceptable use is conduct-based: no unlawful or infringing material, no abuse of the platform. No project category is excluded. | Cryptocurrency projects, and projects consisting mostly of code written by generative AI tools, are not permitted (Terms of Use § 2 (1) 6 and 7). |
| Jurisdiction and regions | Operated from the United States with EU Central, US, and Singapore regions. | Codeberg e.V., non-profit association based in Berlin, Germany; infrastructure region choice is not documented. |
| Hosted CI | Managed runners, with dedicated runner add-ons by plan. | Limited hosted Actions; Woodpecker CI or self-hosted runner paths documented. |
| Pages | Managed Pages are documented. | Yes, Codeberg Pages. |
| Mobile | Native iPhone and iPad app on the App Store. | Not documented. |
| CLI | Yes. | Not documented. |
| Public MCP server | Not documented. | Not documented. |
| Pricing model | Per-instance plans, not per-seat. | Mission is to build and maintain a free collaboration platform; commercial pricing model is not documented. |
| Backups | Included: nightly encrypted backups. | Not documented. |
| Export | Forgejo-native export and exit are documented. | Migration to another Forgejo instance is documented. |
| No-AI-training | Contractual no-AI-training commitment and Content-Signal ai-train=no. | Not documented. |
| Compliance posture | No published SOC 2 or ISO 27001 claim. | Not documented. |
Eligibility Comes Before Features
For most hosting comparisons the first question is what the platform can do. For Codeberg it is whether your project is allowed to be there at all. Codeberg e.V. exists to support Free Software, and its Terms of Use say so plainly. Public repository content must be licensed so that anyone may use it for any purpose, copy it, study it, modify it, and redistribute it. Private repositories are permitted only for what a FLOSS project needs, such as secrets, team-internal discussion, or work not yet ready to publish, plus small personal material, and explicitly not as a personal cloud or media store.
That is a coherent mission and, for a Free Software project, a good deal that costs nothing. It also means a proprietary codebase, client work under NDA, or a product whose source is the business does not qualify, however well the platform would otherwise fit. The same section of those terms excludes cryptocurrency projects and projects consisting mostly of generative-AI-written code.
Fjord has no licence requirement and no project-category rule. Our acceptable use terms govern conduct: nothing unlawful or infringing, no attacks on the service or on third parties. What your code is licensed under is not something we ask.
Choose Codeberg When
- Your project belongs on a public nonprofit Forgejo-based forge.
- Codeberg Pages and public Free Software collaboration are the main use case.
- Your work is licensed so anyone may use, study, modify, and redistribute it.
- You want to support Codeberg e.V. and its community service model.
Choose Fjord When
- You need a private, dedicated, supported Forgejo instance.
- Your code is proprietary, or your private repositories are the point rather than a support for public ones.
- Your team needs managed operations, commercial terms, and per-instance billing.
- You want native mobile access, CLI, managed Pages, managed runners, export, and no-AI-training terms documented.
- You want to choose among Fjord regions rather than use a public shared platform.
What Fjord Is Not For
Fjord is not a public nonprofit forge for open collaboration. If that is the use case, Codeberg is the better fit.
Read the architecture notes, data residency details, no-AI-training terms, and pricing for the current Fjord commitments.