zekariyas

Hey r/selfhosted 👋 I'm the founder of Refearnapp, an affiliate tracking platform that you can self-host on your own infrastructure. I wanted to share why I went the self-hosted route and why it might matter to you if you're running any kind of referral or affiliate program.

Why self-hosting affiliate tracking specifically? Most affiliate/referral SaaS tools charge per-click, per-conversion, or a % of revenue. When you're scaling, that gets expensive fast. With self-hosting, you pay once (or just for your server) and that's it — no surprise invoices tied to your growth.

What you actually own Your data stays on your server. Conversion events, affiliate emails, payout history — none of it goes to a third-party analytics pipeline you don't control. No vendor lock-in. If Refearnapp (or any SaaS alternative) shuts down tomorrow, you still have everything running and your data intact. Custom integrations are actually possible. Access the DB directly, hook into your own webhooks, plug into internal tools — things that are impossible or heavily restricted on closed SaaS platforms. GDPR / compliance is simpler. When your users ask "where is my data?", the answer is literally your own server. Much easier to manage than coordinating with a third-party processor. The tradeoff (being honest) Self-hosting means you're responsible for uptime, updates, and backups. It's not for everyone. But if you're already comfortable running a VPS and a Docker container or two, the setup is straightforward.

Who it's for If you run an indie product, a SaaS, or an e-commerce store and want to run affiliate/referral programs without handing over your conversion data to yet another third party — this is built for you.

Happy to answer questions about the tech stack, setup, or the reasoning behind going self-hosted. What do you all look for when evaluating self-hosted tools like this?

🔗 Repo: https://github.com/ZAK123DSFDF/refearnapp

Hey everyone,

I’ve been working on a self-hosted affiliate tracking tool after running into a common issue with existing solutions like Rewardful or FirstPromoter.

Most of them require full read-access to your billing provider (Stripe/Paddle) and operate as closed, managed services. That means handing over sensitive financial data and trusting a black-box system for attribution.

I wanted something different:

self-hosted transparent privacy-first

So I built RefearnApp — a self-hosted affiliate tracking engine.

🧠 Why this approach No third-party data access → everything runs on your own infrastructure **Transparent attribution logic **→ affiliates can verify how tracking works **Full data ownership **→ all relationships and logs stay in your database **No forced subscriptions **→ you can run it without ongoing costs ⚙️ Deployment Docker-ready Works with Coolify or any VPS Lightweight enough to run alongside existing services 🔓 Open source model

The core engine is AGPL-3.0 and fully self-hostable.

I’m following an open-core approach:

core functionality is free and open optional paid features support ongoing development 🔗 Repo

https://github.com/ZAK123DSFDF/refearnapp

I’d really appreciate feedback from people here — especially around:

setup experience architecture decisions anything missing for a self-hosted workflow