HyCanvas

Verified

Open source, self-hostable design editor for graphics, slides, video and docs with AI

Visit HyCanvas →No rating yetFreemium

Product preview

HyCanvas

What it is

HyCanvas is an open source design platform from HyScaler that positions itself as an alternative to Canva. A single infinite-canvas editor handles social graphics, presentations, simple video, whiteboards, documents, sheets and print layouts. Its AI studio can draft designs and slide decks from a prompt and supports chat-based edits, using an OpenAI, Anthropic or DeepSeek key that you supply, with no markup on usage. Teams get live cursors, comments, approvals, roles and a shared brand kit. You can use the hosted cloud version or self-host it as one container image plus PostgreSQL, and every feature is available on every plan without watermarks.

Key features

Infinite canvas editor
Prompt-to-design AI studio
Real-time collaboration
Self-hosting with Docker

What we liked

+ Every feature free with no watermarks
+ Self-host option for data control
+ No markup on AI usage

Worth noting

· AI features need your own API key
· Cloud plan prices not published

Editor's notes

More context from AI BirdView

Plenty of design tools give away a basic editor and then charge for exports, fonts or background removal. HyCanvas takes a different route: the code is open source under the AGPL, every feature is on for every user, and paid cloud plans only cover hosting, storage, backups and support. That makes it an unusual option for groups that want full design capability without per-feature paywalls.

A bring-your-own-key AI studio, so you pay your model provider directly
Self-hosting as a single container image with PostgreSQL, plus local or S3 storage
SSO through OIDC, TOTP multi-factor sign-in and encrypted AI keys for security-minded teams
Real-time collaboration with comments, approvals and a shared brand kit
An open file format and an MCP endpoint that AI assistants can connect to

HyCanvas suits schools, nonprofits, small businesses and in-house creative teams that care about data ownership or simply dislike watermark gates. The project is still at an early version number, so try the cloud version with a real brand kit and a short deck before moving a whole team over, and check the public GitHub roadmap to see which features are still in progress.