FreshRSS
Hosting
Install FreshRSS in one click on our fast, reliable UK web hosting. Fully managed with free SSL, daily backups, and dedicated expert support.
What is FreshRSS?
FreshRSS is a free, self-hosted RSS feed aggregator written in PHP. It is actively developed, has a growing user base since the decline of Google Reader, and is one of the few feed readers in 2026 that genuinely competes with paid services like Feedly or NewsBlur. It supports OPML import and export, full-text article extraction, multiple users, mobile-friendly themes, keyboard shortcuts, and a Fever-compatible API for use with mobile apps like Reeder, Unread and FeedMe.
The application is light. A small SQLite or MySQL database, a few hundred PHP files, and a cron job that fetches feeds on a schedule. Most personal installations use less than 200 MB of disk and a few MB of database. Resource use scales with the number of subscribed feeds and the retention period for old articles, but even users with 500+ subscriptions rarely outgrow a shared hosting plan.
365i offers FreshRSS as a one-click install on shared hosting plans from £5.99/mo with PHP 8.5, MySQL 8, free SSL, daily backups and free migrations.
365i’s editorial review of FreshRSS
I've used FreshRSS on my own server for years. When Google Reader shut down in 2013, I tried about a dozen replacements before settling on FreshRSS, and I haven't had a reason to move since. It's the quiet kind of software: it sits there, fetches feeds every 30 minutes, and gets out of your way. That's exactly what an RSS reader should do.
From a hosting point of view, FreshRSS is one of the easiest applications I deal with. It runs on the same PHP 8.5 and MySQL 8 stack we use for everything else. The cron job is the only piece that needs a moment's thought, and our shared platform supports cron natively, so it's a one-line setup in the control panel. The application's own auto-update mechanism is reliable and I rarely have to step in unless someone has manually edited a config file and broken it.
"FreshRSS is what self-hosting should feel like. You install it once, set the cron, and forget it exists for six months. Then you remember, log in, and find 8,000 unread articles waiting. That's the price of being good at your job."
Mark McNeece, Founder, 365i Hosting
The feature I lean on most is the Fever API compatibility. It means I can read feeds in Reeder on my iPhone, in the FreshRSS web UI on my desktop, and in a browser tab on a laptop, and read state syncs everywhere. That used to require a paid service. Now it's a self-hosted PHP application on a £5.99 shared plan, and it works the same way. The OPML export means you're never locked in. If you ever want to move, your subscriptions come with you.
One thing I tell every new FreshRSS user: think carefully about your retention settings before you import a big OPML file. The default keeps articles indefinitely, and if you're subscribed to high-volume feeds like news sites or aggregators, the database grows surprisingly fast. I keep mine at 90 days for most feeds and unlimited for a small set of slow-moving blogs. That keeps the MySQL database under 100 MB and queries snappy.
For people coming from Google Reader replacements that have shut down (Inoreader's free tier kept shrinking, The Old Reader had outages, Feedly's free tier became near-useless), FreshRSS on a shared hosting plan is the pragmatic answer. You own your data, you control your retention, and the only thing you're paying for is the hosting itself. No tracking, no ads in your feeds, no rate-limited refresh intervals.
The migration story is good too. We've moved a dozen FreshRSS users from competitors over to our platform in the last year, and the process is the same every time: dump the database, copy the data directory, drop them on PHP 8.5 with MySQL 8, point DNS, done. Subscriptions, read state, starred articles, all preserved.
Why Host FreshRSS with 365i?
Our web hosting is built for PHP applications like FreshRSS. Every plan includes everything you need to launch and grow.
One-Click Installation
Install FreshRSS with a single click from your control panel. No manual configuration, no FTP uploads, no database setup.
Free SSL Certificate
Every site gets a free SSL certificate, automatically configured and renewed. Keep your FreshRSS installation secure from day one.
99.9%+ Uptime Track Record
Enterprise-grade data centres in the UK, US & Asia with redundant power, cooling, and network connectivity. Shared hosting runs on autoscaling cloud infrastructure with a 99.9%+ historical uptime record; Managed Cloud Servers target 99.99% uptime; our VPS products carry a contractual 99.99% network availability SLA with service credits.
Daily Backups
Automatic daily backups with easy one-click restore. Your FreshRSS data is always safe and recoverable.
7-Day Expert Support
UK-based hosting specialists available 7 days a week including evenings, weekends, and bank holidays. Real people, real help.
SSD Storage
All plans run on fast SSD storage for snappy page loads and responsive admin panels. FreshRSS performs at its best.
Where FreshRSS Fits
Best for
Anyone who relied on Google Reader, has a list of 50+ feeds, and wants a self-hosted RSS reader they can rely on long-term. Privacy-conscious readers who don't want their reading habits tracked. Mobile readers who use Reeder, Unread, FeedMe or similar Fever-compatible apps. Small teams who want a shared multi-user feed reader without paying per-seat for a SaaS service.
Watch for
FreshRSS's default retention is unlimited, which lets MySQL grow quickly if you subscribe to high-volume feeds. There is no native push notification, so mobile alerts depend on the third-party app you pair with. Full-text article extraction is per-feed and a bit fiddly to configure for sites that don't expose full content in their feed. There's no built-in social or sharing layer.
Web Hosting for FreshRSS
Get FreshRSS up and running in minutes with our fast, reliable web hosting. Every plan includes one-click installation, free SSL, UK, US & Asia data centres, and dedicated expert support.
- 1 website
- 10 GB SSD storage
- Free SSL certificate
- 80+ 1-click installs
- Unlimited LVE resources
- Autoscaling cloud platform
- UK, US & Asia data centres
- 5 websites
- Unlimited SSD storage
- Free SSL certificate
- 80+ 1-click installs
- CDN included
-
Timeline Backup/Restore
Timeline Backup
- Website files and databases
- Daily snapshots, 30-day retention
- One-click file and database restore
- Everything above, plus email mailbox backups
- 60-day database retention
- Mailbox restore (to a temporary mailbox first, then sync back)
- Unlimited LVE resources
- Autoscaling cloud platform
- UK, US & Asia data centres
- 10 websites
- Unlimited SSD storage
- Free SSL certificate
- 80+ 1-click installs
- CDN included
-
Timeline Backup/Restore (Pro)
Timeline Backup
- Website files and databases
- Daily snapshots, 30-day retention
- One-click file and database restore
- Everything above, plus email mailbox backups
- 60-day database retention
- Mailbox restore (to a temporary mailbox first, then sync back)
- Unlimited LVE resources
- Autoscaling cloud platform
- UK, US & Asia data centres
All prices exclude VAT. No contract, cancel any time.
Need More Power for FreshRSS?
For high-traffic sites, large catalogues, or mission-critical deployments, our fully managed cloud servers give FreshRSS dedicated resources and enterprise-grade performance.
- Dedicated CPU, RAM & SSD storage
- 99.99% uptime
- Fully managed by our team
- Choose 365i, AWS, or Google Cloud
Servers
Servers
Servers
A FreshRSS case from our books
A small editorial team at a Manchester independent publisher came to us in early 2026 looking to replace a paid Feedly Team subscription that had jumped from £180 to £312 per year. Five users, around 220 shared feeds, and a workflow that involved tagging articles for a weekly newsletter. They had no DevOps capacity and were nervous about self-hosting.
We installed FreshRSS via the one-click installer on a £5.99/mo shared plan, configured the cron to refresh every 30 minutes, and imported their OPML file. Total setup was under an hour. We added the five user accounts, set retention to 60 days for high-volume feeds and unlimited for their priority subscriptions, and walked the editor through tag-based filtering. Database settled at around 80 MB after the first month and has stayed flat.
The team saved roughly £240/year against their previous Feedly bill, ended up with the same workflow plus stronger search, and gained an OPML export they own. Read state syncs cleanly to two of them using Reeder on iOS via the Fever API.
What we would tell anyone in the same spot: FreshRSS comfortably handles a multi-user team on shared hosting. Set retention sensibly from day one and the database will not get away from you.
Anonymised at the client's request. Industry, scale, and timeline preserved.
What we look for in feed aggregators hosting
A self-hosted feed aggregator hammers the network on every refresh and chews disk on every cached image. We make sure cron runs at least every fifteen minutes (every minute on heavier installs), tune PHP memory to 256MB so the parser does not exhaust on a feed with embedded images, and let the database grow without panicking because aggregator schemas are usually well-indexed. Outbound HTTP timeouts get bumped because some publisher feeds are genuinely slow.
More applications you can install on 365i hosting
Beyond Feed Aggregators, our one-click installer covers 79 open-source PHP applications across 27 categories. A small selection from across the catalogue:
FreshRSS Hosting FAQ
Common questions we hear from people running FreshRSS on our hosting.
Yes. FreshRSS supports OPML import, which is the standard format for RSS feed lists. Almost every other reader (Feedly, Inoreader, NewsBlur, The Old Reader, Tiny Tiny RSS) supports OPML export. You export from the old service, log into FreshRSS, go to Subscription Management, and import the OPML file. Folders and categories are preserved. Read state and starred articles are not part of OPML, so those start fresh, but your subscription list comes across cleanly.
FreshRSS uses a cron job to fetch feeds, and the schedule is up to you. The most common setting is every 30 minutes, which keeps things fresh without hammering the source servers. You can go as low as every 5 minutes for high-priority feeds, or as high as once an hour for low-volume sites. Our shared platform supports cron natively, so you set it once in the control panel and forget it. Per-feed refresh frequency overrides the default, which is useful for tuning.
Yes. FreshRSS implements the Fever API, which is the de facto standard for self-hosted RSS readers. Apps that work with it include Reeder (iOS/Mac), Unread (iOS), FeedMe (Android), Reams, Fiery Feeds and others. You configure the app with your FreshRSS URL, username and an API password (separate from your login password for security), and read state syncs both ways. There's also a Google Reader API compatibility layer for older apps.
Set sensible retention. FreshRSS lets you configure how long to keep articles globally and per-feed. For high-volume feeds (news sites, aggregators) I usually set 30-60 days. For slow-moving feeds I leave retention unlimited. There's also a "purge old articles" task that runs as part of the cron and a setting to keep starred articles forever regardless of retention. Without retention, a heavy reader with 500+ feeds can accumulate 500 MB of database in a year, which is fine but not necessary.
Yes, very much so. FreshRSS releases multiple updates per year, has an active GitHub repository, and the maintainers respond to issues and pull requests regularly. It's one of the healthier open-source projects in the self-hosted reader space. Major releases bring new features and the project supports current PHP versions, which is more than can be said for some competitors. Updates can be applied through the in-application updater or by replacing files manually if you prefer that workflow.
Ready to Host FreshRSS?
Get started with FreshRSS on our fast UK web hosting. One-click installation, free SSL, and dedicated expert support included.