Khoj

Khoj is an open-source personal AI app, often described as an AI second brain, that you can run privately on your own machine or use through its hosted cloud.

It lets you chat with your own notes and documents, search them semantically, and pull answers from the live web, turning any local or online large language model into a personal assistant.

Khoj supports models from providers such as OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and Mistral as well as local models via Ollama, and it can ingest PDFs, images, Markdown, org-mode, Word, and Notion files.

It is built for privacy-conscious individuals, researchers, knowledge workers, and developers who want a self-hostable assistant that keeps their data on their own infrastructure.

Features include custom agents with their own knowledge and persona, scheduled automations and newsletters, deep research, semantic search, and content generation, accessible from the browser, desktop, phone, Obsidian, Emacs, and WhatsApp.

Pros are full data control through self-hosting, flexibility to mix local and cloud models, and broad platform access. Cons are that self-hosting requires technical setup and ongoing maintenance, and the experience is less turnkey than fully managed consumer assistants.

Khoj is free and open-source to self-host, with paid hosted cloud tiers for those who prefer a managed option. Pricing changes often, so check the official site for current plans.

Khoj's core capabilities include Open-source and self-hostable, Chat with your own docs and the web, Custom agents with knowledge and persona, Semantic search across files, Scheduled automations and newsletters and Works across browser, desktop, mobile, Obsidian, and WhatsApp.

Open-source and self-hostable is built in, Chat with your own docs and the web is built in, Custom agents with knowledge and persona is built in, Semantic search across files is built in, so you get a rounded toolkit rather than a single trick.

Each feature is designed to take the manual effort out of the task and help you reach a usable result faster, which is what makes Khoj worth a place on your shortlist.

On the plus side, users consistently highlight Full data control via self-hosting, Flexible mix of local and cloud LLMs and Broad platform and file-type support as the reasons they keep using Khoj.

It isn't perfect, though — Self-hosting requires technical setup and maintenance and Less turnkey than fully managed assistants are the trade-offs people most often mention, so weigh those against your own priorities before you commit.

As with any AI tool, the output still benefits from a quick human review, but Khoj gets you most of the way there with far less effort.

Khoj runs on a freemium pricing model, so you can start for free and only pay once you outgrow the free tier — handy for testing it on a real task before spending anything.

AI-tool pricing changes often, so always check the current plans, seats and add-ons on the official site for the latest details before you buy. Who is Khoj for? It's best suited for open-source self-hostable personal ai second brain.

Whether you're a beginner trying this kind of AI tool for the first time or a professional who'll use it every day, it's a credible option to consider.

If you're still deciding, compare Khoj against the alternatives and the head-to-head comparisons linked below — looking at features, pricing and real user ratings side by side is the fastest way to find the right fit for your workflow and budget.