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About livedocuments

Why Use livedocuments?

Free and open source, no sign-in wall, and real-time collaboration from the very first shape.

There are plenty of ways to make a deck or a document. livedocuments is built around four ideas that make it a comfortable home for teams: it is free, it is open source, it never puts a sign-in wall in front of the editor, and it is multiplayer from the start. Here is what each of those actually means for you.

Free, with no paid tier

livedocuments is free for everyone. There is no paid tier, no "Pro" upgrade, no trial that expires, and no plan to introduce any of those. Every feature in the product is available to every user. The hosted version at livedocuments.app costs nothing to use.

Open source

The whole codebase is MIT-licensed and publicly viewable. That has real consequences:

  • Nothing to verify on faith. Anyone can read how livedocuments stores and handles a document, and there is no license check phoning home.
  • No lock-in. Because the code is open and your documents export to portable formats, you are never trapped.
  • Accounts stay optional. The editor is fully usable as a guest; an account adds sync and teams.

No sign-in wall

The editor always works without signing in. A first-time visitor can open a new document, build something real, and only later be asked to create an account, never blocked by a modal before they have even started. An account adds cross-device sync and teams, but it is never a gate in front of the editor.

You start building straight away, with no sign-in gate in front of the canvas.

Multiplayer from the first shape

Collaboration is not a bolt-on. Hand someone a share link and they join the same document, where everyone sees live cursors, live selections, and every edit as it happens. To keep edits from colliding, an element another person currently has selected is gently locked for everyone else.

Multiplayer from the start: live cursors and presence the moment someone joins.

Real-time sharing

Hand over a link and collaborate live, even with guests.

Pages

Articles, slides and infographics, side by side on a tab.

Themes

Recolour a whole document to match your style.

Templates

Start from a ready-made layout instead of a blank page.

The best argument for livedocuments is the editor itself. Open a new document and try it, no account needed.

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