Overview

Kiln puts editing on the site itself: editors can change text, images, documents, blocks, galleries, events, and calendar content. Each publish is saved as a Git commit, making Kiln a natural addition to a static site that already redeploys when its GitHub repository changes. That connection is also a constraint: Kiln is not a general-purpose editing layer for sites built around another publishing system.

Drafts, scheduled publishing, named versions, history, and restoration give owners useful controls over the lifecycle of a change. Content stays as plain HTML in the customer’s GitHub repository on every plan, and the site can be kept after leaving Kiln. That makes the content portable, though the site still depends on its own hosting and deployment setup.

Key features

Editing and review

Owners sign in with GitHub, while invited editors and members can use Google sign-in without GitHub accounts. Page- or section-level access is useful when different people maintain separate parts of a site. Comment-only reviewer seats keep feedback distinct from editing, and suggest mode lets owners approve or decline proposed changes field by field.

GitHub workflow and safeguards

Kiln works with GitHub repositories and hosts that redeploy on push, including Cloudflare Pages, Netlify, Vercel, and GitHub Pages. The setup guide says its GitHub App can access only repositories selected during installation; invited Google-email addresses are the only ones allowed to sign in as editors or members. These controls help limit access, but the GitHub-centered setup will not suit teams that avoid that provider.

API, AI, and file handling

A REST API and kiln-mcp let scripts and agents edit scoped, sanitized fields, which can support controlled automation rather than unrestricted repository access. Optional AI assist uses an API key supplied by the user. Uploaded documents have a 15 MB per-file limit, a meaningful constraint for teams managing large media or documents through the editor.

Kiln supports static HTML sites and documents a source mode for Astro-generated sites. Adapters for Eleventy, Hugo, and Jekyll are planned to follow, so those site types are not yet a documented supported path. Self-hosted plans include community support on GitHub; Fully managed includes priority support.

Pricing

Plan	Price	What it means
Self-hosted	0.00 USD per free	Free forever and open source under AGPL-3.0. You run the worker and GitHub App and provide the site host; best for teams willing to operate the service themselves.
Kiln Cloud	4.99 USD per month	Monthly recurring, with a 7-day free trial. It removes the need to self-host Kiln, while the site still uses its own host.
Fully managed	14.99 USD per month	Monthly recurring, with a 7-day free trial and priority support. It is the clearest fit for owners who want managed service and a higher level of support.
Concierge setup & tagging	399.00 USD per once	One-time optional service covering hand-tagging, menu and editor-access configuration, and one revision round; useful when setup help matters more than ongoing hosting.

The free plan avoids a subscription but shifts operation of the worker and GitHub App to the customer. Cloud and Fully managed are recurring monthly commitments after their 7-day free trial; the listed plans do not state seat or usage quotas, so teams should not assume a particular capacity from the price alone.

Platforms

Kiln is available as a web service and self-hosted software, with API access. The self-hosted route offers the most operational control, while the managed plans suit owners who would rather not run Kiln themselves. In either case, its GitHub repository workflow and static-site focus shape the deployment choices.

Who it's for

Kiln is best for people building static sites who need clients or other non-technical editors to maintain content themselves. It is particularly persuasive when changes should be reviewed before publication and when keeping content in a customer-owned repository matters. It is a weaker choice for teams that need a broad range of documented static-site adapters today, larger-than-15-MB document uploads, or a publishing flow outside GitHub.

Pros and cons

Pro: Editors work on the page and can handle several content types, reducing the need to route routine updates through a developer.
Pro: Scoped access, comment-only review, and field-by-field suggestions support delegation without giving every contributor the same role.
Pro: Plain HTML stays in the customer’s repository even after leaving Kiln, limiting content lock-in.
Pro: The free self-hosted plan is open source, while paid monthly options add managed service and, at the top tier, priority support.
Con: Free self-hosting requires the customer to run the worker and GitHub App and provide hosting.
Con: GitHub is central to ownership and publishing, and support for several popular static-site generators is still planned rather than documented.
Con: The 15 MB upload cap can rule out larger documents.

Alternatives

Decap CMS is worth considering for a free, self-hosted Git-based CMS with a free plan capped at one site and one seat. Siteleaf offers a free Developer plan capped at 100 MB and 100 pages, with public GitHub repositories and API access; choose it if those limits fit your project. Mattrbld is another free option with Android and iOS platforms as well as self-hosted and web access.

Quiqr is a free, open-source alternative with Linux, macOS, Windows, and web platforms. deco CMS offers a free open-source core that can be self-hosted. Netlify is an alternative if your priority is a hosting platform with a free plan of 300 credits per month, one concurrent build, and one team owner. Sitepins has paid Pro and Team plans and a free trial. TinaCMS is another freemium, self-hosted option, with a free tier for two users and two roles.

Browse more options in Git-Based CMS or Content Management Systems.

Verdict

Choose Kiln if you need non-technical editors to update a GitHub-backed static site with scoped permissions and a review path, while keeping content in your repository. The main reason to look elsewhere is the operational and platform commitment: free use means running Kiln yourself, and its documented site support remains focused on static HTML and Astro.

	Dotclear	Kiln
Free plan	No	Yes
Free trial	No	Yes
Paid from	—	$4.99/mo
Open source	No	No
Platforms	Web	api, self-hosted, Web
Free plan	Yes	Yes
Platform type	self_hosted	—
Editorial workflows	Yes	—
Multilingual content	Yes	—
SEO tools	Yes	—
Media library	Yes	—
Paid from	—	$4.99/mo

Dotclear vs Kiln

Dotclear

Kiln