Grist

Grist is the evolution of spreadsheets

Alternative to: airtable, google sheets, excel online, smartsheet

Grist is a modern relational spreadsheet that combines the flexibility of a spreadsheet with the robustness of a database. Organize data your way while keeping it structured with columns types, formulas written in Python, and linked views, then share documents, build forms, and automate workflows without writing code.

Grist Docker Compose example

Self-host Grist on your own server, homelab, or VPS starting from this Docker Compose example. It runs Grist in Docker containers using the official gristlabs/grist:latest image, with persistent volumes and automatic restarts preconfigured. Review the environment variables and adjust them to your setup, save the file as compose.yml (or docker-compose.yml), and start the stack with docker compose up -d.

services:
  grist:
    image: gristlabs/grist:latest
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      # Secret used to sign and encode session cookies. Set to a long random string.
      GRIST_SESSION_SECRET: "changeme"
    volumes:
      - persist:/persist

volumes:
  persist:

Values set to changeme are required — replace them with your own values before starting Grist.

Prefer a managed setup? WinterFlow installs, configures, and updates Grist for you using this same Docker Compose configuration.