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Comparison · Collab

AFFiNE vs Shiori

A side-by-side editorial comparison of AFFiNE and Shiori — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.

AFFiNE vs Shiori: at a glance

FeatureAFFiNEShiori
SectorCollabCollab
Velocity score6.30.0
Sparks · 30d10
Top themesnote-taking, ios-mobile, knowledge-management, canvas-editorbookmarks, self-hosted, api-first, golang
Last editorial update4h ago1mo ago
WebsiteVisit →Visit →

What is AFFiNE?

AFFiNE ships a full iOS Share Extension with PDF capture and link preview transcripts, while fixing a silent heap corruption in canvas routing.

AFFiNE is shipping in parallel across mobile, desktop, and server tracks. The 2026.9.15 canary delivered a comprehensive iOS Share Extension — PDF and image capture, a file-backed Share Inbox with stable document IDs and retry recovery, and expandable link preview with YouTube transcript support. Infrastructure fixes this week addressed a long-standing heap invariant bug in the A* connector routing (corrupting 394 of 20,000 random heaps) and a doc sync priority accumulation bug that caused opened documents to quietly deprioritize.

Read the full AFFiNE trajectory →

What is Shiori?

A Go bookmark manager rebuilding itself around an API — and only ever shipping release candidates.

Shiori is a self-hosted read-later and bookmark tool whose recent history is entirely release candidates: v1.7.0-rc.2, rc.3, v1.7.2-rc.1, v1.8.0-rc.1. The visible work has moved off the web UI and into an API v1 surface — tag endpoints, bookmark-tag association, filtering and counts — plus infrastructure like proxy-header authentication and SQLite performance. The last tagged release in this window is from July 2025.

Read the full Shiori trajectory →

AFFiNE vs Shiori: editorial side-by-side

A
AFFiNE
COLLAB
6.3

AFFiNE ships a full iOS Share Extension with PDF capture and link preview transcripts, while fixing a silent heap corruption in canvas routing.

◆ Current state

AFFiNE is shipping in parallel across mobile, desktop, and server tracks. The 2026.9.15 canary delivered a comprehensive iOS Share Extension — PDF and image capture, a file-backed Share Inbox with stable document IDs and retry recovery, and expandable link preview with YouTube transcript support. Infrastructure fixes this week addressed a long-standing heap invariant bug in the A* connector routing (corrupting 394 of 20,000 random heaps) and a doc sync priority accumulation bug that caused opened documents to quietly deprioritize.

◆ Where it's heading

AFFiNE is building toward being a capture-first workspace — the iOS sharing investment covering URLs, text, PDFs, images, and YouTube previews signals intent to compete as a mobile knowledge inbox. The subscription plan validation and payment-enablement work in 2026.9.18 indicate the monetization layer is being hardened, likely ahead of pricing changes. Deep internal fixes to sync engine priority queuing and canvas A* routing suggest the team is paying off technical debt in its core primitives while expanding mobile reach.

◆ Prediction

The iOS Share Extension work will likely move from canary to a stable release, positioned as a differentiator for AFFiNE cloud — the workspace-selection and offline-handling logic already supports both cloud and self-hosted modes. The subscription validation work may be prepping for a new plan tier.

S
Shiori
COLLAB
0.0

A Go bookmark manager rebuilding itself around an API — and only ever shipping release candidates.

◆ Current state

Shiori is a self-hosted read-later and bookmark tool whose recent history is entirely release candidates: v1.7.0-rc.2, rc.3, v1.7.2-rc.1, v1.8.0-rc.1. The visible work has moved off the web UI and into an API v1 surface — tag endpoints, bookmark-tag association, filtering and counts — plus infrastructure like proxy-header authentication and SQLite performance. The last tagged release in this window is from July 2025.

◆ Where it's heading

The project is converting from a web app with an API bolted on into an API-first service with a client, and the login component, PWA and theme work are being rewritten around that split. Proxy forward-header authentication in particular is a deployment-shape decision: it assumes Shiori sits behind an authenticating reverse proxy rather than owning identity itself. The RC-only tagging pattern makes it hard to tell what the maintainers consider stable.

◆ Prediction

The next step is presumably a final v1.8.0 consolidating the API v1 tag work, though nothing in these entries indicates the RC-to-stable promotion is scheduled. If the pattern holds, the following RC continues on API endpoints rather than the UI.

Alternatives to AFFiNE and Shiori

Other Collab products tracked by Sparkpulse, ranked by recent ship velocity. Each card links to a full editorial trajectory and lets you pivot into a head-to-head comparison with either AFFiNE or Shiori.

See all AFFiNE alternatives → · See all Shiori alternatives →

Recent activity from AFFiNE and Shiori

Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.

  1. 10h agoAFFiNE2026.9.18-canary.909
  2. 3d agoAFFiNEAFFiNE iOS Share Extension: capture PDFs, images, and YouTube previews
  3. 5d agoAFFiNE2026.9.13-canary.928
  4. 8d agoAFFiNE2026.9.10-canary.909
  5. 9d agoAFFiNE2026.9.9-canary.909
  6. 10d agoAFFiNE2026.9.8-canary.909
  7. 1y agoShioriAPI v1 gains tag endpoints, filtering and counts; proxy header auth
  8. 1y agoShioriSwagger UI disabled by default; session auth and Postgres fixes
  9. 2y agoShioriLight, dark and system theme selection in the web UI
  10. 2y agoShioriHome button clears the active search query

Frequently asked questions

What is the difference between AFFiNE and Shiori?

They serve adjacent needs but don't currently overlap on shipped themes. AFFiNE is currently shipping more aggressively (velocity 6.3 vs 0.0), with 1 editorial sparks in the last 30 days against 0. See the at-a-glance table above for a side-by-side breakdown of velocity, recent sparks, and editorial themes.

Is AFFiNE better than Shiori?

Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. AFFiNE is currently shipping more aggressively (velocity 6.3 vs 0.0), with 1 editorial sparks in the last 30 days against 0. For your specific use case, the alternatives sections above list other Collab products to evaluate alongside.

What are the best alternatives to AFFiNE?

Top AFFiNE alternatives in Collab are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "AFFiNE alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/affine for the full list with editorial commentary on each.

What are the best alternatives to Shiori?

Top Shiori alternatives in Collab are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "Shiori alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/shiori for the full list with editorial commentary on each.