Overleaf alternatives

The best free Overleaf alternatives in 2026.

Free online, no login

LaTeX.to: A free online LaTeX editor that compiles to PDF in your browser, with no login and no compile timeout. Import a project as a zip or open a folder from your computer (Chrome only), or start from one of the templates. pdfLaTeX, XeLaTeX, LuaLaTeX, ConTeXt and more, with BibTeX, biblatex and Biber, and it works on phones and tablets. No real-time collaboration. Open LaTeX.to
TeXlyre: Free and open source, compiles pdfTeX, XeTeX and LuaTeX in the browser and keeps projects in the browser's storage. Peer-to-peer collaboration with no server. Only those three engines, so no ConTeXt and no Japanese engines.

Free online, with collaboration

Prism: OpenAI's LaTeX editor, free with a ChatGPT account, with unlimited collaborators, no compile timeout and GPT-5.2 built in. Projects live on OpenAI's servers, and the stronger AI features are expected to move to paid plans.
Papeeria: Real-time collaboration with unlimited collaborators and a full TeX Live on the server. The free plan allows one active private project and 24 hours of history; the paid plan starts at $5 a month.
inscrive.io: A hosted editor with real-time collaboration, Git sync and EU-only hosting. The free plan has 10 active projects, unlimited collaborators and a 60 second compile timeout; Pro is 7 euros a month with 480 seconds.
LetX: A hosted editor aimed at student teams, with real-time collaboration and an AI assistant. The free plan has unlimited projects and collaborators but 40 compiles a day; Pro is $18 a month.
Murfy: A hosted editor with real-time collaboration, comments, track changes and AI review built in. The free plan has unlimited projects and collaborators, a 30 second compile timeout and 24 hours of history; Pro is about $20 a month.
TeXPage: A hosted editor with real-time collaboration and compiles on its servers. The free plan allows one collaborator per project and a 30 second compile timeout; paid plans start at $5 a month.
CoCalc: Collaborative editing plus Sage, Python and R running inside the document. Free trial projects have no internet access and a short idle timeout; a subscription lifts that. Best when the computation lives in the paper.
Bibby: A hosted editor with real-time collaboration and an AI co-author for citations and reviews. The free plan is one project, 20 compiles and 2 AI completions a month; Pro is $16 a month, $12 on the annual plan.

Open source and self-hosted

Overleaf Community Edition: Overleaf itself, AGPL 3.0, installed with the Overleaf Toolkit as Docker containers with TeX Live inside, so you set the compile timeout. No sandboxed compiles, single sign-on or track changes, which Overleaf sells as Server Pro.
TeXlyre: AGPL 3.0 and served as static files, so hosting it is a folder on any web server; collaboration needs only an optional signaling server.
TeXstudio: The most common desktop editor, with a built-in PDF viewer, completion and wizards for tables and figures. Like every desktop editor below it needs TeX Live or MiKTeX installed, and then compiles offline with no limits.
Visual Studio Code with LaTeX Workshop: The extension adds a PDF preview, SyncTeX and build recipes to VS Code. The natural pick if you already live there.
Oleafly: A new desktop editor for Mac, Windows and Linux (AGPL 3.0) that bundles its own TeX engine, so nothing else has to be installed. LaTeX, Typst and Markdown, Git built in, AI with your own API key. No real-time collaboration yet.
Texmaker: The editor TeXstudio was forked from, still maintained and simpler, with the same built-in viewer.
TeXShop: The free Mac editor that ships with MacTeX, simple and with a built-in viewer.
TeXworks: The small editor that ships with TeX Live and MiKTeX. Nothing to configure, nothing beyond editing and compiling.
Kile: The KDE editor for Linux, with a project view and a live preview.
LyX: A document processor that writes the LaTeX for you, so you see formatted text instead of markup.
Emacs with AUCTeX: The classic setup for Emacs users, with completion, folding and formula preview inside the buffer.
Vim or Neovim with VimTeX: The same for Vim users: compile on save, forward search and completion.

Leaving LaTeX

Typst: A new typesetting language with shorter markup, a free hosted editor with real-time collaboration and an open source compiler (Apache 2.0) for local use. Journal .cls files and LaTeX packages do not carry over, so a publisher that wants LaTeX still wants LaTeX.
TypeTeX: A hosted Typst-first editor that imports an Overleaf project and exports LaTeX, PDF or Word, with live collaboration and AI. The free plan has 5 projects and one collaborator; Pro is $12 a month.
Quarto: Posit's open source publishing system: write Markdown or a Jupyter notebook and render articles, slides and books to PDF through LaTeX, or through Typst, which comes bundled. Made for papers with code in them.
Pandoc: Write Markdown and let pandoc build the PDF through LaTeX or Typst, which still has to be installed. Enough for notes and reports, not for a journal template.

Moving a project out of Overleaf

In Overleaf, open Menu, then Download, then Source. You get a zip file of the project (the source only, no PDF).
Note the compiler under Menu, Settings, Compiler (pdfLaTeX, XeLaTeX, LuaLaTeX or LaTeX) and pick the same one in the new editor.
Import the zip: on LaTeX.to, click the "+" next to Projects, then Import ZIP; in a desktop editor, unzip it and open the main .tex file; the hosted editors have a zip import of their own.
History, comments and track changes stay on Overleaf, so read what you still need before the project goes quiet.

Questions people ask

Is Overleaf free?

Yes, with limits: a 10 second compile timeout, one collaborator per project and 24 hours of history. Paid plans start at $13 a month or $98 a year for students.

What is the best free Overleaf alternative?

LaTeX.to for a document that times out, since it compiles on your own machine with no login. Prism, Papeeria or CoCalc when you need real-time collaboration.

Can you use Overleaf offline?

No. Every desktop editor above works offline on a local TeX Live.

Is Overleaf open source?

The core is, as Overleaf Community Edition under the AGPL 3.0. Sandboxed compiles, single sign-on and track changes are in the paid Server Pro.

How do I export a project from Overleaf?

In Overleaf, open Menu, then Download, then Source. You get a zip file of the project, which holds the source files, not the PDF or the history.

Which Overleaf alternative works for a resume?

Any of them, since a one-page resume never reaches a compile timeout. LaTeX.to has a resume template and an academic CV template that open with one click and no account.

Last updated September 2026.