Open-Source Research Assistant for Teams
Stop paying per-user fees for research AI. Open WebUI is self-hosted, extensible, and runs offline. One flat rate. Unlimited team members. Full control over your data.
What Is an Open-Source Research Assistant?
A research assistant helps you find, synthesize, and analyze information faster. It combs the web, cross-references sources, and builds on what you tell it. SaaS tools like Perplexity Pro charge $20/mo per user and keep your research locked in their infrastructure.
An open-source research assistant is different. You own it. You host it. You control which models power it and where your data lives. Open WebUI is the mature, production-ready option: 153.4K GitHub stars, 22.4K forks, 18,717 active commits.
How It Works for Research
Open WebUI gives you research superpowers:
Web Search: Integrated search through multiple providers (SearXNG, Brave, Kagi, Perplexity API, and others). Ask a question, get cited sources instantly. No fragmented tabs.
Local RAG (Retrieval Augmented Generation): Upload your own documents—PDFs, CSVs, notes, research papers. The model retrieves relevant passages and synthesizes them into answers. 9 vector databases supported (ChromaDB, Qdrant, Elasticsearch, and more).
Multi-Model Research: Connect 40+ LLM providers. OpenAI's GPT-4. Anthropic's Claude. Mistral. Groq. Local models via Ollama (free, air-gapped). Switch models mid-conversation without losing context.
Offline Research: Run fully offline with local LLMs. No cloud API dependencies. Critical for regulated industries (medical research, legal analysis, financial planning).
Research Agents: Open Terminal lets models write code, execute scripts, analyze data, fix errors, and output files. Multi-step research workflows fully automated.
Why Open-Source Matters for Research
Research teams deal in sensitivity: confidential data, proprietary methodologies, regulatory constraints. A SaaS research tool is a black box. You don't know if your queries train their models. You can't audit how they store your findings.
Open WebUI is auditable. The source code is public. You (or your security team) can review it. No hidden data training. No mysterious vendor changes. When you self-host, you control the entire stack: the LLM, the storage, the search backends, the logs.
For teams avoiding vendor lock-in: moving from one proprietary tool to another is a bet. Open WebUI is portable. Export your data. Move your instance to a different host. Run it locally. Zero switching costs.
Why Choose Opsily for Open WebUI
Open WebUI is free software. Opsily removes the infrastructure burden so you focus on research.
No per-user fees: One price scales to 100 users
SaaS research tools charge €20/user/mo. A 10-person team costs €2,000/year in per-seat fees alone. Open WebUI on Opsily costs a flat rate: €20/mo for the same 10 users. Bring 50 researchers into one instance; the price stays the same. No growth penalty. Budget certainty.
GDPR-compliant German hosting: Your data stays in the EU
Your research stays in Frankfurt, Germany. Encrypted at rest and in transit. No US data transfers. No compliance callbacks. Teams in regulated industries (finance, pharma, legal) need this guarantee. Perplexity: US-based, no GDPR guarantee. Open WebUI on Opsily: from day one, compliant.
3-minute setup, zero DevOps: Opsily handles the ops
Click Deploy. Choose your region. Your managed instance is live. Opsily handles backups (daily, encrypted), security updates (24-hour patching), SSL certificates, monitoring, and 99.9% uptime SLA. You don't touch the infrastructure. Just use it.
Built for teams who need reliability
Deploy Your Research Assistant in 3 Minutes
From signup to first research query takes less time than a coffee break.
Email + password. No credit card for the free trial. 30 seconds.
One click. Opsily provisions a managed instance in German servers (GDPR by default). Automatic backups and updates included.
Link a model: Ollama (free, local), OpenAI, Anthropic Claude, Mistral, Groq, or 40+ other APIs. Copy-paste your API key. Done.
Email + password. No credit card for the free trial. 30 seconds.
One click. Opsily provisions a managed instance in German servers (GDPR by default). Automatic backups and updates included.
Link a model: Ollama (free, local), OpenAI, Anthropic Claude, Mistral, Groq, or 40+ other APIs. Copy-paste your API key. Done.
Create your account
Email + password. No credit card for the free trial. 30 seconds.
Deploy Open WebUI
One click. Opsily provisions a managed instance in German servers (GDPR by default). Automatic backups and updates included.
Connect your LLM
Link a model: Ollama (free, local), OpenAI, Anthropic Claude, Mistral, Groq, or 40+ other APIs. Copy-paste your API key. Done.
Start researching
Ask. The model searches the web, synthesizes sources, and cites them. Upload documents for local RAG. Run research agents. Invite your team.
Open WebUI vs SaaS Research Tools
How teams compare when choosing where to run their research.
SaaS costs based on Perplexity Pro ($20/mo per user). Opsily Small plan €15/mo. Data as of September 2026.
Everything Built In
No tiers, no gatekeeping. Every research team gets the full feature set from day one.
Simple, Transparent Pricing
One price per instance. Unlimited team members. All plans include GDPR-compliant German hosting, daily encrypted backups, 99.9% uptime SLA, automatic security updates, and unlimited team collaboration.
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Enterprise-Grade Safety
GDPR compliant
Your data stays in the EU. Compliant with GDPR Article 32 requirements. Data residency guarantees. No data training without consent.
German data center security
Your servers run in Frankfurt data centers with encryption in transit and at rest, 24/7 monitoring, and redundant infrastructure.
Daily encrypted backups
Automated daily backups. Encrypted at rest. 30-day retention. Disaster recovery SLA included.
Automatic security updates
Security patches applied within 24 hours. Zero downtime for most updates. You stay protected without manual intervention.
99.9% uptime SLA
Redundant infrastructure across Frankfurt data centers. 99.9% uptime guarantee with compensation credits for breaches.
Questions About Open-Source Research Assistants
An open-source research assistant is software you own and host yourself. It helps you search the web, upload and analyze documents, synthesize information, and run automated research workflows. Open WebUI is the leading option: it's free, well-maintained (153.4K GitHub stars), and supports 40+ LLM providers. Unlike SaaS research tools (Perplexity, Gemini), open-source means you control the data, the models, and the infrastructure.
Run Your Own Research Assistant
Open WebUI on Opsily. Open source. No per-user fees. EU-hosted. Start free for 7 days, no credit card required.