AltoRank: open-source, self-hosted AI SEO content writer (Outrank alternative)

An open-source alternative to Outrank and Jasper. AltoRank researches a keyword, writes the article, scores it and fact-checks it: a figure that cites a page is looked for on that page, and one with no source is flagged for the reviewer. Every draft can be copied as Markdown (front matter included) or HTML, or downloaded as a .md file, for you to paste wherever you publish. Approve it, paste it, then Mark as published records the live URL, and the article is tracked from there: indexing and rank.

AltoRank never publishes to your site without an approval recorded under a named person. Approve each draft by hand, or set a rule that approves drafts after a hold unless you hold them (the rule publishes through a CMS connection, which is built but not yet verified end to end; see Status). Agents can research and draft through the MCP server and the agent API. Neither can approve, and neither can publish anything a person has not already approved (the one publish-side call retries a failed publish of an approved article).

Self-host it free under AGPL-3.0, or use the hosted app at app.altorank.co. Open source, the whole product. No feature-gated tier, no ee/ directory.

Status

The hosted app at app.altorank.co is this repository, deployed from main (docs/deploy.md). A self-hosted install runs the same code against your own Supabase and your own API keys. Research, drafting, scoring, fact-checking, audits, rank tracking and Search Console / Bing sync run today; the table below has the detail. What is not finished yet:

• No paying customers, no case studies. Nothing here has a growth figure attached to it, and that is on purpose.
• CMS publishing is built but not yet verified end to end. The thirteen adapters are in apps/web/lib/cms/ and the connection form covers all of them, but none has been watched publishing to a live site yet, so the platform tiles on /connect ask you to request an integration instead of offering Connect. Every draft can be copied as Markdown or HTML today. Details under What works today.
• AI visibility tracking is built but not switched on. The probe, the daily cron and the /geo page exist, but nothing in the app turns tracking on for a workspace or adds the prompts it measures, so the sidebar marks it "soon" (apps/web/lib/constants.ts).
• The CLI is publishable, not yet on npm. packages/altorank-cli bundles apps/web/scripts/cli.ts into an altorank binary (npx altorank auth whoami once it is published); until then, npm run cli from apps/web drives the same agent API from a checkout. skills/altorank/SKILL.md is the skill file a coding agent reads, and it does install with npx; see below.

Whether you want to read how it works, run it yourself or send a patch, everything is here.

The publishing decision

One gate, two ways through it. lib/publishing/core.ts refuses any article that is not approved or scheduled with approved_by set. Only the server writes those columns: a signed-in user's own database client cannot make an article approved, scheduled or live (migration 109), and an edit to approved text sends it back to review. What can write an approval:

• A person, from the editor (approveArticle), recorded as approved_by. The button checks for an active plan and refuses a bare, unsourced figure.
• A rule a named member of the account set (auto_approve, migration 079): the publish cron runs stricter checks than the Approve button - active plan, somewhere to publish, no unsourced figure, no named reviewer still to sign off, no failing audit item, SEO score at or above the floor - after a hold window (default 24h) during which the drafted email carries a Hold link. approved_by is whoever turned the rule on; approval_kind says auto. Held drafts

... View full README on GitHub