Websites and hosting decision
Directory Hunt
A capable developer can build a useful self-hosted replacement for the listing and promotion mechanics, but the paid product's audience, newsletter promotion, and competition-driven visibility are platform-owned benefits that are costly to replicate—so keep paying if you need that built-in reach.
Visit website↗Built by Alexander Osso, who ships 5 products in this index
$8.99/mo
$108/yr
Read off the official pricing page.
$100one-off74 h to build
$25/mo6 h/mo upkeep
On cash alone, building overtakes the subscription at 4 seats.
Open-source builds that already do this
Every project below is open source and already does this job today. Fork one, self-host it, or take the parts you need - the build prompt further down assumes an empty file, and this is the shortcut past that. Licences differ; check the one on each card before you ship. All Directory Hunt alternatives, with the arithmetic →
What a replacement has to do
- Allow submitters to create a project listing, accept paid promotion, surface featured listings on the homepage, run a weekly competition with vote counts, and provide basic visit analytics.
What it still won’t have
- Featured placement and priority placement on the Directory Hunt homepage (promotional network/audience)
- Inclusion in Directory Hunt newsletter and social promotion
- Participation in Directory Hunt competitions and awarded badges
- Built-in community exposure and platform curation
What remains hard
- Product polish and ongoing maintenance
First-year cost
Keep paying
Paying is—cheaper in year one.
On cash alone, building overtakes the subscription at 4 seats.
Money you would actually spend
Time you would spend
—
What you would spend
What we assumed
The verdict above measures whether you could build it. This one is only about money.
Runnable build prompt
Build a small hosted directory launch platform using Next.js for the frontend, a Node.js + Express API, and PostgreSQL (managed) for data. Core features in scope: public project listing pages, submission form with image upload, Stripe integration for one-off and recurring promotion purchases, admin dashboard to approve listings and assign/expire featured homepage slots, scheduled job (cron) to rotate featured items weekly, simple visit/pageview counters and an analytics endpoint, and email notifications via a transactional provider. Out of scope: running a newsletter campaign list and building a large community/voting network. Include input validation, error handling, unit tests for API endpoints, and deployment scripts (Dockerfiles, GitHub Actions).
How we checked
How the score was reached
- Partly verdict base52
- An open-source build was found+5
- 4 cited sources+3
- Price verified on pricing page+3
- Evidence score63
The base comes from the verdict. Everything under it is a check that either happened or did not, and each one is a fact frozen in this record rather than a judgement made at render time - so the same evidence always produces the same number.
How scoring works →Cited sources · 4
Every page the run actually retrieved.
- official productDirectory Hunt - Launchpad for Directories and Tiny Projects
- official pricingDirectory Hunt Pricing
- open sourcecollinbarrett/FilterLists
- open sourceajnart/dcm
Integrity checks
What held up, and what did not.
