Bear Blog Alternative: Same Small-Web Values, More Room to Grow

Bear Blog is the closest cousin ULTRV has, and this page will say so plainly. Both have zero trackers, zero ads, and zero third-party scripts on every tier. Both think most blogging software does too much. The audience for this page is not people who have never heard of Bear Blog — it is people who have used it or are considering it and want an honest comparison. We won't trash Bear Blog. If it already covers what you need, use it.

What Bear Blog does better

• The lightest pages in the segment — approximately 2.7 KB per page, no JavaScript, no third-party scripts on any tier
• Open-source codebase on GitHub — you can read and verify every line of what runs your blog
• An active indie and small-web community with an opt-in discovery feed
• A $189 lifetime option — pay once, done
• Markdown-only, which some writers genuinely prefer: no editor interface, just text

If you want the absolute lightest pages, an open-source codebase, and an established indie-blogging community, Bear Blog is a fine choice. This comparison exists for writers who want those same values with a free custom domain and more kinds of pages.

Where ULTRV is different

• Custom domain on the free tier. Bear Blog gates custom domains behind its paid plan ($5/month or $49/year). ULTRV includes custom domains at no extra cost — point a domain with a CNAME or A record and SSL is provisioned automatically.
• Rich text or Markdown — your choice. Bear Blog is Markdown-only. ULTRV supports both: write in a rich text editor if you'd rather not think about syntax, or write in Markdown if that's your native habitat.
• Eighty-four themes, one click. Bear Blog is deliberately minimal on theming — a small set of looks with no casual one-click switching between dozens of options. ULTRV has 84 themes: Brutalist, GeoCities, Synthwave, Tufte, Bauhaus, and seventy-nine more, one click to switch.
• Typed pages Bear Blog has no equivalent for. Photo albums, recipe collections, bookshelves, guestbooks, now pages — first-class page types with their own URLs and layouts. Bear Blog offers posts and basic navigation; these structured page types don't exist in the platform.
• Import from WordPress, Substack, Ghost, and Medium. Bear Blog has no import tooling — migrating from another platform means manually recreating posts. ULTRV ships importers for all four major sources so switching is an afternoon, not a chore.
• A terminal client. ULTRV ships a full TUI built in Rust. Write, publish, and manage blogs without opening a browser. Bear Blog has no equivalent.
• Per-tag feeds. RSS, Atom, and JSON feeds ship with every blog, with per-tag feeds and auto-discovery. Readers can subscribe to just the topics they care about.

Pick Bear Blog if

• You want the absolute lightest pages in the segment and page weight is a genuine priority
• Open source is important to you — you want to read and verify the code that runs your blog
• Markdown is your native writing environment and you don't want or need a rich text editor
• The $189 lifetime deal appeals — one payment, done
• You want to be part of an established indie-blogging discovery community

Pick ULTRV if

• You share Bear Blog's ethos but want a free custom domain without paying $5/month
• You'd rather click "publish" in a rich editor than remember Markdown syntax
• You want to make a photo album, recipe collection, or bookshelf page that is a first-class feature, not a workaround
• You're migrating from WordPress, Substack, Ghost, or Medium and want an importer that handles the heavy lifting
• Publishing from a terminal sounds appealing

Frequently asked questions