Excalidraw or tldraw?

Excalidraw if you want a whiteboard today. tldraw if you are building a product that needs a canvas component. They are not the same job.

Stacks / Docs

Easy

Excalidraw / tldraw

A whiteboard you host. Excalidraw is MIT; tldraw is the source-available canvas SDK. Miro without the member meter.

The problem

Miro Starter is $8 per member per month billed yearly, then Business climbs. A sketch board does not need that SKU. Excalidraw is the MIT whiteboard; tldraw is the canvas SDK if you are building a product on top.

Replaces

Miro

Replace Miro

Estimated SaaS saved

$1,920

per year, small team, before lock-in

Start on Railway

Sponsor this stack Tip jar

Placeholder: Excalidraw plus a storage backend (or the official room server) with a volume. tldraw is an SDK — only deploy it if you are embedding a canvas, not as a Miro clone on day one.

The stack

Excalidraw
MIT virtual whiteboard for hand-drawn diagrams
tldraw
Source-available infinite-canvas SDK (not a drop-in Miro clone)

Cost table

You stop paying	Typical / year	Self-host instead
Miro Starter (small team)	$1,920	Excalidraw + a volume

Agent setup prompt

Replace Miro with a self-hosted whiteboard.

Preferred: Excalidraw (MIT). Persist rooms/files on a volume or object storage. Bind HTTP to 0.0.0.0:$PORT.
tldraw is an SDK with a source-available license — use it only if you are embedding a canvas in your own app, not as the team whiteboard.
- Disable public rooms if this is an internal board. Write AGENT_PROMPT.md.

Also as markdown: /stacks/excalidraw-whiteboard.md

FAQ

Excalidraw or tldraw?: Excalidraw if you want a whiteboard today. tldraw if you are building a product that needs a canvas component. They are not the same job.