Comparison
Excaliwow vs Excalidraw
Excaliwow is a hosted, real-time Excalidraw workspace with a developer platform. It is built on the open-source Excalidraw editor and adds the things teams need to work together over time — accounts, persistent diagrams, real-time multiplayer, and a way to drive diagrams from code or an AI agent.
A fair note: this page compares Excaliwow with the open-source Excalidraw editor, whose free tier is a single local scene. The Excalidraw team also sells Excalidraw+, a paid hosted product, for the cloud storage, folders, and team access listed below — features Excaliwow includes free while in early access. Excaliwow’s distinctive angle on top of that is its developer platform: a REST API, a CLI, and an MCP server for AI agents.
Side by side
| Feature | Excalidraw (open source) | Excaliwow |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Open-source editor for hand-drawn-style diagrams (MIT licensed). | Hosted, real-time Excalidraw workspace with a developer platform. |
| The drawing canvas | The Excalidraw editor itself. | The same Excalidraw editor, hosted for you. |
| Use without an account | Yes — local-first in your browser on excalidraw.com. | Sign up (free) to save diagrams to your account. |
| Persistent diagrams, folders & library | Free tier is a single local scene; cloud storage and folders need paid Excalidraw+. | Saved to your workspace, with folders, starring, and trash. |
| Real-time collaboration | Yes — end-to-end-encrypted, link-based sessions. | Yes — in your workspace, with members, live cursors, and comments. |
| Workspaces & member roles | — (open-source editor has no accounts) | Yes — invite editors and viewers to your workspace. |
| Public read-only share links | Shareable links to a scene. | Read-only links with optional password, abuse reporting, and takedown. |
| REST API | Not available | Yes — /api/v1 to list, read, create, render, and edit diagrams. |
| Command-line client | Not available | Yes — @excaliwow/cli (Apache-2.0, on npm). |
| MCP server for AI agents | Not available | Yes — @excaliwow/mcp, for Claude and other MCP clients. |
| Self-host the editor | Yes — MIT licensed and self-hostable. | Hosted for you; the Excalidraw editor underneath is open source. |
| Price | Editor is free & open source; cloud storage, folders, and team access need paid Excalidraw+. | Free to start — hosted storage, folders, team collaboration, and the dev platform included. |
Choose Excalidraw if…
- You want a free, open-source editor to self-host or embed in your own app.
- You sketch on a single canvas and don’t need cloud storage, folders, or accounts.
- You prefer keeping diagrams local — saved in your browser, or to exported files — rather than in a hosted account.
Choose Excaliwow if…
- You want hosted accounts and persistent, organized diagrams — folders and a shared team workspace that Excalidraw keeps for paid Excalidraw+ — free while in early access.
- You want to create, render, and edit diagrams from the CLI or a REST API.
- You want an AI agent to build and update diagrams for you over MCP.
- You want your data to stay portable — self-serve export and account deletion whenever you want.
The part that’s genuinely different: the developer platform
The standout reason to reach for Excaliwow is that your diagrams aren’t locked inside the canvas. The same diagram you draw in the browser can be listed, created, rendered to PNG or SVG, and additively edited over a hosted REST API. The @excaliwow/cli wraps that for your terminal and scripts, and the @excaliwow/mcp server lets Claude and other AI agents draw and update real diagrams in your account. They all speak the same diagram DSL.
Common questions
- Is Excaliwow a replacement for Excalidraw?
- Not exactly — Excaliwow is built on the open-source Excalidraw editor. It's a hosted home for your Excalidraw diagrams that adds accounts, real-time team collaboration, and a developer platform — a REST API, CLI, and MCP server — on top of the same canvas.
- Is Excaliwow open source?
- Partly. Excaliwow is a hosted product and the platform itself is not open source. But its client tools — @excaliwow/cli and @excaliwow/mcp — are open source under Apache-2.0 on npm, and the drawing editor it is built on, Excalidraw, is open source under the MIT license.
- Can I control Excalidraw diagrams with an API or an AI agent?
- Through Excaliwow, yes. Diagrams you draw in the Excalidraw-based editor can also be created, rendered, and edited over the REST API, the @excaliwow/cli, or an AI agent using the @excaliwow/mcp server. The open-source Excalidraw editor on its own does not include a hosted API.
Try the hosted workspace
Free to start, no credit card. Draw with your team, then drive the same diagrams from the CLI, the API, or your AI agent.