cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/51336189
I know there are a dozen of different “EU Alternatives” websites/catalogs already and some of them are actually great for discovering European brands and software. But they never show you what’s inside: you only get a name, a logo, a few lines long pitch and then you’re on your own.
So after doing some due diligence I’ve built a more detailed one. Whether you just want a European Dropbox/Google Analytics/1Password etc or you need to know your customers’ data won’t leave the EU, the idea is the same: give you what you need after the name, not just the name.
Two features I have that surface-level lists do not:
- I show the exposure, not just the “European” label. That word hides the part that matters. A company can have a Berlin office, a “hosted in the EU” banner, and still route your data through a US analytics provider or sit on US-owned cloud — at which point US law reaches it regardless of where the rack is. So for every listing I check, and link the source for:
- Where the data is actually hosted — the data-centre region, not the HQ on the about page.
- The sub-processor list — the one nobody reads. Pretty EU hosting page up front, US tooling quietly in the DPA annex.
- CLOUD Act exposure — US parent or US hyperscaler storage means US jurisdiction, full stop.
- Who owns the company — “EU-founded, US-funded” is a different animal from “EU-owned”. Ownership and hosting are shown as separate signals so you decide which one you care about.
- A proper feature matrix. Not “here are five alternatives, good luck” - an actual side-by-side, so you can see which tool genuinely replaces the US one feature-for-feature and which is wishful thinking.
Everything is from public sources only - the vendor’s own DPA, sub-processors page, the company registry, legal notice etc. Each point has a link to original page and last verification date. Vendor’s self-attestation is not taken on faith.
One number that fell out of doing this for more than 200 tools: a little more than 30% are completely clear of US Cloud Act exposure - no US parent and no significat sub-processors.
On money: the site earns nothing right now. There are a couple of affiliate links added already and it’s disclosed everywhere they appear plus listed in full on the transparency page. That’s the whole monetisation plan: affiliate links, nothing hidden. Listing order is editorial - no commission logic anywhere in how stuff is sorted.
What I would be happy to hear from you: what’s missing? Did I get any assessments wrong? If you see something - let me know and I will fix it right away.
Disclaimer: I’m affiliated — I built and run this site. It currently has a couple of affiliate links live; how it’s funded is documented in full at https://euvetted.com/transparency
I’ll look at the site later, but is there a central place where the community can suggest alternatives, help with collecting well-sourced information, see what questions are still open before alternatives can be included in the site, etc?
Thanks! So far there is only this page describing what can be listed and an email https://euvetted.com/request-listing But more decent submission form is on the roadmap
I think each mention of the CLOUD Act should have an “ⓘ” link to a site explaining why it’s important. The About page is way too brief about this.
Agreed and good timing, because that page already exists, it’s just not linked well. There’s a full write-up at /insights/cloud-act-exposure (why it matters, who’s exposed, the numbers across the directory) way more than the About page covers. The gap is exactly what you said: every “CLOUD Act” mention should point to it instead of assuming you’ll go find it. I’ll wire up the ⓘ link. Thanks.
Thanks, seeing it in all caps on the screenshot I thought “is this short for Cloud Account?”
great post and site
Thank you!
you’re welcome
the list is here: https://euvetted.com/
Looks like that got cut off mid-sentence :) Did you mean the list of tools on the homepage something missing from it, or hard to find? Let me know what you were after.
The repost was missing thr text and the link, at least on my instance, it’s just a screenshot. So i thought I’d provide the minimum information.
Nice to see that Hetzner is a good pick to replace (German) Hetzner because a European Cloud Hoster defnitely needs a European alternative… 🤣
If you mean this page https://euvetted.com/alternatives/hetzner than the first blue line means the product that we compare against, Hetzner in this case. In case if the base product is US the line is red like here https://euvetted.com/alternatives/aws
I’ve intentionally added alternative to X for some most obvious European products like Proton or Hetzner in this case.
Please let me know if either of these are confusing or do not make sense. Thanks!
“European alternatives to the US tools you already use. Pick a US tool to see the vetted European alternatives.”
And under this a field with said US tools: Dropbox, Google Drive, AWS, OneDrive, Gmail, Outlook, iCloud, Hetzner, Azure [and more…]
So German Hetzner is somehow a US tool with 11 alternatives (“How do the 11 European alternatives to Hetzner compare?”), of which one is Hetzner…
Okay, now thats a bug in both code and the content. Huge thanks for pointing it out. As mentioned in my previous comment the website does have “alternative to X” for some of European products, but it should not display these amongst US tools. Will fix that asap
