Contextual
Freemium
Individual developers managing local codebases
Cognita
FreemiumOpen SourceAPISelf-Hosted
TrueFoundry's Cognita is a free, self-hosted RAG framework for teams building document-search-powered AI applications without vendor lock-in.
$25/user/month · Free tier: Up to 3 users, 10K requests & tool calls / user / month, 7-day log retention · Checked Oct 19, 2026
Similar tools
ContextualFreemiumThe engine indexes your repository — symbols, commits, PR threads, docs — into a local graph…
AI·rete·RAGFreemiumThe tool pairs a deterministic rule engine with retrieval-augmented generation, so every…
CMEMFreemiumThe open-source claude-mem engine hooks into Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf, and CLI agents…
JylusFreemiumJylus ingests streaming data, resolves current and historical state, follows relationships…
Get This Tool
License: License: unverified
Local-run terms: Open-source tool can be freely installed and run locally using Docker and docker-compose; users can deploy without vendor platform, but vendor platform components (TrueFoundry AI Gateway, artifact storage) are optional integrations for enhanced features.
Screenshots 4
Summary
Cognita lets data science and platform engineering teams assemble retrieval-augmented generation systems by connecting pluggable components—vector databases, embedding models, rerankers—without writing infrastructure code. The problem it solves: production RAG deployment is fragmented across commercial APIs and open-source libraries, forcing teams to choose between convenience and control. The headline differentiator is its ability to run entirely via docker-compose on local infrastructure while hosting multiple RAG instances in a single application, making it viable for organizations with sensitive document collections. It's free. The honest catch: you're limited to Qdrant or SingleStore for vector storage today, and production use requires standing up separate LLM and embedding model services yourself—so the 'free' price tag assumes you can manage containerized infrastructure.
Bottom line: *Use this if your team can containerize infrastructure and needs to avoid cloud APIs for data; skip it if you want a fully managed SaaS solution.*
Pricing Plans
SubscriptionLast verified 2 weeks ago- Price
- $25/user/month
- Free Tier
- Up to 3 users, 10K requests & tool calls / user / month, 7-day log retention
Developer
Free
For small teams prototyping AI workflows
- Up to 3 users
- 10K requests & tool calls / user / month
- LLM & MCP Gateway
- Prompts, skills & agent registry
- 7-day log retention
- Community support (Discord)
Pro
$25per month
For teams shipping AI to production
- Unlimited users
- 20K requests & tool calls / user / month
- Built-in guardrails
- Budget limiting
- 30-day log retention
- SSO & custom roles
- Dedicated Support portal
Enterprise
Custom
For organizations running AI at scale
- Custom annual commitment
- Enterprise-grade security, compliance & SLA
- Custom log retention & audit exports
- External IdP mapping
- Third-party guardrails & advanced observability
- VPC, on-prem & data residency
- Priority support, SLA & onboarding
View full pricing on truefoundry.com →
Pricing may have changed since last verified. Check the official site for current plans.
Find your fit
Before you choose Cognita
More options in RAG Frameworks. Compare pricing, platforms, and features side by side.
AI·rete·RAG
Freemium
Teams needing deterministic rules plus RAG explanations
Pros
- Ability for non-technical users to play with UI by uploading documents and performing Q&A
- Support for multiple document retrievers and state-of-the-art open-source embeddings and reranking
- Can be run entirely using docker-compose, recommended for local deployment
- Allows hosting multiple RAG systems using one app
- Can be used locally with or without TrueFoundry components; TrueFoundry components simplify testing and scalable deployment
Cons
- Currently limited to Qdrant and SingleStore as vector database options (though Chroma and Weaviate support is planned)
- Requires separate deployment of LLM and embedding models as services for production use
- Incremental indexing requires tracking document hashes, adding operational complexity
About
- Platforms
- Docker, Kubernetes, cloud-agnostic (VPC, on-premise, hybrid, public cloud)
- Languages
- Python
- API Available
- Yes
- Self-Hosted
- Yes
- Last Updated
- April 29, 2026
Best For
Who it's for
- Data science and ML teams building RAG systems
- Platform engineering teams deploying production AI
- Organizations with extensive, unstructured document collections
- Teams requiring customizable, modular RAG architectures
- Non-technical users wanting to experiment with RAG via UI
What it does well
- Building document-based question-answering systems
- Enterprise knowledge base retrieval
- Production RAG pipelines with modular architectures
- Testing and iterating on RAG configurations
- Deploying AI assistants with vector search
Integrations
Compare Cognita
Frequently Asked Questions
- Is Cognita free?
- Cognita offers a free option alongside paid upgrades. Pricing: $25/user/month. Check the current allowances and terms before choosing a plan.
- Is Cognita open source?
- Yes. Cognita is open source — the source repository is at https://github.com/truefoundry/cognita.
- Does Cognita have an API?
- Yes. Cognita exposes a developer API. See the official documentation at https://truefoundry.com for details.
- Can I self-host Cognita?
- Yes. Cognita supports self-hosting on your own infrastructure.
- When was Cognita released?
- Cognita was first released in 2024.
- What platforms does Cognita support?
- Cognita is available on: Docker, Kubernetes, cloud-agnostic (VPC, on-premise, hybrid, public cloud).
People also compared
Curated lists that include this category
TrueFoundry's Cognita is a free, self-hosted RAG framework for teams building document-search-powered AI applications without vendor lock-in.
Cognita lets data science and platform engineering teams assemble retrieval-augmented generation systems by connecting pluggable components—vector databases, embedding models, rerankers—without writing infrastructure code. The problem it solves: production RAG deployment is fragmented across commercial APIs and open-source libraries, forcing teams to choose between convenience and control. The headline differentiator is its ability to run entirely via docker-compose on local infrastructure while hosting multiple RAG instances in a single application, making it viable for organizations with sensitive document collections. It's free. The honest catch: you're limited to Qdrant or SingleStore for vector storage today, and production use requires standing up separate LLM and embedding model services yourself—so the 'free' price tag assumes you can manage containerized infrastructure.
*Use this if your team can containerize infrastructure and needs to avoid cloud APIs for data; skip it if you want a fully managed SaaS solution.*
Contribute
- Work on Cognita? Claim this listing.
- Embed a badge for your README or site.
Sign in to rate this tool or suggest an edit.