Free Mermaid AlternativesDiagram Editors & UML Modeling Tools like Mermaid

The best free alternative to Mermaid is yEd Graph Editor. If that doesn't suit you, our users have ranked more than 25 alternatives to Mermaid and many of them is free so hopefully you can find a suitable replacement. Other interesting free alternatives to Mermaid are FossFLOW, PlantUML, quiver diagram editor and Graphviz.

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Mermaid alternatives are mainly Diagram Editors, but if you're looking for UML Modeling Tools or Mind Mapping Tools you can filter on that. Other popular filters include Diagram Editor. These are just examples - use the filter bar below to find more specific alternatives to Mermaid.
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Alternatives list

  1. yEd Graph Editor icon
     444 likes

    yEd is a powerful diagram editor that can be used to quickly create diagrams manually or import external data for analysis and auto-magically arrange even large data sets by just pressing a button. You can use yEd to quickly create flow charts, BPMN and UML diagrams...

    119 yEd Graph Editor alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Proprietary

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Linux
    • Online
    • BSD
     
  2. FossFLOW icon
     19 likes

    Open-source PWA for isometric 3D diagramming with offline use, no sign-in, React and Isoflow codebase, auto-saving, privacy-focused local data, import/export as JSON, Docker optional storage, multilingual support, available on Mac and Linux.

    26 FossFLOW alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source (MIT)

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Online
    • Self-Hosted
    • Docker
     
  3. PlantUML icon
     119 likes

    PlantUML is an open-source tool that uses simple textual descriptions to draw UML diagrams. The generator can be run anywhere within JVM and integrated with various application such as wiki, text editor, IDE, programming language, documentation generator, and others.

    118 PlantUML alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Linux
    • Online
    • Android
    • Chrome OS
     
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    1
    PlantUML vs Mermaid Comments
    Maxim Kamalov
    Positive
    0

    Both can be integrated into markdown files.

    • PlantUML is Free and Open SourceMermaid is also Free and Open Source
  4. Efficient web-based tool for constructing high-quality commutative diagrams. Offers LaTeX export with embedded links, intuitive interface supporting both mouse and keyboard inputs, and features like multiple selections, macro support, and smart label alignment.

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source (MIT)

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Online
     
  5. Graphviz icon
     74 likes

    Graphviz is open source graph visualization software. Graph visualization is a way of representing structural information as diagrams of abstract graphs and networks. It has important applications in networking, bioinformatics, software engineering, database and web design...

    57 Graphviz alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Linux
    • Online
     
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    1
    Graphviz vs Mermaid Comments
    Maxim Kamalov
    Negative
    0

    Mermaid is more about diagrams that follow strict conventions (like UML diagrams). Graphviz is more about graphs that don't bother with conventions.

    • Graphviz is Free and Open SourceMermaid is also Free and Open Source
  6. Kroki icon
     7 likes

    Creates diagrams from textual descriptions! It provides a unified API with support for BlockDiag, BPMN, Bytefield, C4 (with PlantUML), Ditaa, Erd, GraphViz, Mermaid, Nomnoml, PlantUML, SvgBob, UMLet, Vega, Vega-Lite, WaveDrom.

    26 Kroki alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source (MIT)

    Platforms

    • Online
    • Self-Hosted
     
  7. Umbrello icon
     40 likes

    Umbrello is a Unified Modelling Language (UML) modelling tool and code generator. It can create diagrams of software and other systems in the industry-standard UML format, and can also generate code from UML diagrams in a variety of programming languages.

    Cost / License

    Platforms

    • Windows
    • Linux
    • Snapcraft
    • Flathub
    • Flatpak
     
  8. DBDiagram.io icon
     12 likes

    Quick and simple free tool to help you draw your database relationship diagrams and flow quickly using simple DSL language.

    28 DBDiagram.io alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Proprietary

    Platforms

    • Online
     
  9. Penrose icon
     4 likes

    Penrose is a platform that enables people to create beautiful diagrams just by typing mathematical notation in plain text. The goal is to make it easy for non-experts to create and explore high-quality diagrams and provide deeper insight into challenging technical concepts.

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source (MIT)

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Online
    • BSD
    • Linux
    • Mac
    • Windows
     
  10. PlantText icon
     6 likes

    The PlantText tool is an online tool for quickly creating UML (Unified Modeling Language) diagrams. Unlike most tools, PlantText can build diagrams without the use of a mouse because it is based on PlantUML markup language.

    74 PlantText alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Proprietary

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Online
    • PlantUML
     
  11. ChartDB icon
     2 likes

    Open source diagram editor for visualizing full database schemas via a single query in seconds, supporting MySQL, MariaDB, PostgreSQL, SQL Server, and SQLite, with AI-driven DDL export, image download, attractive sharing options, and advanced editing features.

    24 ChartDB alternatives

    Cost / License

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Online
    • Self-Hosted
    • npm
     
  12. DiagramDeck icon
     5 likes

    Cloud-based diagram creation platform hosting draw.io diagrams, featuring real-time collaboration in a shared workspace. Supports flowcharts, cloud architecture (AWS, Azure, GCP), UML, ER, network diagrams, seamless import/export, and modern, intuitive interface.

    12 DiagramDeck alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Proprietary

    Platforms

    • Online
     
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