Brave Search

The Small Web is a movement and set of practices centered on personal, non-commercial websites that prioritize simplicity, privacy, and user control over the dominant, ad-driven, algorithmic web. It emphasizes text-first content, minimal design, and independence from large tech platforms, often using static HTML, basic CSS, and avoiding JavaScript, trackers, cookies, and forms.

Core Principles

Ownership & Control: On the Small Web, individuals own and control their own digital spaces—your website is your home, not a rented space from a megacorp.
Privacy & Simplicity: Sites are designed to be fast, lightweight, and private, avoiding surveillance capitalism and data harvesting.
Human-Centric Design: Focuses on reading, writing, and connection rather than engagement metrics or monetization. Content is often long-form, personal, or niche.

Key Technologies & Protocols

Gemini Protocol: A lightweight alternative to HTTP, designed for text-only or minimal-content websites. It’s gaining traction among those seeking a distraction-free, privacy-respecting online experience.
Gopher & Other Legacy Protocols: Influences on the Small Web, valued for their simplicity and low resource usage.
RSS & Web Rings: Tools for discovery and community-building without algorithms.

Communities & Resources

IndieWeb: A global community promoting personal websites, self-hosting, and decentralized identity.
Kagi Small Web: A search initiative that surfaces fresh content from the Small Web.
Wiby, Search Marginalia, Lieu: Search engines dedicated to finding content in the Small Web.
Small Web September: An annual event encouraging people to build and share small web projects.

Why It Matters

The Small Web offers a counterbalance to the "Big Web"—a space dominated by surveillance capitalism, algorithmic manipulation, and platform monopolies. It fosters creativity, autonomy, and meaningful connection, echoing the early internet’s ethos of open sharing and individual expression.

In short: The Small Web isn’t about technology alone—it’s a cultural and philosophical return to the internet as a place for people, not platforms.

What is the Small Web?

reddit.com › r › Rad_Decentralization › comments › i5hvys › what_is_the_small_web

I know that is natural for decentralized systems to occasionally reinvent some wheels, but this site offers nothing that has not been presented in a more mature form on the IndieWeb . Answer from rglullis on reddit.com

Plain English Westminster

benhoyt.com › writings › the-small-web-is-beautiful

The small web is beautiful

Here are the main web pages I can find that do: Rediscovering the Small Web by Parimal Satyal: a fabulous article about the joy of small, independent (and sometimes retro) websites in contrast to the “commercial web”.

Hackaday

hackaday.com › 2024 › 09 › 10 › a-look-at-the-small-web-part-1

A Look At The Small Web, Part 1 | Hackaday

September 12, 2024 - If there’s a ray of hope in this wilderness then, it comes in the shape of the Small Web. This is a movement in reaction to a Facebook or Google internet, an attempt to return to that mid-1990s dream of a web of lightweight self-hosted sites.

Discussions

What is the Small Web?

r/Rad_Decentralization

August 7, 2020

What is the small web? (2020)

Small Web applications and sites are single tenant. That means that one server hosts one application that serves just one person: you · I feel like people forgot that shared hosting exists (e.g. Dreamhost, or Nearly Free Speech) More on news.ycombinator.com

news.ycombinator.com

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January 9, 2022

Videos

40:30

YouTube

intro to html and personal websites | small web deep dive part ...

December 3, 2025

15:07

YouTube

Another Take on the Small Web - YouTube

2022 - Rocking the Web Bloat: Modern Gopher, Gemini and the Small ...

medium.com › homullus › importance-of-the-small-web-03b5766a4c1e

Importance of The Small Web. In a surprising twist of fate, AI, the… | by MrManafon | Homullus | Medium

October 12, 2025 - To begin with, while there is no single definition, “small web” typically refers to the non-commercial part of the web, crafted by individuals to express themselves or share knowledge without seeking any financial gain.

Kagi

blog.kagi.com › small-web

Kagi Blog - Kagi Small Web

September 7, 2023 - To begin with, while there is no single definition, "small web" typically refers to the non-commercial part of the web, crafted by individuals to express themselves or share knowledge without seeking any financial gain.

reddit.com › r/rad_decentralization › what is the small web?

r/Rad_Decentralization on Reddit: What is the Small Web?

August 7, 2020 - The ability of communities to self-organize, create and self-host their own digital tools. Sharing resources, balancing knowledge and time (not everyone wants to be a sysadmin, even a very small one), and giving each other support seems like a much more sustainable way of re-creating the web.

IndieWeb

indieweb.org › small_web

small web - IndieWeb

Small Web (or smallweb) is a term used in a 1999 article, a hosting service, two consulting services, a May 2020 article, a Aug 2020 blog post that describes a subset of IndieWeb principles, a HackerNews summary of Gemini, a curation of indie websites, most recently a blog + Mastodon account, and has variants smol web (smolweb) and smol net (smolnet). There is at least one Small Web blog and accompanying profile (@thesmallweb):

Neustadt

neustadt.fr › essays › the-small-web

Rediscovering the Small Web - Neustadt.fr

May 25, 2020 - Most websites today are built like commercial products by professionals and marketers, optimised to draw the largest audience, generate engagement and 'convert'. But there is also a smaller, less-visible web designed by regular people to simply to share their interests and hobbies with the world.

Find elsewhere

Google Bing Mojeek

Newton

newton.cx › ~peter › 2024 › small-web-and-science

PKGW: The Small Web and Science

The modern web has become corporatized, user-hostile, siloed, sterile; it used to be better, and it would be nice if it became better again. Small-web advocates generally encourage people to make their own websites and to do so in a way that consciously rejects the pressures of the attention economy.

Aral Balkan

ar.al › 2020 › 08 › 07 › what-is-the-small-web

What is the Small Web? – Aral Balkan

August 7, 2020 - Small Web applications and sites are single tenant. That means that one server hosts one application that serves just one person: you. On the Small Web, we do not have the concept of “users”. When we refer to people, we call them people.

Scott Willsey

scottwillsey.com › small-web

Small Web, Indie Web

April 13, 2024 - They are about linking and sharing and going down rabbit holes in a way that the way USED to be about, but now with modern design and personal touches of whimsy. In a way, as terrible as the mainstream web has become, infected with an almost certainly incurable cancer of advertising-driven enshiteification (sic), the indie web, the small web, the personal web is better than ever.

Smallweb

smallweb.page › why

Guide - The Small Web

The website this article is originally from, for example, only uses basic HTML and CSS and I invite you to play with the code to your heart’s content. It’s all in the public domain, so you can even copy all of it and modify it (and you don’t have to credit me or even link back, it’s all free). The small web still exists and has a lot to offer.

Thesmallweb

afterhours.thesmallweb.co

the small web co.

Advanced Web Development, Analytics, and Product Makers. We provide rocket fuel for your business.

Wantedly

sg.wantedly.com › 株式会社smallweb

About 株式会社smallweb - Wantedly

株式会社smallwebは、2021年4月に新設立されたスモールビジネスのIT支援という領域に特化した、WEBサービス開発会社です。メインプロダクトである「とりあえずHP」は、累計利用者...

Smallweb

smallweb.page

The Small Web

Enter the small web

Hacker News

news.ycombinator.com › item

What is the small web? (2020) | Hacker News

January 9, 2022 - Small Web applications and sites are single tenant. That means that one server hosts one application that serves just one person: you · I feel like people forgot that shared hosting exists (e.g. Dreamhost, or Nearly Free Speech)

Springer

link.springer.com › home › research and advanced technology for digital libraries › conference paper

The Small World Web | Springer Nature Link

I show that the World Wide Web is a small world, in the sense that sites are highly clustered yet the path length between them is small. I also demonstrate the advantages of a search engine which makes use of the fact that pages corresponding ...

The Small Web

thesmallweb.org

The Small Web

Also: independent web, indieweb, retroweb. It’s full of wonderful discoveries, beautiful words, and genius inventions, and free of the clutter and algorithmic influence of Big Tech. Everyone is talking about it! This site offers a community-curated list of small web discoveries.