Harken tracks keywords, brands, or products across online sources and organizes mentions, sentiment, and themes in a local dashboard. Sources include Hacker News, Reddit, Mastodon, Bluesky, Stack Overflow, RSS, X, and YouTube. A built-in local lexicon analyzer scores sentiment, while optional LLM analysis can label themes. Harken offers a local web dashboard and a terminal CLI, stores its database in SQLite, and says it sends no Harken telemetry. Optional theme labeling can use Anthropic, OpenAI, or locally run Ollama. Alerts for negative mentions and configured volume or sentiment thresholds can go to Slack, generic webhooks, or SMTP email. The open-source MIT software is free to self-host, with no per-seat pricing, and includes API access. Tracking sends search terms to the selected source APIs; choosing Anthropic or OpenAI for theme labels sends a small sample of mention text to that provider. Hacker News and Bluesky work without credentials, while other sources may require credentials, feeds, or tokens. The quickstart requires Python 3.10 or later, and the repository includes Docker Compose instructions.
Who it is for
Harken is intended for indie founders, open-source maintainers, and privacy-conscious teams. It suits users who want a self-hosted way to monitor mentions and configure alerts.
What is good
- Free, open-source MIT software with no per-seat pricing.
- Stores data locally in SQLite.
- Includes a web dashboard and terminal CLI.
- Supports Slack, webhook, and SMTP alerts.
- Optional theme analysis can use local Ollama.
What to know first
- Historical data is limited.
- Python 3.10 or later is required.
- Most listed sources require credentials, feeds, or tokens.
- Selected source APIs receive tracking search terms.
Verdict
Harken offers self-hosted mention monitoring with local storage, sentiment scoring, and alert options. Review the credential requirements for your chosen sources and the data sent when using optional hosted LLM providers.
Harken plans and pricing
All plansCompared on social media listening software
- Free plan
- Yes
- Source coverage
- Hacker News, Reddit, Mastodon, Bluesky, Stack Overflow, RSS/Atom, X, YouTube
- Sentiment analysis
- Yes
- Historical data
- limited
- API access
- Yes
