open-coreui: Turning Open WebUI into a Rust food truck

I’ve watched a lot of people open the Open WebUI setup guide with one innocent goal:

“I just want a webui to chat with my model on my own machine.”

Then the guide hits them like a surprise business license exam: Docker, Python, a database, maybe a cache… and suddenly you’re not “trying a tool” anymore, you’re “opening a restaurant chain.”

That’s where open-coreui makes sense. It’s the lightweight “food truck” version of that experience: smaller, lighter, and much easier to start serving something warm right now.

What open-coreui actually is (no marketing)

Here’s the straight definition:

• open-coreui is a lite rewrite (a fork) of Open WebUI v0.6.32, not an official release.
• It tries to keep the original frontend, while moving the backend to rust (actix-web).
• It’s explicitly in an early development stage: the project states that only basic chat is implemented right now, with other features coming gradually.

Think of it like keeping the same menu board, but swapping the kitchen for a tighter, faster stove. The first dish to perfect is the house fried rice: chat. The rest comes later.

It also ships as two completely separate “ways to run the truck”:

Pick one. You don’t need both.

“Lightweight” where exactly? 5 things that matter

When I say lightweight, I mostly mean “fewer moving parts between you and the first successful chat.”

1. Original frontend, low re-learning cost
   The goal isn’t a brand-new UI. It’s “feel like Open WebUI, but easier to deploy.”

2. Rust backend with actix-web
   The backend is built on actix-web, which usually means good throughput and sane resource usage when you have concurrent requests.

3. Default data store is SQLite
   The CLI docs describe a default CONFIG_DIR and a default DATABASE_URL that points to SQLite. In food-truck terms: the pantry lives under the counter.

4. No forced dependency buffet
   The README highlights “no Docker, Python, PostgreSQL, Redis” requirements for the server. If you just want chat, you don’t have to build a whole kitchen.

5. A lot of switches, but don’t flip them all at once
   The CLI exposes many env vars (auth, websockets, web search, code execution, image generation…). Treat them as optional toppings, not “must enable everything.”

Hands-on: get it running in ~10 minutes (Desktop or CLI)

Official entry points:

• Releases: https://github.com/xxnuo/open-coreui/releases/latest
• CLI docs (env vars): https://github.com/xxnuo/open-coreui/blob/main/CLI.md

Option A: Desktop (for “just let me use it”)

1. Download the Desktop app from Releases
2. Install and open it

macOS gotcha: if you see an “app is damaged” warning, the quarantine attribute is usually the culprit:

sudo xattr -d com.apple.quarantine "/Applications/Open CoreUI Desktop.app"

Option B: Backend server / CLI (for “put it on a box and share it”)

1. Download the backend binary from Releases
2. On Linux/macOS, make it executable and run it:

chmod +x open-coreui-*
./open-coreui-*

3. Open the printed URL in your browser (commonly http://localhost:8168)

If you only want local access (no LAN visitors), bind it to loopback:

HOST=127.0.0.1 PORT=8168 ./open-coreui-*

Make it talk to a model: OpenAI-compatible API (minimal env vars)

open-coreui is built around OpenAI-compatible endpoints. The two env vars you’ll touch most often:

• OPENAI_API_BASE_URL (default is https://api.openai.com/v1)
• OPENAI_API_KEY

Example with a local OpenAI-compatible server (replace the URL with yours):

OPENAI_API_BASE_URL="http://127.0.0.1:11434/v1" \\
OPENAI_API_KEY="local-dev" \\
./open-coreui-*

The mental model is simple: open-coreui is the webui; your model server is the stove. They talk over an OpenAI-compatible wire.

Gotchas (don’t drive the truck into a ditch)

1) “I assumed it supports everything Open WebUI does”

Reality check: the project states it’s early-stage, with basic chat first. So if a switch exists in the CLI docs, it doesn’t automatically mean the full feature is production-ready.

2) “I put it on a server and accidentally exposed it”

The CLI docs show HOST defaults to 0.0.0.0. At minimum:

• Bind to the right interface (HOST=127.0.0.1 or an internal IP)
• Disable open registration if you don’t want it (ENABLE_SIGNUP=false)
• Set a stable secret (WEBUI_SECRET_KEY) instead of relying on a fresh auto-generated value

3) “I reinstalled and my data vanished”

Check the config/data directory. The default is:

• ~/.config/open-coreui

If you want data to live somewhere you already back up, set:

CONFIG_DIR="/path/to/open-coreui" ./open-coreui-*

4) “Port is already in use”

Two easy outs:

• Change PORT
• Enable random port assignment: ENABLE_RANDOM_PORT=true

3-line wrap-up + a practical next checklist

Three lines:

1. open-coreui is a practical bet: make Open WebUI-style chat easier to deploy, using rust for the backend.
2. It’s a food truck: fast to start, easy to move, but it won’t serve the full banquet on day one.
3. “High performance” only matters if it feels smooth on the machines you actually own.

Next checklist:

• Personal use: try the Desktop app first, confirm chat works end-to-end
• Team use: run the CLI server, bind correctly, lock down signups
• Backup-friendly: move CONFIG_DIR to a place you already back up
• Tweak responsibly: enable one feature switch at a time and test it

References:

• Repo: https://github.com/xxnuo/open-coreui
• Releases: https://github.com/xxnuo/open-coreui/releases/latest
• CLI env vars: https://github.com/xxnuo/open-coreui/blob/main/CLI.md

If this helped, do one “technical action”

I’m not great at shouting “smash that button,” so here’s a checklist that actually maps to real actions:

1. Like: click the like button so this doesn’t disappear into the content void
2. Share: send the link to the friend currently stuck “opening a restaurant” just to get a webui running
3. Bookmark: browser bookmark is the most reliable (macOS: Command+D, Windows/Linux: Ctrl+D)
4. Follow: subscribe via RSS (usually /index.xml) and drop it into your reader, so you don’t have to rely on algorithms

If you did any of those, I’ll assume this food-truck guide earned its parking spot.