RSS is still one of the best ways to follow websites without relying on algorithms or centralized platforms. But if you follow many feeds, the signal-to-noise ratio can quickly become a problem.
Sometimes you only want specific types of posts, articles matching keywords, or content from multiple feeds combined into a curated stream.
That’s exactly why I built NebulaPicker.
NebulaPicker is a self-hosted app that generates filtered RSS feeds in a simple way. It allows you to take existing feeds, apply filtering rules, and produce new clean RSS feeds you can use anywhere.
GitHub: https://github.com/djsilva99/nebulapicker
The Problem
Many RSS users face a few common challenges:
- Feeds often contain too much content
- You may only care about specific topics or keywords
- Curating feeds manually is tedious
- Many tools are hosted services, not self-hosted
What I wanted was a tool that could:
- take multiple RSS feeds
- filter them
- generate a new RSS feed with only the relevant items
- and do this in a simple, self-hosted way.
What NebulaPicker Does
NebulaPicker lets you:
- Subscribe to existing RSS feeds using CRON jobs
- Filter items based on rules
- Generate new curated RSS feeds
- Combine multiple sources into one clean feed
The result is a filtered feed you can plug into any RSS reader.
Many RSS tools today are cloud services. NebulaPicker is different: it is self-hosted.
Running it yourself means:
- You own your data
- No API limits
- No subscriptions
- Full control over your feeds
NebulaPicker is designed to be simple to run and maintain.
Example Use Case
Imagine you want a feed that only contains AI-related articles from several tech blogs.
With NebulaPicker you can:
- Add multiple RSS feeds
- Create a filter for keywords like AI, LLM, or machine learning
- Generate a new RSS feed containing only those articles
You can then subscribe to that filtered feed in any RSS reader.
Tech Stack
NebulaPicker is built with a modern and lightweight stack designed for simplicity and reliability.
Backend API: Built with FastAPI, providing a fast and efficient REST API.
Database: Uses PostgreSQL for storing feeds, pickers, and generated data.
Frontend: The web interface is built with Next.js, offering a responsive and smooth user experience.
This architecture makes NebulaPicker easy to deploy while remaining powerful enough to handle feed filtering and content extraction workflows.
Available Editions
NebulaPicker currently comes in two editions, each designed for a slightly different workflow.
1. Original Edition
The Original Edition represents the original vision of NebulaPicker.
It focuses on the core idea: generating filtered RSS feeds in a simple and self-hosted way.
With this edition you can:
- Add RSS feeds as sources
- Apply filtering rules to select relevant items
- Generate new curated RSS feeds
- Use those feeds in any RSS reader
This edition is ideal if you want a lightweight tool to filter and curate RSS content without additional processing.
2. Content Extractor Edition
The Content Extractor Edition extends NebulaPicker with full article extraction capabilities.
It integrates with Wallabag to retrieve the complete article content, not just the RSS summary.
This is useful when:
- RSS feeds only provide short excerpts
- You want full-text content in the generated feeds
- You use read-later tools or offline readers
- You want better searching or archiving
By combining NebulaPicker filtering with Wallabag extraction, you can build filtered RSS feeds that also include the full article text. Nebulapicker is also responsive, so it is mobile friendly.
Getting Started
NebulaPicker is open source and easy to run. It can be started quickly using Docker Compose, without complex setup. You can find the instructions in the nebulapicker github repository.
Feedback Welcome
NebulaPicker is still evolving, and feedback is very welcome.
⭐ If NebulaPicker sounds useful to you, feel free to try it and leave a star on GitHub — it really helps the project grow.
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