Where NetBox fits
NetBox models a network in depth — sites, racks, devices, cables, IP addresses, VLANs, circuits — so that automation can read the intended state from one place. Teams that generate configurations from their source of truth, and run it themselves, choose NetBox for that, and it has a large community and plugin ecosystem.
Where Cablefolio fits
Cablefolio is built for the person standing in the comms room. It works offline on a phone, files photos where they were taken, draws floor plans with every device and run pinned on them, walks a crew through a checklist the customer signs, prints the labels, and turns the record into the as-built report and the customer’s portal. It is hosted, so there is no server to keep. NetBox device-type files import into Cablefolio as presets.
Using both
They are not exclusive. A team can keep NetBox as the automation source of truth and use Cablefolio for site surveys, installs, and client handovers; Cablefolio’s API and webhooks are there for syncing what each one owns.
Questions and answers
Is Cablefolio a NetBox alternative?
For field documentation, floor plans, client handovers, and teams that want a hosted service with an offline phone app, yes. For a self-hosted source of truth that drives network automation, NetBox is built for that job, and the two can be used together.
Is Cablefolio open source?
No. Cablefolio is a commercial hosted service. Your data can be exported in full at any time.
What NetBox’s own pages say
- NetBox’s maintainers wrote that floor plans and outlet locations would not be pursued “as part of the core application”; floor plans are available through community plugins. Source: NetBox issue #21342 (floor plans), read .
Sources
What this page says about NetBox comes from their own public pages, each dated where it is quoted; product names are their owners’ trademarks. If something here is out of date, tell us at the support page and we will correct it.