# TrueCharts: Community Helm Chart Catalog for TrueNAS Scale and Kubernetes > TrueCharts is an AGPL-3.0 licensed community catalog of Helm Charts, optimized to work with TrueNAS Scale and any helm-compatible deployment tool, maintained by a distributed team of chart maintainers who each set their own release cadence. **trueforge-org/truecharts** — Community Helm Chart Repository. title: TrueCharts Community Helm Chart Catalog** TrueCharts is a catalog of highly optimised Helm Charts. - Repository: https://github.com/trueforge-org/truecharts - Website: https://truecharts.org - Stars: 1,355 · Forks: 601 - Language: Go Template - License: AGPL-3.0 - Published: 2026-09-07 · Updated: 2026-09-07 · Language: en - Canonical page: https://hysenlabs.com/projects/trueforge-org-truecharts ## What TrueCharts is and who it targets TrueCharts is a Helm Chart catalog built and maintained by a community of contributors. The project's stated purpose is to provide highly optimized Helm Charts that work together and can be deployed with any helm-compatible tool. The primary audience is self-hosters and small infrastructure teams who run TrueNAS Scale or a Kubernetes cluster and want pre-packaged, tunable application deployments rather than writing their own Helm Charts from scratch. The project is hosted under the trueforge-org organization on GitHub and maintains a website at trueforge.org. The README links to truecharts.org as the documentation site, which reflects the catalog's history under its original name before the organization move. The Discord server and GitHub issues are the primary support channels. TrueCharts is not an official vendor product. It is community work, and the level of support and maintenance for any individual chart depends on the volunteer who maintains it. The development model is explicitly decentralized: each chart maintainer sets their own roadmap and release speed. This gives maintainers flexibility but means that charts in the catalog vary in quality and freshness. ## Repository layout and the charts directory The repository root holds configuration files for development tooling, a charts/ directory containing the Helm Charts, and template files used across chart generation. The .pre-commit-config.yaml and Renovate configuration manage automated dependency updates and code quality checks. Helm documentation is excluded from the build via .helmdocsignore. The charts/ directory is the core of the repository. Each subdirectory inside it corresponds to one application or service packaged as a Helm Chart. The structure follows standard Helm Chart conventions: a Chart.yaml with metadata, a values.yaml with default configuration, and a templates/ directory with Kubernetes resource definitions. The README notes that the development process is fully distributed and agile. There is no centralized roadmap. Chart maintainers commit changes to their own charts independently, which means the charts directory is updated in many small increments rather than coordinated releases. The cr.yaml file at the root is used by the chart-releaser tool for packaging and publishing charts to the catalog. Getting started instructions point to the website at trueforge.org rather than providing inline steps in the README. The README states that support questions should go to the FAQ and manual on the website before opening a GitHub issue. ## Adding TrueCharts to TrueNAS Scale or a Kubernetes cluster The README does not provide inline Helm CLI commands for adding the TrueCharts repository. Installation instructions are maintained on the website at trueforge.org/general/, which the README links as the manual. Users intending to add TrueCharts to a cluster should consult that page for the current procedure, since the catalog URL and installation method have changed in past migrations between organizations. For TrueNAS Scale users, the process involves adding the TrueCharts catalog through the Applications section of the TrueNAS Scale interface rather than running helm commands directly. The website documents the current catalog URL and any Scale-specific configuration steps. For standard Kubernetes clusters, the process follows the standard Helm repository pattern: add the repository URL with `helm repo add`, update the local index with `helm repo update`, and install specific charts. The exact repository URL to use is in the current website documentation. The clustertool releases in the repository, the most recent being v2.0.6 from 2025-09-07, package a tooling component rather than the charts themselves. The charts directory is the primary deliverable. ## The decentralized maintenance model and its trade-offs TrueCharts describes its development as fully distributed and agile, with each chart maintainer free to set their own roadmap. This model produces a catalog with broad coverage: a large number of applications are available because any contributor can add a chart without waiting for approval from a centralized release team. The trade-off is consistency. A catalog with hundreds of charts maintained by different contributors will have charts at different levels of maturity. Some charts may lag behind upstream application releases. Others may have broken templates or values documentation that has not been updated after an upstream breaking change. The GitHub issue tracker is the primary place where breakage gets reported, and resolution speed depends on whether the individual chart maintainer is still active. The README says the decentralized model ensures that end users always have the latest and greatest of every chart installed, but that claim describes the intent rather than a guarantee. Checking the commit history for a specific chart in the charts/ directory gives a more reliable picture of how recently it was updated before adopting it. ## AGPL-3.0 licence and the project's organizational history TrueCharts is licensed under AGPL-3.0. For a self-hoster deploying applications through these charts, the licence has limited direct impact since you are running software for personal or internal use, not distributing a network service built on the chart templates. AGPL-3.0 becomes relevant if you build a product that uses these chart templates as part of a hosted service and distribute that service to users over a network. In that scenario, AGPL-3.0 requires you to make the chart source available to those users. This distinction between GPL-3.0 and AGPL-3.0 is significant for commercial users. The project's website links to the full FAQ for licence questions. The repository's organization history is visible in the current repository URL (trueforge-org/truecharts) and the presence of both truecharts.org and trueforge.org in the README. The search query "is truecharts dead" reflects a period of uncertainty during the organizational move. The last push to the repository was on 2026-09-22, confirming the project continues under the new organization. ## Comparison with Bitnami charts and when to choose each Bitnami, now maintained by Broadcom, provides a large catalog of vendor-backed Helm Charts. The key difference from TrueCharts is organizational model. Bitnami charts are maintained by a dedicated team at a commercial company with formal release processes and security scanning. TrueCharts charts are maintained by community volunteers under a distributed model. Bitnami charts are generally a better fit for teams that need a chart with a published vulnerability disclosure process, regular security updates tied to a vendor's release cycle, and support contracts for production deployments. Bitnami also maintains charts for a wider range of infrastructure software that TrueCharts may not cover. TrueCharts is a better fit for self-hosters who prioritize breadth of catalog coverage, TrueNAS Scale compatibility, and tunability. The community model gives TrueCharts faster coverage of niche applications that Bitnami would not prioritize. The two catalogs are not mutually exclusive: a Kubernetes cluster can use charts from both simultaneously. ## Conclusion TrueCharts is the right catalog for self-hosters and small teams who run TrueNAS Scale or a Kubernetes cluster and want a large selection of pre-packaged Helm Charts that are designed to work together. It is not the right choice for teams who need charts with official vendor support, audit trails, or certified security scanning, since TrueCharts is community-maintained without those guarantees. Before adopting the catalog for a production deployment, verify that the specific chart you need is actively maintained by checking its last commit history in the charts/ directory. The AGPL-3.0 licence is worth reviewing if you plan to build software on top of these charts for distribution, since AGPL-3.0 has network-service copyleft requirements that differ from permissive alternatives. ## FAQ ### How do I install TrueCharts on TrueNAS Scale? The README directs users to the manual at trueforge.org/general/ for current installation instructions. For TrueNAS Scale, charts are added through the Applications section of the Scale interface rather than direct Helm CLI commands. The exact catalog URL to use is maintained on the website. ### How do I add TrueCharts to TrueNAS Scale? Adding TrueCharts to TrueNAS Scale involves adding the catalog through the Applications section in the Scale web interface. Current step-by-step instructions, including the catalog URL, are maintained on the TrueCharts website at trueforge.org/general/ rather than in the repository README. ### Is TrueCharts dead or still maintained? TrueCharts is active under the trueforge-org GitHub organization, with the last push to the repository on 2026-09-22. The organizational move from the previous account to trueforge-org caused uncertainty, but the project continues with the same community and catalog. ### What is a good TrueCharts alternative? Bitnami charts, now maintained by Broadcom, provide vendor-backed Helm Charts for common infrastructure software with formal release processes. The difference is that Bitnami targets production Kubernetes deployments with commercial support, while TrueCharts focuses on breadth of community-maintained coverage and TrueNAS Scale compatibility. ## Sources - [Official documentation](https://truecharts.org) - [Official README](https://github.com/trueforge-org/truecharts#readme) - [Project repository](https://github.com/trueforge-org/truecharts) - [Release notes](https://github.com/trueforge-org/truecharts/releases) --- Hysen Labs editorial analysis, written from the project's own repository and release notes. Cite the canonical page: https://hysenlabs.com/projects/trueforge-org-truecharts