Best NAS for running Paperless-ngx as a scanned document archive (2026)
Updated 2026-11-08
Short answer. Buy the UGREEN NASync DXP2800 ($389.99; buy: https://dealectric.com/go/ugreen-nasync-dxp2800), the best NAS for running Paperless-ngx as a document archive at its 2026 price, $389.99 diskless on 2026-11-03: an x86 Intel N100 with 8 GB that runs the Docker Compose stack (Paperless, Redis, PostgreSQL, optional Tika and Gotenberg) with room for OCR workers, two mirrored bays plus two M.2 slots for the database, and an SMB share your scanner writes into as the consume folder.
What to know: Paperless-ngx publishes no RAM or CPU minimum and says it "runs on Raspberry Pi", so a $100–170 N100 mini PC or a Pi 5 is enough for a small personal archive if you don't want drive bays; Synology's DS225+ (about $340, 3-year warranty, 2 GB RAM) has far more Paperless guides, Asustor ships a native Paperless package, and UGREEN's only how-to is a third-party post, so on UGOS you follow the project's own compose file. The DH2300 is out: UGREEN says it has no official Docker support.
- UGREEN NASync DXP2800, $389.99. Buy: https://dealectric.com/go/ugreen-nasync-dxp2800
- UGREEN NASync DXP4800 Plus, $619.99. Buy: https://dealectric.com/go/ugreen-nasync-dxp4800-plus
Published 2026-11-03 · prices checked 2026-11-03.
| Model | CPU / RAM | Docker and Paperless guides | Warranty | Price | Code |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UGREEN NASync DXP2800 Buy: https://dealectric.com/go/ugreen-nasync-dxp2800 | Intel N100 (x86), 8 GB DDR5 (16 GB); 2× M.2 | Docker app on UGOS Pro; one third-party guide (Marius Hosting, Portainer + compose); no owner reports found | 2 years | $389.99 | No discount code applies. |
| UGREEN NASync DXP4800 Plus Buy: https://dealectric.com/go/ugreen-nasync-dxp4800-plus | Pentium Gold 8505, 8 GB (64 GB); 4 bays, 10GbE | Same; overkill for Paperless alone, the pick if the NAS also does Plex or VMs | 2 years | $619.99 | No discount code applies. |
| Synology DS225+ | Celeron J4125, 2 GB (6 GB); 2.5GbE | Container Manager; the most Paperless guides of any NAS (incl. a MariaDB variant); DSM ACLs and a postgres:18 bind-mount bug on btrfs are the reported snags | 3 years | about $339.99 (B&H/Newegg trackers, undated) | Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison. |
| Synology DS224+ | Celeron J4125, 2 GB (6 GB); 1GbE | Container Manager | 2 years | tracker prices conflict ($251 low, $599 outlier); not verified | Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison. |
| QNAP TS-264 | Celeron N5095, 8 GB | Container Station; community compose files only | not verified | $439–504 across sellers (trackers, undated) | Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison. |
| TerraMaster F2-425 Plus | Intel N150, 8 GB DDR5; 2× 5GbE | TOS 6 Docker Manager; no Paperless guide; one report of Docker's data root vanishing after a reboot | 2 years (reseller) | $424.99 (listing from May 2026) | Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison. |
| Asustor Nimbustor 2 Gen2 (AS5402T) | Celeron N5105, 4 GB (16 GB) | Native Paperless-ngx package in App Central (MariaDB build on ADM 5), the only one-click NAS install | 3 years (listings conflict) | about $370–460 (sellers, undated) | Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison. |
| Raspberry Pi Pi 5, 8 GB + USB SSD | Arm Cortex-A76, 8 GB | Official arm64 image; the docs' own low-power settings (SQLite, 1 webserver worker, OCR clean none) | not found | $175 board (after the April 2026 rise); case, PSU and SSD extra | Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison. |
| Mini PC N100, 16 GB / 512 GB | Intel N100, 16 GB | Any Linux + Docker; no RAID, no bays, no NAS apps | varies | about $100–170 (refurb to new, undated) | Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison. |
Rows marked with a code and buy link are products Dealectric lists: the price was verified on the brand's own US store on 2026-11-07 and the code is tested daily in that brand's cart; the date shown is its last pass (last check 2026-11-13). The other rows (Asustor, Mini PC, QNAP, Raspberry Pi, Synology, TerraMaster) are included so the comparison is complete; their figures and prices were read from the makers' own US pages on 2026-11-03 and are not re-checked daily. The buy links are affiliate links: they open the brand's official US store at no cost to the shopper, and the commission pays for the testing; see the disclosure.
What Paperless-ngx needs
- The stack: the official compose file runs the webserver (ghcr.io/paperless-ngx/paperless-ngx), Redis as the broker, PostgreSQL (recommended for new installs; SQLite for the smallest boxes), and optionally Gotenberg and Tika for Office files. The image is published for amd64 and arm64.
- CPU and RAM: no published minimum; OCR (OCRmyPDF/Tesseract) uses every core by default, with one task worker and threads set to the core count. The docs' advice for small boxes is SQLite, one webserver worker, OCR mode auto (skip pages that already carry text) and OCR clean none. An N100 with 8 GB runs it with headroom; extra OCR languages cost CPU.
- Consume folder: Paperless watches it, imports each file and deletes it. Scanners reach it over an SMB or FTP share on the NAS; if the folder sits on a network mount from elsewhere, set the polling interval because inotify does not fire. Email consumption (mail rules, every 10 minutes) and the mobile apps are the other inputs. Set USERMAP_UID/GID to a user that can write the folder.
- Backups: document_exporter writes originals, archive PDFs, thumbnails and a manifest.json of the database, runs incrementally and imports only into the same Paperless version; schedule it to a second disk and keep an off-site copy. RAID 1 protects against a dead drive, not a deletion.
- Version churn: Paperless 3.x renamed settings and requires the database engine to be set explicitly, so third-party guides go stale; start from the project's compose file.
Scanners that feed the consume folder without a PC
- Brother ADS-4300N (about $400–530): scan to SMB network folder, FTP or SFTP from the panel.
- Brother ADS-1800W (replaces the discontinued ADS-1700W, $249.99): network folder (CIFS) and FTP.
- Ricoh ScanSnap iX1600 (about $400–460): one of only two ScanSnaps (with the iX2500) that save straight to a NAS folder, over SMB 1.0–3.0.2, but direct save drops searchable-PDF, naming and deskew; let Paperless do the OCR.
- Epson ES-580W (about $380–450): SMB, FTP, email and cloud destinations.
Use a dedicated scanner account with write access to the consume folder only; SMB version mismatches and paths are the usual failures.
Storage math
A 300-dpi black-and-white page is about 50–200 KB, a colour page 1–3 MB, so 10,000 pages is roughly 0.5–2 GB in black and white or 10–30 GB in colour, and Paperless roughly doubles that with its OCR'd archive copy (which you can turn off). Two 4 TB drives in RAID 1 hold decades of paper; the budget goes into the box, the scanner and the backup, not the disks.
Sources
- UGREEN NASync DXP2800 — ai.ugreen.com
- UGREEN NASync DH2300 (no official Docker) — nas.ugreen.com
- Paperless-ngx docs: setup (hardware, low-power devices, UID/GID) — github.com
- Paperless-ngx docs: configuration (workers, OCR, polling) — github.com
- Paperless-ngx docs: administration (document_exporter) — github.com
- Paperless-ngx docs: usage (consume folder, email) — github.com
- Paperless-ngx container image (amd64, arm64) — github.com
- Marius Hosting: Paperless-ngx on a UGREEN NAS — mariushosting.com
- Marius Hosting: Paperless-ngx on a Synology NAS — mariushosting.com
- Asustor App Central: Paperless-ngx — www.asustor.com
- Synology DS225+ — www.synology.com
- Synology DS224+ — www.synology.com
- QNAP TS-264 — www.qnap.com
- TerraMaster F2-425 Plus — www.terra-master.com
- Brother ADS-1700W (discontinued; network folder and FTP) — www.brother-usa.com
- Ricoh ScanSnap FAQ: saving to a NAS folder — scansnap-faq.pfu.ricoh.com
- Ricoh ScanSnap FAQ: PC vs direct network-folder save — scansnap-faq.pfu.ricoh.com
- Dynafile: scanned document storage estimates — kb.dynafile.com
- BGR: Raspberry Pi 5 price after the 2026 RAM rise — www.bgr.com
Published 2026-11-03; figures for other brands read on 2026-11-03; our prices verified 2026-11-07. Corrections welcome at [email protected] or /feedback.