head to head · open source
AdGuardHome vs sdns
AdGuardHome has 37,140 GitHub stars, 2,529 forks, 1,253 open issues and last shipped yesterday. sdns has 1,086 stars, 72 forks, 0 open issues and last shipped yesterday. AdGuardHome leads on adoption by 3,320% (37,140 vs 1,086 stars). AdGuardHome is written in TypeScript under GPL-3.0; sdns is written in Go under MIT. AdGuardHome has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, sdns 7%. sdns was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 4 topic tags (dns, dns-over-https, dns-over-quic, dns-over-tls), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| AdGuardHome | sdns | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 37K | ★ 1.1K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-30 | 2026-09-30 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.5K | ⑂ 72 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick AdGuardHome if
- You weight community size — 37K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick sdns if
- You want the sdns feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and sdns fits your workflow better
About AdGuardHome
AdGuard Home is a free and open source, network wide DNS server that blocks ads and trackers for every device on a network, aimed at self hosters, homelab operators, and network administrators who want filtering without installing client side software on each device.
read the full AdGuardHome overview →
About sdns
sdns is a high performance recursive DNS resolver written in Go that resolves from the root, validates answers against DNSSEC trust anchors and serves DNS over UDP, TCP, TLS, HTTPS and QUIC, intended for operators and privacy focused self hosters who want to run their own resolving name server instead of relying on a third party resolver.
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Frequently asked questions
Is AdGuardHome or sdns more popular?
AdGuardHome has 37,140 GitHub stars and sdns has 1,086. AdGuardHome has the larger community by that measure.
Are AdGuardHome and sdns free?
Both are open source. AdGuardHome is licensed under GPL-3.0 and sdns under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between AdGuardHome and sdns?
AdGuardHome is written in TypeScript and sdns in Go. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, AdGuardHome or sdns?
Choose AdGuardHome if you want the larger community (37,140 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose sdns if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.