head to head · open source
Authentik vs caddy-security
Authentik has 26,311 GitHub stars, 2,128 forks, 1,074 open issues and last shipped yesterday. caddy-security has 2,281 stars, 105 forks, 8 open issues and last shipped 15 days ago. Authentik leads on adoption by 1,053% (26,311 vs 2,281 stars). Authentik is written in Python under a custom or non-standard licence; caddy-security is written in Go under Apache-2.0. Authentik has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, caddy-security 5%. Authentik was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 3 topic tags (authentication, authorization, oauth2), 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
| Authentik | caddy-security | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 26K | ★ 2.3K |
| License | Custom / other | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Python | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-11 | 2026-10-28 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.1K | ⑂ 105 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Authentik if
- You weight community size — 26K stars and counting
- You want the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick caddy-security if
- You want the caddy-security feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and caddy-security fits your workflow better
About Authentik
What is authentik? authentik is an open source Identity Provider (IdP) for modern SSO. It supports SAML, OAuth2/OIDC, LDAP, RADIUS, and more, designed for self hosting from small labs to large production clusters. Our enterprise offering is available for organizations to securely replace existing IdPs such as Okta, Auth0, Entra ID, and Ping Identity for robust, large scale identity management. Installation Docker Compose: recommended for small/test setups. See the documentation. Kubernetes (Helm Chart): recommended for larger setups. See the documentation and the Helm chart repository. AWS CloudFormation: deploy…
read the full Authentik overview →
About caddy-security
caddy security Security App with Authentication and Authorization Plugins for Caddy v2. It includes: Authentication Plugin for implementing Form Based, Basic, Local, LDAP, OpenID Connect, OAuth 2.0, SAML Authentication Authorization Plugin for HTTP request authorization based on JWT/PASETO tokens Credentials Plugin for managing credentials for various integrations To retain sessions and generated signing keys across restarts, enable persistent runtime state. It supports portals and direct OAuth policies without a portal. Persistent deployments require a complete stop/start; overlapping reload is rejected. Please…
read the full caddy-security overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Authentik or caddy-security more popular?
Authentik has 26,311 GitHub stars and caddy-security has 2,281. Authentik has the larger community by that measure.
Are Authentik and caddy-security free?
Both are open source. Authentik has no licence declared in this registry, and caddy-security is licensed under Apache-2.0. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Authentik and caddy-security?
Authentik is written in Python and caddy-security 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, Authentik or caddy-security?
Choose Authentik if you want the larger community (26,311 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose caddy-security if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.