head to head · open source
Better Auth vs authelia
Better Auth has 30,553 GitHub stars, 3,052 forks, 723 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. authelia has 29,482 stars, 1,531 forks, 137 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. Better Auth leads on adoption by 4% (30,553 vs 29,482 stars). Better Auth is written in TypeScript under MIT; authelia is written in Go under Apache-2.0. Better Auth has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, authelia 5%. authelia was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (authentication, 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
| Better Auth | authelia | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 31K | ★ 29K |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-01 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.1K | ⑂ 1.5K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Better Auth if
- You weight community size — 31K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick authelia if
- You want the authelia 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 authelia fits your workflow better
About Better Auth
Discord · Website · Issues Better Auth Better Auth is a framework agnostic authentication (and authorization) framework for TypeScript. It provides a comprehensive set of features out of the box and includes a plugin ecosystem that simplifies adding advanced functionalities with minimal code in a short amount of time. Whether you need 2FA, multi tenant support, or other complex features, it lets you focus on building your actual application instead of reinventing the wheel. Why Better Auth Authentication in the TypeScript ecosystem is a half solved problem. Other open source libraries often require a lot of…
read the full Better Auth overview →
About authelia
<img alt="SLSA 3" src="
read the full authelia overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Better Auth or authelia more popular?
Better Auth has 30,553 GitHub stars and authelia has 29,482. Better Auth has the larger community by that measure.
Are Better Auth and authelia free?
Both are open source. Better Auth is licensed under MIT and authelia under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Better Auth and authelia?
Better Auth is written in TypeScript and authelia 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, Better Auth or authelia?
Choose Better Auth if you want the larger community (30,553 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose authelia if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.