head to head · open source
caddy vs cloudflared
caddy has 75,894 GitHub stars, 4,982 forks, 286 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. cloudflared has 15,829 stars, 1,451 forks, 545 open issues and last shipped 5 days ago. caddy leads on adoption by 379% (75,894 vs 15,829 stars). caddy is written in Go under Apache-2.0; cloudflared is written in Go under Apache-2.0. caddy has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, cloudflared 9%. caddy was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (reverse-proxy), 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
| caddy | cloudflared | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 76K | ★ 16K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-19 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.0K | ⑂ 1.5K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick caddy if
- You weight community size — 76K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick cloudflared if
- You want the cloudflared 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 cloudflared fits your workflow better
About caddy
Caddy is a Go based, Apache 2.0 licensed HTTP/1.1, HTTP/2, and HTTP/3 web server and reverse proxy that obtains and renews TLS certificates automatically by default, built for operators and teams who want every site on HTTPS without maintaining a separate certificate workflow.
read the full caddy overview →
About cloudflared
cloudflared is the open source command line client and tunneling daemon for Cloudflare Tunnel, a Go program under the Apache 2.0 licence that proxies traffic from the Cloudflare network to your origins so a webserver can stay closed to the public internet, and it is aimed at operators, platform teams and developers who need to publish HTTP services or reach private origins without opening inbound firewall ports.
read the full cloudflared overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is caddy or cloudflared more popular?
caddy has 75,894 GitHub stars and cloudflared has 15,829. caddy has the larger community by that measure.
Are caddy and cloudflared free?
Both are open source. caddy is licensed under Apache-2.0 and cloudflared under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between caddy and cloudflared?
caddy is written in Go and cloudflared 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, caddy or cloudflared?
Choose caddy if you want the larger community (75,894 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose cloudflared if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.