head to head · open source
caddy vs numa
caddy has 76,149 GitHub stars, 5,013 forks, 286 open issues and last shipped yesterday. numa has 1,513 stars, 107 forks, 28 open issues and last shipped yesterday. caddy leads on adoption by 4,933% (76,149 vs 1,513 stars). caddy is written in Go under Apache-2.0; numa is written in Rust under MIT. caddy has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, numa 7%. numa 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 | numa | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 76K | ★ 1.5K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Go | Rust |
| Last push | 2026-09-28 | 2026-09-28 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.0K | ⑂ 107 |
| 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 numa if
- You want the numa feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You evaluated both and numa 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 numa
numa is a portable DNS resolver written in Rust and shipped as a single roughly 8 MB binary, aimed at developers, self hosters and privacy conscious laptop users who want ad blocking, .numa local service names, hostname overrides and ODoH encrypted upstream queries without a cloud account or a Raspberry Pi.
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Frequently asked questions
Is caddy or numa more popular?
caddy has 76,149 GitHub stars and numa has 1,513. caddy has the larger community by that measure.
Are caddy and numa free?
Both are open source. caddy is licensed under Apache-2.0 and numa under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between caddy and numa?
caddy is written in Go and numa in Rust. 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 numa?
Choose caddy if you want the larger community (76,149 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose numa if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.