head to head · open source
certificates vs certstrap
certificates has 8,885 GitHub stars, 597 forks, 299 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. certstrap has 2,454 stars, 212 forks, 32 open issues and last shipped 8 months ago. certificates leads on adoption by 262% (8,885 vs 2,454 stars). certificates is written in Go under Apache-2.0; certstrap is written in Go under Apache-2.0. certificates has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, certstrap 9%. certificates was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (certificate-authority, 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
| certificates | certstrap | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 8.9K | ★ 2.5K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-02-03 |
| Forks | ⑂ 597 | ⑂ 212 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick certificates if
- You weight community size — 8.9K 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 certstrap if
- You want the certstrap 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 certstrap fits your workflow better
About certificates
step ca is an open source online certificate authority that issues X.509 and SSH certificates and runs as an ACME server, built for DevOps teams that need automated certificate management without a commercial PKI contract.
read the full certificates overview →
About certstrap
certstrap is a simple certificate manager written in Go that bootstraps a private certificate authority and public key infrastructure, aimed at operators and developers who need to issue TLS certificates without wrestling with openssl.
read the full certstrap overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is certificates or certstrap more popular?
certificates has 8,885 GitHub stars and certstrap has 2,454. certificates has the larger community by that measure.
Are certificates and certstrap free?
Both are open source. certificates is licensed under Apache-2.0 and certstrap under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between certificates and certstrap?
certificates is written in Go and certstrap 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, certificates or certstrap?
Choose certificates if you want the larger community (8,885 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose certstrap if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.