head to head · open source
teleport vs lynis
teleport has 20,924 GitHub stars, 2,158 forks, 3,262 open issues and last shipped yesterday. lynis has 16,355 stars, 1,635 forks, 224 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. teleport leads on adoption by 28% (20,924 vs 16,355 stars). teleport is written in Go under AGPL-3.0; lynis is written in Shell under GPL-3.0. teleport has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, lynis 10%. teleport was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
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
| teleport | lynis | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 21K | ★ 16K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Go | Shell |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-16 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.2K | ⑂ 1.6K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick teleport if
- You weight community size — 21K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick lynis if
- You want the lynis feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Shell
- You evaluated both and lynis fits your workflow better
About teleport
Teleport is an open source, identity aware access plane that provides connectivity, authentication, access control, and audit for servers, Kubernetes clusters, databases, Windows desktops, web applications, and cloud APIs, and it is aimed at platform, security, and infrastructure teams that need to protect access to that infrastructure.
read the full teleport overview →
About lynis
Lynis is an agentless, GPL 3.0 security auditing and hardening tool that runs on the UNIX based system itself, built for system administrators, auditors, security officers, and penetration testers who need to assess security defenses and test compliance against standards such as ISO27001, PCI DSS, and HIPAA.
read the full lynis overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is teleport or lynis more popular?
teleport has 20,924 GitHub stars and lynis has 16,355. teleport has the larger community by that measure.
Are teleport and lynis free?
Both are open source. teleport is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and lynis under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between teleport and lynis?
teleport is written in Go and lynis in Shell. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, teleport or lynis?
Choose teleport if you want the larger community (20,924 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose lynis if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.