head to head · open source
SafeLine vs Tyk
SafeLine has 23,154 GitHub stars, 1,592 forks, 69 open issues and last shipped 12 days ago. Tyk has 10,873 stars, 1,169 forks, 509 open issues and last shipped yesterday. SafeLine leads on adoption by 113% (23,154 vs 10,873 stars). SafeLine is written in Go under GPL-3.0; Tyk is written in Go under a custom or non-standard licence. SafeLine has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, Tyk 11%. Tyk was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (api-gateway), 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.
← all 20902 open source comparisons
Side by side
| SafeLine | Tyk | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 23K | ★ 11K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | Custom / other |
| Written in | Go | Go |
| Last push | 2026-10-22 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.6K | ⑂ 1.2K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick SafeLine if
- You weight community size — 23K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Tyk if
- You want the Tyk feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and Tyk fits your workflow better
About SafeLine
SafeLine Make your web apps secure 🏠 Website 📖 Docs 🔍 Live Demo 🙋♂️ Discord 中文版 🏆 Achievements 👋 INTRODUCTION SafeLine is a self hosted WAF(Web Application Firewall) to protect your web apps from attacks and exploits. A web application firewall helps protect web apps by filtering and monitoring HTTP traffic between a web application and the Internet. It typically protects web apps from attacks such as SQL injection , XSS , code injection , os command injection , CRLF injection , ldap injection , xpath injection , RCE , XXE , SSRF , path traversal , backdoor , bruteforce , http flood , bot abused , among…
read the full SafeLine overview →
About Tyk
Documentation Forum Blog About Tyk API Gateway Tyk Gateway is the cloud native, open source, enterprise ready API Gateway supporting REST, GraphQL, TCP and gRPC protocols. Built from the ground up, as the fastest API Gateway on the planet since 2014. Tyk Gateway is provided ‘Batteries included’, with no feature lockout. Enabling your organization to rate limit, auth, gather analytics, apply microservice patterns and more with ease. Tyk runs natively on Kubernetes , if you prefer, thanks to the Tyk Kubernetes Operator Everything you need to manage APIs. Follow the simple Get Started guide below 👇 The Enterprise…
More in Developer Tools
Related comparisons
More API Development & Testing projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the API Development & Testing field.
Frequently asked questions
Is SafeLine or Tyk more popular?
SafeLine has 23,154 GitHub stars and Tyk has 10,873. SafeLine has the larger community by that measure.
Are SafeLine and Tyk free?
Both are open source. SafeLine is licensed under GPL-3.0, and Tyk has no licence declared in this registry. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between SafeLine and Tyk?
SafeLine is written in Go and Tyk 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, SafeLine or Tyk?
Choose SafeLine if you want the larger community (23,154 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose Tyk if its feature set, stack or Custom / other licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.