head to head · open source
traefik vs DnsServer
traefik has 64,898 GitHub stars, 6,201 forks, 939 open issues and last shipped yesterday. DnsServer has 9,921 stars, 785 forks, 187 open issues and last shipped 7 days ago. traefik leads on adoption by 554% (64,898 vs 9,921 stars). traefik is written in Go under MIT; DnsServer is written in C# under GPL-3.0. traefik has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, DnsServer 8%. traefik 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
| traefik | DnsServer | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 65K | ★ 9.9K |
| License | MIT | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Go | C# |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-12 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.2K | ⑂ 785 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick traefik if
- You weight community size — 65K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick DnsServer if
- You want the DnsServer feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C#
- You evaluated both and DnsServer fits your workflow better
About traefik
Traefik — pronounced traffic — is "The Cloud Native Application Proxy": an MIT licensed, Go based HTTP reverse proxy and load balancer that watches your orchestrator or service registry and generates its own routes, aimed at teams running microservices on Docker, Swarm, Kubernetes, Consul, Etcd, Rancher v2, or Amazon ECS.
read the full traefik overview →
About DnsServer
Technitium DNS Server is an open source, cross platform authoritative and recursive DNS server written in C under GPL 3.0, aimed at anyone who wants to self host DNS resolution for privacy and security — a home network on a Raspberry Pi, or an organisation that needs encrypted DNS, network wide block lists, and centralised management.
read the full DnsServer overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is traefik or DnsServer more popular?
traefik has 64,898 GitHub stars and DnsServer has 9,921. traefik has the larger community by that measure.
Are traefik and DnsServer free?
Both are open source. traefik is licensed under MIT and DnsServer under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between traefik and DnsServer?
traefik is written in Go and DnsServer in C#. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, traefik or DnsServer?
Choose traefik if you want the larger community (64,898 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose DnsServer if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.