head to head · open source
Unleash vs Cerbos
Unleash has 13,811 GitHub stars, 896 forks, 39 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Cerbos has 4,588 stars, 211 forks, 57 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Unleash leads on adoption by 201% (13,811 vs 4,588 stars). Unleash is written in TypeScript under AGPL-3.0; Cerbos is written in Go under Apache-2.0. Unleash has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, Cerbos 5%. Cerbos 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
| Unleash | Cerbos | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 14K | ★ 4.6K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 896 | ⑂ 211 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Unleash if
- You weight community size — 14K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Cerbos if
- You want the Cerbos 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 Cerbos fits your workflow better
About Unleash
Unleash is an open source feature management platform written in TypeScript and released under the AGPL 3.0 license. It lives in the DevOps, continuous delivery, and application security ecosystem, and its topics describe feature flags, feature toggles, activation strategies, experiments, and collaboration.
read the full Unleash overview →
About Cerbos
Cerbos is an open core authorization management platform written in Go under the Apache 2.0 license. It provides an authorization layer for applications, gateways, workloads, and AI agents, and it operates as a Policy Decision Point that evaluates access rules and returns decisions. The project lives in the Go and cloud native application security ecosystem, with Kubernetes, serverless, and edge deployment support reflected in its facts.
read the full Cerbos overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Unleash or Cerbos more popular?
Unleash has 13,811 GitHub stars and Cerbos has 4,588. Unleash has the larger community by that measure.
Are Unleash and Cerbos free?
Both are open source. Unleash is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and Cerbos under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Unleash and Cerbos?
Unleash is written in TypeScript and Cerbos 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, Unleash or Cerbos?
Choose Unleash if you want the larger community (13,811 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose Cerbos if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.