head to head · open source
Zitadel vs pocket-id
Zitadel has 15,060 GitHub stars, 1,317 forks, 1,171 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. pocket-id has 9,230 stars, 312 forks, 98 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. Zitadel leads on adoption by 63% (15,060 vs 9,230 stars). Zitadel is written in Go under AGPL-3.0; pocket-id is written in Go under BSD-2-Clause. Zitadel has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, pocket-id 3%. pocket-id was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (oidc), 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
| Zitadel | pocket-id | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 15K | ★ 9.2K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | BSD-2-Clause |
| Written in | Go | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-19 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.3K | ⑂ 312 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Zitadel if
- You weight community size — 15K 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 pocket-id if
- You want the pocket-id feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the BSD-2-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and pocket-id fits your workflow better
About Zitadel
Zitadel is an open source identity and access management platform written in Go and released under the AGPL 3.0 license. It lives in the open source IAM ecosystem and provides identity infrastructure for developers who need to operate an authentication and authorization layer themselves.
read the full Zitadel overview →
About pocket-id
Pocket ID is a self hosted, OpenID Connect Certified™ and OAuth 2.0 provider, written in Go, that authenticates users with passkeys and passwords never, aimed at anyone who wants single sign on for their own applications without standing up a heavyweight identity platform.
read the full pocket-id overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Zitadel or pocket-id more popular?
Zitadel has 15,060 GitHub stars and pocket-id has 9,230. Zitadel has the larger community by that measure.
Are Zitadel and pocket-id free?
Both are open source. Zitadel is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and pocket-id under BSD-2-Clause. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Zitadel and pocket-id?
Zitadel is written in Go and pocket-id 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, Zitadel or pocket-id?
Choose Zitadel if you want the larger community (15,060 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose pocket-id if its feature set, stack or BSD-2-Clause licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.