Anubis vs Pi-hole
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted reverse proxy & gateways options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Anubis
Proof-of-work proxy to block AI scraper bots
VS
Pi-hole
Blackhole for Internet advertisements with a GUI for management and
| Feature | Anubis | Pi-hole |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Reverse Proxy & Gateways | Reverse Proxy & Gateways |
| License | MIT | EUPL-1.2 |
| Language | Go | Shell |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 64 MB | 512 MB |
| Deployment | docker, binary | docker |
| GitHub stars | ★ 21,230 | ★ 60,247 |
| First released | 2025 | 2026 |
| Replaces | Cloudflare Bot Management | — |
Why pick each one
Choose Anubis if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Mature project with 21.2k GitHub stars
Choose Pi-hole if…
- Released under the EUPL-1.2 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Mature project with 60.2k GitHub stars
- Written in Shell
Frequently asked questions
Is Anubis or Pi-hole better?
Neither is universally better. Pi-hole has the larger community, while Anubis is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Anubis and Pi-hole free and open-source?
Yes. Anubis is licensed under MIT and Pi-hole under EUPL-1.2. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Anubis and Pi-hole with Docker?
Anubis: yes. Pi-hole: yes.