boringproxy vs expose
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted remote access & vpn options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
boringproxy
Simple self-hosted reverse proxy and tunnel manager
VS
expose
Beautiful, fully open-source tunnel to localhost
| Feature | boringproxy | expose |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Remote Access & VPN | Remote Access & VPN |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Language | Go | PHP |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 64 MB | 256 MB |
| Deployment | binary, docker | bare-metal, docker |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,381 | ★ 4,567 |
| First released | 2020 | 2020 |
| Replaces | ngrok | ngrok |
Why pick each one
Choose boringproxy if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (1.4k GitHub stars)
Choose expose if…
- Released under the MIT license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (4.6k GitHub stars)
- Written in PHP
Frequently asked questions
Is boringproxy or expose better?
Neither is universally better. expose has the larger community, while boringproxy is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are boringproxy and expose free and open-source?
Yes. boringproxy is licensed under MIT and expose under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run boringproxy and expose with Docker?
boringproxy: yes. expose: yes.