SHSelfHostIndex

Casbin vs FreeRADIUS

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted identity & sso options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

Not the right match-up?
CA Casbin Authorization library supporting many access control models VS FR FreeRADIUS High-performance open-source RADIUS server
FeatureCasbinFreeRADIUS
CategoryIdentity & SSOIdentity & SSO
LicenseApache-2.0GPL-2.0
LanguageGoC
Setup difficultyMediumHard
Min. RAM128 MB256 MB
Deploymentsourcebare-metal, source, docker
GitHub stars★ 20,311★ 2,569
First released20171999
ReplacesAuth0 RBACCisco ISE

Why pick each one

Choose Casbin if…

  • Released under the Apache-2.0 license
  • Mature project with 20.3k GitHub stars
  • Written in Go
  • Tiny footprint — runs in 128 MB RAM
Casbin details

Choose FreeRADIUS if…

  • Industry standard
  • Extremely flexible
FreeRADIUS details

Frequently asked questions

Is Casbin or FreeRADIUS better?

Casbin is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler medium setup. Consider FreeRADIUS if its specific feature set fits your needs better.

Are Casbin and FreeRADIUS free and open-source?

Yes. Casbin is licensed under Apache-2.0 and FreeRADIUS under GPL-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Casbin and FreeRADIUS with Docker?

Casbin: check the project docs for container support. FreeRADIUS: yes.

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