FusionAuth vs Supabase Auth
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted identity & sso options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
FusionAuth
Complete authentication and authorization platform
VS
Supabase Auth
Small JWT-based user authentication API service
| Feature | FusionAuth | Supabase Auth |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 70 · Good | 87 · Excellent |
| Category | Identity & SSO | Identity & SSO |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Language | Dockerfile | Go |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 1,024 MB | 128 MB |
| Deployment | docker, kubernetes, bare-metal | docker, binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 241 | ★ 2,569 |
| First released | 2018 | 2017 |
| Replaces | Auth0, Okta | Auth0 |
What are FusionAuth and Supabase Auth?
FusionAuth
FusionAuth is a self-hostable customer identity and access management platform supporting OAuth, OIDC, SAML, MFA, and user management. The community edition runs free on your own infrastructure.
- OAuth, OIDC and SAML support
- Multi-factor authentication
- User and tenant management
- Themable login pages
Supabase Auth
GoTrue is a lightweight JSON Web Token based authentication API for managing users and sessions, originally from Netlify and extended by Supabase. It is self-hosted as a small Go service.
- JWT-based auth API
- Email and OAuth login
- Lightweight Go service
- Self-hostable
FusionAuth vs Supabase Auth: key differences
FusionAuth is written in Dockerfile, while Supabase Auth is built with Go. Licensing differs — Apache-2.0 for FusionAuth versus MIT for Supabase Auth. Supabase Auth is the lighter option, starting around 128 MB of RAM against 1,024 MB for FusionAuth. Supabase Auth has the considerably larger community, at 2,569 GitHub stars versus 241.
Why pick each one
Choose FusionAuth if…
- Released under the Apache-2.0 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Kubernetes-ready with Helm charts available
- Written in Dockerfile
Choose Supabase Auth if…
- Released under the MIT license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (2.6k GitHub stars)
- Written in Go
Frequently asked questions
Is FusionAuth or Supabase Auth better?
Neither is universally better. Supabase Auth has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are FusionAuth and Supabase Auth free and open-source?
Yes. FusionAuth is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Supabase Auth under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run FusionAuth and Supabase Auth with Docker?
FusionAuth: yes. Supabase Auth: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, FusionAuth or Supabase Auth?
Supabase Auth has the smaller minimum footprint at 128 MB of RAM, compared to about 1,024 MB for FusionAuth. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.