SHSelfHostIndex

Ingress-NGINX vs OAuth2 Proxy

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?
IN Ingress-NGINX Kubernetes ingress controller using NGINX VS OA OAuth2 Proxy Reverse proxy that adds authentication to any web app
FeatureIngress-NGINXOAuth2 Proxy
CategoryReverse Proxy & GatewaysReverse Proxy & Gateways
LicenseApache-2.0MIT
LanguageGoGo
Setup difficultyMediumMedium
Min. RAM256 MB128 MB
Deploymentkubernetes, helmdocker, kubernetes, binary
GitHub stars★ 19,485★ 14,808
First released20162015
ReplacesAWS ALB IngressCloudflare Access

Why pick each one

Choose Ingress-NGINX if…

  • Released under the Apache-2.0 license
  • Kubernetes-ready with Helm charts available
  • Mature project with 19.5k GitHub stars
  • Written in Go
Ingress-NGINX details

Choose OAuth2 Proxy if…

  • Released under the MIT license
  • First-class Docker support for quick deployment
  • Kubernetes-ready with Helm charts available
  • Mature project with 14.8k GitHub stars
OAuth2 Proxy details

Frequently asked questions

Is Ingress-NGINX or OAuth2 Proxy better?

Neither is universally better. Ingress-NGINX has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.

Are Ingress-NGINX and OAuth2 Proxy free and open-source?

Yes. Ingress-NGINX is licensed under Apache-2.0 and OAuth2 Proxy under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Ingress-NGINX and OAuth2 Proxy with Docker?

Ingress-NGINX: check the project docs for container support. OAuth2 Proxy: yes.

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