Ipsilon vs Ory Hydra

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?
FeatureIpsilonOry Hydra
CategoryIdentity & SSOIdentity & SSO
LicenseGPL-3.0Apache-2.0
LanguagePythonGo
Setup difficultyHardHard
Min. RAM512 MB256 MB
Deploymentbare-metal, sourcedocker, kubernetes, binary
GitHub stars★ 80★ 17,462
First released20142015
ReplacesOkta, PingFederateOkta, Auth0

Why pick each one

Choose Ipsilon if…

  • Good FreeIPA companion
  • Federation focused
Ipsilon details

Choose Ory Hydra if…

  • Security focused and certified
  • Integrates with any user store
Ory Hydra details

Frequently asked questions

Is Ipsilon or Ory Hydra better?

Neither is universally better. Ory Hydra has the larger community; both share a hard setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.

Are Ipsilon and Ory Hydra free and open-source?

Yes. Ipsilon is licensed under GPL-3.0 and Ory Hydra under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Ipsilon and Ory Hydra with Docker?

Ipsilon: check the project docs for container support. Ory Hydra: yes.

Related comparisons