tunnelmole vs rathole
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?
tunnelmole
Open-source tunnel to expose local servers to the internet
VS
rathole
Lightweight and high-performance reverse proxy for NAT traversal
| Feature | tunnelmole | rathole |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Remote Access & VPN | Remote Access & VPN |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Language | TypeScript | Rust |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 128 MB | 64 MB |
| Deployment | binary, docker, source | binary, docker |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,885 | ★ 13,999 |
| First released | 2021 | 2021 |
| Replaces | ngrok, localtunnel | ngrok, frp |
Why pick each one
Choose tunnelmole if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (1.9k GitHub stars)
Choose rathole if…
- Released under the Apache-2.0 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Mature project with 14k GitHub stars
- Written in Rust
Frequently asked questions
Is tunnelmole or rathole better?
Neither is universally better. rathole has the larger community, while tunnelmole is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are tunnelmole and rathole free and open-source?
Yes. tunnelmole is licensed under MIT and rathole under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run tunnelmole and rathole with Docker?
tunnelmole: yes. rathole: yes.