Pingora vs Sozu
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?
Pingora
Rust framework to build fast, reliable network services
VS
Sozu
Hot-reconfigurable HTTP reverse proxy in Rust
| Feature | Pingora | Sozu |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Reverse Proxy & Gateways | Reverse Proxy & Gateways |
| License | Apache-2.0 | AGPL-3.0 |
| Language | Rust | Rust |
| Setup difficulty | Hard | Hard |
| Min. RAM | 128 MB | 128 MB |
| Deployment | binary, source | docker, binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 27,153 | ★ 3,715 |
| First released | 2024 | 2016 |
| Replaces | Nginx | HAProxy, Nginx |
Why pick each one
Choose Pingora if…
- Released under the Apache-2.0 license
- Mature project with 27.2k GitHub stars
- Written in Rust
- Tiny footprint — runs in 128 MB RAM
Choose Sozu if…
- Released under the AGPL-3.0 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (3.7k GitHub stars)
- Written in Rust
Frequently asked questions
Is Pingora or Sozu better?
Neither is universally better. Pingora has the larger community; both share a hard setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Pingora and Sozu free and open-source?
Yes. Pingora is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Sozu under AGPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Pingora and Sozu with Docker?
Pingora: check the project docs for container support. Sozu: yes.