Pingora vs YARP
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted reverse proxy & gateways options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | Pingora | YARP |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Read-the-docs project | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 97 · Excellent | 78 · Good |
| Category | Reverse Proxy & Gateways | Reverse Proxy & Gateways |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Language | Rust | C# |
| Setup difficulty | Hard | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 128 MB | 256 MB |
| Deployment | binary, source | docker, binary, bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 27,517 | ★ 9,616 |
| First released | 2024 | 2021 |
| Replaces | Nginx | Nginx |
What are Pingora and YARP?
Pingora
Pingora is an open-source Rust framework from Cloudflare for building fast, secure, and programmable proxies and network services. It powers a large share of Cloudflare's traffic.
- Programmable proxy framework
- Memory-safe Rust core
- High performance
- Battle-tested at Cloudflare
YARP
YARP, short for Yet Another Reverse Proxy, is a Microsoft open-source toolkit for building fast, customizable reverse proxy servers using ASP.NET Core. Developers configure it in code or config files.
- Build custom reverse proxies
- ASP.NET Core based
- Dynamic configuration
- Load balancing and health checks
Pingora vs YARP: key differences
Pingora is written in Rust, while YARP is built with C#. Licensing differs — Apache-2.0 for Pingora versus MIT for YARP. Pingora is the lighter option, starting around 128 MB of RAM against 256 MB for YARP. YARP is the more established project (first released 2021), while Pingora arrived in 2024. Pingora has the considerably larger community, at 27,517 GitHub stars versus 9,616. YARP lists first-class Docker deployment; Pingora does not.
Why pick each one
Choose Pingora if…
- Battle-tested at Cloudflare
- Excellent performance
- Memory-safe Rust
Watch out for
- Rust coding required
- Not a turnkey proxy
Choose YARP if…
- Released under the MIT license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Mature project with 9.6k GitHub stars
- Written in C#
Frequently asked questions
Is Pingora or YARP better?
Neither is universally better. Pingora has the larger community, while YARP is simpler to set up (medium difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Pingora and YARP free and open-source?
Yes. Pingora is licensed under Apache-2.0 and YARP under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Pingora and YARP with Docker?
Pingora: check the project docs for container support. YARP: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Pingora or YARP?
Pingora has the smaller minimum footprint at 128 MB of RAM, compared to about 256 MB for YARP. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.