SoftEther VPN vs strongSwan
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted remote access & vpn options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | SoftEther VPN | strongSwan |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Read-the-docs project | Read-the-docs project |
| Health score | 84 · Excellent | 87 · Excellent |
| Category | Remote Access & VPN | Remote Access & VPN |
| License | Apache-2.0 | GPL-2.0 |
| Language | C | C |
| Setup difficulty | Hard | Hard |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 128 MB |
| Deployment | bare-metal, binary | bare-metal, binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 13,582 | ★ 2,987 |
| First released | 2014 | 2005 |
| Replaces | Cisco AnyConnect | Cisco AnyConnect |
What are SoftEther VPN and strongSwan?
SoftEther VPN
SoftEther VPN is a powerful open-source multi-protocol VPN server supporting its own protocol plus OpenVPN, L2TP/IPsec, and SSTP. It is known for high performance and firewall traversal.
- Multiple VPN protocols
- Excellent firewall traversal
- Cross-platform server
- High throughput
strongSwan
strongSwan is a complete IPsec implementation for Linux and other platforms supporting IKEv1 and IKEv2 key exchange. It is widely used for site-to-site and remote access VPNs.
- Full IPsec implementation
- IKEv1 and IKEv2 support
- Certificate-based auth
- Cross-platform
SoftEther VPN vs strongSwan: key differences
Both projects are written in C. Licensing differs — Apache-2.0 for SoftEther VPN versus GPL-2.0 for strongSwan. StrongSwan is the lighter option, starting around 128 MB of RAM against 256 MB for SoftEther VPN. StrongSwan is the more established project (first released 2005), while SoftEther VPN arrived in 2014. SoftEther VPN has the considerably larger community, at 13,582 GitHub stars versus 2,987.
Why pick each one
Choose SoftEther VPN if…
- Released under the Apache-2.0 license
- Mature project with 13.6k GitHub stars
- Written in C
- Tiny footprint — runs in 256 MB RAM
Choose strongSwan if…
- Released under the GPL-2.0 license
- Active community (3k GitHub stars)
- Written in C
- Tiny footprint — runs in 128 MB RAM
Frequently asked questions
Is SoftEther VPN or strongSwan better?
Neither is universally better. SoftEther VPN has the larger community; both share a hard setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are SoftEther VPN and strongSwan free and open-source?
Yes. SoftEther VPN is licensed under Apache-2.0 and strongSwan under GPL-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run SoftEther VPN and strongSwan with Docker?
SoftEther VPN: check the project docs for container support. strongSwan: check the project docs for container support.
Which is lighter on resources, SoftEther VPN or strongSwan?
strongSwan has the smaller minimum footprint at 128 MB of RAM, compared to about 256 MB for SoftEther VPN. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.