Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Caddy VS AWS Elastic Load Balancing

Compare Caddy VS AWS Elastic Load Balancing and see what are their differences

Caddy logo Caddy

The HTTP/2 Web Server with Automatic HTTPS

AWS Elastic Load Balancing logo AWS Elastic Load Balancing

Amazon ELB automatically distributes incoming application traffic across multiple Amazon EC2 instances in the cloud.
  • Caddy Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-07-22
  • AWS Elastic Load Balancing Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-04-27

Caddy features and specs

  • Automatic HTTPS
    Caddy automatically handles HTTPS by obtaining and renewing certificates from Let's Encrypt, simplifying the process of securing web applications.
  • Ease of Configuration
    Caddy uses a straightforward configuration file (Caddyfile) that is easier to write and understand compared to other web servers like Nginx or Apache.
  • Cross-Platform
    Caddy is designed to run efficiently on virtually any platform, including Windows, macOS, Linux, and Docker, giving it great flexibility for deployment.
  • Built-in Reverse Proxy
    Caddy includes built-in support for reverse proxy functionality, which can easily be configured to distribute load among multiple servers.
  • Extensible
    Caddy supports plugins for additional features, allowing users to extend its functionality without compromising its core simplicity.
  • Integrated Logging and Metrics
    Caddy includes integrated logging and monitoring capabilities, which make it easier to maintain and debug the server without additional tools.
  • Active Community and Support
    Caddy has an active community and is well-supported with extensive documentation, which helps new users get up to speed quickly and troubleshoot issues effectively.

Possible disadvantages of Caddy

  • Memory Usage
    Caddy can have higher memory usage compared to other web servers like Nginx, which might be a concern for resource-constrained environments.
  • TLS Configuration Complexity
    While Caddy handles basic HTTPS automatically, advanced TLS configurations can be more complicated to manage and may require a deeper understanding.
  • Learning Curve for New Features
    As Caddy rapidly evolves and adds new features, there can be a learning curve associated with keeping up to date on the latest changes and functionalities.
  • Performance
    Although Caddy performs adequately for many use cases, it may not match the high performance of optimized setups with other web servers like Nginx in highly demanding environments.
  • Licensing Costs
    While Caddy is open source, certain features are available under a commercial license. Organizations may incur additional costs for enterprise-grade functionality.

AWS Elastic Load Balancing features and specs

  • Scalability
    AWS Elastic Load Balancing can automatically distribute incoming application traffic across multiple targets, such as Amazon EC2 instances, containers, and IP addresses, promoting application elasticity.
  • Health Monitoring
    It continually checks the health of the registered targets, ensuring that traffic is routed only to healthy instances.
  • Security
    Integrated with AWS's Certificate Manager and Application Load Balancer, allowing easy deployment of SSL/TLS for secure communication.
  • Flexibility
    Supports various types of load balancers: Application, Network, and Classic, each suited to different types of application architectures and requirements.
  • Cost-effective
    Pay-as-you-go pricing model ensures you only pay for the resources you use, which can lead to cost savings compared to a fixed-cost solution.
  • Integration
    Seamlessly integrates with other AWS services such as Auto Scaling, Route 53, CloudWatch, and more for a more robust solution.

Possible disadvantages of AWS Elastic Load Balancing

  • Complexity
    Initial setup and configuration can be complex, especially for users unfamiliar with AWS services and cloud architecture.
  • Cost
    While the pay-as-you-go model is cost-effective, the charges can ramp up quickly, especially for high-traffic applications.
  • Dependence on AWS Ecosystem
    Highly integrated with AWS services, making it less ideal for multi-cloud or hybrid cloud environments.
  • Latency
    In some cases, the load balancer can introduce a slight increase in latency, which might be a concern for latency-sensitive applications.
  • Configuration Limitations
    Some specific configurations and customizations may not be possible, leading to constraints on certain types of applications.

Analysis of Caddy

Overall verdict

  • Caddy is generally considered a good choice for developers looking for a hassle-free, secure, and modern web server. Its automatic HTTPS and easy configuration make it particularly appealing for small teams and developers who need to deploy web services quickly without diving deep into server setup complexities.

Why this product is good

  • Caddy, available at caddyserver.com, is praised for its ease of use, automatic HTTPS configuration, and modern design. It features an intuitive configuration system and comes with a built-in SSL/TLS to automatically manage HTTPS certificates using Let's Encrypt. Caddy is highly regarded for its simple deployment, minimal configuration, and the ability to serve static and dynamic content efficiently. It also supports HTTP/2 and QUIC protocols, making it a future-proof choice for web servers.

Recommended for

  • Small to medium-sized web developers who require quick and secure web server deployments.
  • Developers who prefer automatic HTTPS setups.
  • Projects that benefit from modern protocols like HTTP/2 and QUIC.
  • Users looking for a straightforward configuration process with minimal overhead.

Analysis of AWS Elastic Load Balancing

Overall verdict

  • AWS Elastic Load Balancing is generally considered a good choice for managing traffic distribution in cloud-based applications. Its integration with other AWS services, reliability, and ability to handle varying workloads make it a strong contender for enterprises leveraging Amazon Web Services.

Why this product is good

  • AWS Elastic Load Balancing (ELB) is widely regarded as effective because it provides automated distribution of incoming application or network traffic across multiple targets, such as Amazon EC2 instances, containers, and IP addresses. This helps improve the availability and fault tolerance of applications. ELB supports dynamic scaling, which means it can automatically adjust to handle spikes in traffic. Additionally, it is integrated with AWS services, providing a seamless experience for users already within the AWS ecosystem.

Recommended for

    AWS Elastic Load Balancing is recommended for businesses and developers who are operating in the AWS ecosystem and require reliable load balancing solutions for their applications. It's especially beneficial for those needing to manage traffic across multiple applications and services, and for organizations looking for scalability and integration with AWS tools.

Caddy videos

Getting started with Caddy the HTTPS Web Server from scratch

AWS Elastic Load Balancing videos

No AWS Elastic Load Balancing videos yet. You could help us improve this page by suggesting one.

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Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Caddy and AWS Elastic Load Balancing)
Web Servers
67 67%
33% 33
Web And Application Servers
HTTP/2 Web Server
100 100%
0% 0
Load Balancer / Reverse Proxy

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Caddy and AWS Elastic Load Balancing

Caddy Reviews

Self Hosting Like Its 2025
If you’re looking to forego fancy web interfaces and prefer editing a straightforward file while having the server manage everything from proxying to HTTPS via Let’s Encrypt, then this is the option for you. However, due to the absence of a web interface, I wouldn’t recommend it for complete beginners. But if you appreciate simple UNIX-based tooling, Caddy is an excellent...
Source: kiranet.org
Top Linux Web Servers: Pros and Cons
Now that we know their advantages and disadvantages, which web server is the best? The answer depends on your use case. Nginx is a very fast and powerful option, Apache is a great general-purpose web server, while LiteSpeed represents a premium alternative. Caddy works great if you need simplicity, while Lighthttpd works best when resources are low.
Source: bigstep.com

AWS Elastic Load Balancing Reviews

We have no reviews of AWS Elastic Load Balancing yet.
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Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Caddy should be more popular than AWS Elastic Load Balancing. It has been mentiond 248 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Caddy mentions (248)

  • I no longer have an old-school cert on my HTTPS site
    The Caddy[1] webserver also has built-in ACME. It has all the problems Rachel mentioned, of course, because now it's an ACME client embedded in an even bigger piece of software, but it's handy for sure! I don't know much about Caddy scalability but it's worked great for my personal sites. [1] https://caddyserver.com/. - Source: Hacker News / 20 days ago
  • How I made my Home Server accessible outside my home
    This single record will suffice as we will be using a reverse proxy to map each of our application. For the reverse proxy solution, we will be using Caddy, particularly xcaddy. - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
  • Simple Web Server
    It looks nice and friendly, but for developers I can recommend exploring caddy[1] or nginx[2]. It's a useful technology to have worked with, even if they're ultimately only used for proxying analytics. [1] https://caddyserver.com/. - Source: Hacker News / about 2 months ago
  • Adventures in Homelabbing: From Cloud Obsession to Self-Hosted Shenanigans
    I began to self-host a Minecraft server using Crafty Controller, an Excalidraw instance, Docmost to replace Notion, Plane to replace Jira, and Penpot to replace Figma. To be able to access them from the internet, I used Nginx Proxy Manager to set up reverse proxies with SSL. You can use Traefik or Caddy instead, but I enjoyed the ease-of-use of NPM. For a dashboard solution, I started with Homarr, but later... - Source: dev.to / 2 months ago
  • Self-hosting with Caddy Server And Souin (Caching Module)
    Caddy is the ultimate web server anyone should be using. This is true for production as well as for local development. It is very fast, and by default obtains and renews SSL certificates automatically. This is useful for when you want to test certain website feature that is only allowed when they're accessed with HTTPS. You get free TLS for all your subdomains, and it does that in a scalable way. - Source: dev.to / 3 months ago
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AWS Elastic Load Balancing mentions (25)

  • Basic AWS Elastic Load Balancer Setup
    Load balancers can be categorized to different types depending on their use cases. On a broader classification, we can divide load balancers into three different categories based on how they are deployed. 1. Hardware load balancers - Dedicated physical appliances designed for high-performance traffic distribution. They are often used by large scale enterprises and data centers that require minimum latency and... - Source: dev.to / 7 months ago
  • Work Stealing: Load-balancing for compute-heavy tasks
    When a backend starts or stops, something needs to update, whether it’s Consul, kube-proxy, ELB, or otherwise. To stop a worker without incurring failures, you need to prevent the load balancer from sending new requests and then finishing existing ones. - Source: dev.to / 11 months ago
  • Load Balancers in AWS
    In this way, you can create a load balancer and custom rules using AWS Elastic Load Balancer. You can refer the official user guide to learn more about load balancing in AWS. - Source: dev.to / 12 months ago
  • A Ride Through Optimising Legacy Spring Boot Services For High Throughput
    Use load balancers and distribute load accordingly to your redundant spring boot services. - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • DevSecOps with AWS- Ephemeral Environments – Creating test Environments On-Demand - Part 1
    • Amazon Elastic Container Service (Amazon ECS) is a fully managed container orchestration service that helps you easily deploy, manage, and scale containerized applications. • AWS Fargate is a serverless, pay-as-you-go compute engine that lets you focus on building applications without managing servers. AWS Fargate is compatible with both Amazon Elastic Container Service (Amazon ECS) and Amazon Elastic... - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing Caddy and AWS Elastic Load Balancing, you can also consider the following products

nginx - A high performance free open source web server powering busiest sites on the Internet.

Apache HTTP Server - Apache httpd has been the most popular web server on the Internet since April 1996

Traefik - Load Balancer / Reverse Proxy

Nginx Proxy Manager - Docker container and built in Web Application for managing Nginx proxy hosts with a simple, powerful interface, providing free SSL support via Let's Encrypt

Google Cloud Load Balancing - Google Cloud Load Balancer enables users to scale their applications on Google Compute Engine.

Azure Traffic Manager - Microsoft Azure Traffic Manager allows you to control the distribution of user traffic for service endpoints in different datacenters.