Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

frp VS Headscale

Compare frp VS Headscale and see what are their differences

frp logo frp

A fast reverse proxy to help you expose a local server behind a NAT or firewall to the internet.

Headscale logo Headscale

An open source, self-hosted implementation of the Tailscale control server
  • frp Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-07-24
  • Headscale Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-10-20

frp features and specs

  • Versatile Tunneling
    FRP supports a variety of tunneling protocols, including HTTP, TCP, and UDP, making it suitable for a wide range of applications and use cases.
  • Cross-Platform Support
    FRP is compatible with multiple operating systems, including Windows, Linux, and macOS, providing flexibility in deployment across different environments.
  • Configuration Simplicity
    The tool's configuration is straightforward, enabling quick setup and deployment, especially for users with basic networking knowledge.
  • High Performance
    FRP is designed to handle high-performance tunneling, with efficient resource usage, ensuring reliable connectivity even under load.
  • Active Community
    FRP has an active open-source community that provides extensions, support, and frequent updates, contributing to its development and reliability.

Possible disadvantages of frp

  • Complexity in Advanced Configurations
    While basic setup is simple, more advanced configurations and customizations can become complex and may require deeper networking knowledge.
  • Security Considerations
    As with any tunneling software, running FRP without proper security measures can expose sensitive data to potential risks, requiring careful configuration and firewall rules.
  • Lack of Official Support
    Being an open-source project, FRP does not have formal customer support, which can be challenging for organizations that require guaranteed assistance.
  • Resource Consumption
    Though efficient, FRP still consumes additional resources, which may be a concern for environments with limited computational capacity.
  • Network Restrictions
    FRP may face restrictions in environments with strict network policies, such as corporate or government networks, impacting its accessibility and usability.

Headscale features and specs

  • Open Source
    Headscale is open-source, meaning it is free to use, modify, and distribute. This promotes transparency and encourages community collaboration.
  • Tailscale Compatibility
    Headscale is designed to be compatible with the Tailscale client, allowing users to leverage their existing Tailscale configurations in an alternative backend.
  • Self-Hosted
    Headscale allows users to self-host their own coordination server, providing greater control over their network and data privacy.
  • Community Support
    Being an open-source project, Headscale benefits from community-driven support and contributions, which may lead to rapid feature development and issue resolution.
  • Scalability
    Users can scale their deployments according to their needs without being restricted by commercial licensing models.

Possible disadvantages of Headscale

  • Technical Expertise Required
    Implementing and maintaining a self-hosted solution like Headscale requires a certain level of technical knowledge and expertise, potentially limiting its accessibility to less technical users.
  • Limited Official Support
    Being a community-driven project, Headscale may not have the same level of official support or comprehensive documentation as some commercial alternatives.
  • Configuration Complexity
    Configuring and managing a self-hosted Headscale server can be more complex compared to using managed solutions like Tailscale, potentially posing a challenge for some users.
  • Feature Parity
    While Headscale aims to be compatible with Tailscale, there may be some features or updates that are not immediately available or fully supported.
  • Development Reliance
    As an independent project, Headscale's development relies heavily on community contributions, which can affect the speed of updates or new feature integrations.

frp videos

DO NOT BUY - Roland FRP-1 Digital Piano Bundle With Bluetooth

More videos:

  • Review - Piano teacher tests and reviews a Roland FRP-1 digital piano bundle (Costco Exclusive)
  • Review - RIDER REVIEW! FRP Pocket Rocket from Amazon!

Headscale videos

Testing out headscale locally for homelab setup

More videos:

  • Review - Tutorial: Using Tailscale Overlay Network VPN with the Self Hosted Headscale Controller

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to frp and Headscale)
Localhost Tools
55 55%
45% 45
VPN
0 0%
100% 100
Tunnel
100 100%
0% 0
Cloud VPN
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare frp and Headscale

frp Reviews

7 Ngrok Alternatives & Competitors for App Tunneling, Free & Paid
frp is a self-hosted reverse proxy server and client you can install from a simple binary executable compiled from Go, making it fast to load and run.
Source: onboardbase.com

Headscale Reviews

We have no reviews of Headscale yet.
Be the first one to post

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Headscale should be more popular than frp. It has been mentiond 45 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.

frp mentions (17)

  • Expose home server with Rathole tunnel and Traefik
    In the previous article, I wrote about a temporary SSH tunneling technique to bypass CGNAT. This method is not suitable for exposing permanent services, at least not without autossh manager. Proper tools for this are rapiz1/rathole or fatedier/frp. I chose Rathole since it's written in Rust and offers better performance and benchmarks. - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
  • Expose local dev server with SSH tunnel and Docker
    Another point to make is that the SSH tunnel technique is most suitable for temporarily exposing services for demo purposes. For permanent tunnels, you would need to add autossh to keep the connection alive, but there are better tools for permanent tunnels, such as rapiz1/rathole or fatedier/frp. - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
  • 3 Best Ngrok Alternatives
    According to its Github page, FRP is "a fast reverse proxy that allows you to expose a local server located behind a NAT or firewall to the internet. It currently supports TCP and UDP, as well as HTTP and HTTPS protocols, enabling requests to be forwarded to internal services via domain name.". - Source: dev.to / 4 months ago
  • Show HN: Connet – A P2P reverse proxy with NAT traversal
    Over the past couple of months, I've been working on connet. At this point, it is working pretty smoothly (in what I use it for), so I wanted to share it with more people and see what they think. I know many other similar/reverse proxy solutions exist - like https://github.com/fatedier/frp, and a bunch more you can find at - Source: Hacker News / 5 months ago
  • List of ngrok/Cloudflare Tunnel alternatives and other tunneling software and services. Focus on self-hosting.
    If you want to self-host, there are many options. For something production ready frp is probably what you want. If you're a developer, I'd recommend starting with my own SirTunnel project and modifying it for your needs. For non-developers and those wanting more of a GUI experience, I created boringproxy. It's my take on a comprehensive tunnel proxy solution. It's in beta but currently solves almost everything I... - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
View more

Headscale mentions (45)

  • Set up: VPN - Part 1
    Root@hz-headscale-tmp-1:~# export HEADSCALE_VERSION="0.23.0" \ && export HEADSCALE_ARCH="arm64" \ && wget --output-document=headscale.deb "https://github.com/juanfont/headscale/releases/download/v${HEADSCALE_VERSION}/headscale_${HEADSCALE_VERSION}_linux_${HEADSCALE_ARCH}.deb" <...redacted for brevity..> 2024-09-28 12:24:54 (189 MB/s) - ‘headscale.deb’ saved [17022910/17022910]. - Source: dev.to / 8 months ago
  • The New Internet
    > I still have to rely on a landlord. This is a very good point. Counterpoint is self-hosting Headscale which I mentioned in another comment here: https://github.com/juanfont/headscale Works with native Tailscale clients with a few config changes. I use it myself. - Source: Hacker News / 10 months ago
  • SSH has become our universal (Unix) external access protocol
    Tailscale is just a commercial service that builds upon wireguard. It automatically generates certificates for each of your devices, ensures they're rotated and up to date, automatically configures routing and DNS between your devices and offers some additional functionality. Tailscale has open source clients but a proprietary server to do this, but you can use the open source alternative headscale instead: - Source: Hacker News / 11 months ago
  • List of ngrok/Cloudflare Tunnel alternatives and other tunneling software and services. Focus on self-hosting.
    Headscale - Open source implementation of Tailscale control server. Can be used with Tailscale's official open source client. Written in Go. - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • Securely Accessing Private AWS Resources from GitHub Actions with TailScale
    One more thing, you can host Tailscale Control Server yourself if you want, which is a plus. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing frp and Headscale, you can also consider the following products

Rathole - A reverse proxy for NAT traversal written in Rust. An alternative to frp and ngrok.

TailScale - Private networks made easy Connect all your devices using WireGuard, without the hassle. Tailscale makes it as easy as installing an app and signing in.

Pinggy.io - Public URLs for localhost without downloading any binary

NetBird - Connect your devices into a single secure private WireGuard®-based mesh network with SSO/MFA and manage access with just a few clicks.

zrok - Next-generation sharing platform built on top of OpenZiti

Netmaker - Netmaker automates mesh VPN's and software-defined networks using WireGuard.