Apache Traffic Server vs ngrok
Apache Traffic Server
trafficserver.apache.org
ngrok
ngrok.comSide by side
| Figure | Apache Traffic Server | ngrok |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | $10/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | Yes |
| Open source | Yes | — |
| Web | — | Yes |
| Windows | — | Yes |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 4 |
| Spec score · Reverse Proxy Software | 9.0 (#2) | 9.1 (#1) |
| Audience | The documentation says Traffic Server is designed for enterprises, internet service providers, backbone providers, and large intranets. | ngrok describes its Free and Hobbyist plans for developers, solo developers, home labs, and game servers, and Pay-as-you-go for teams shipping production traffic. |
| Installation | The project distributes source tarballs and repository code rather than project-provided binary downloads; installation uses CMake. | Linux installation supports Apt, Snap and standalone binaries with no runtime dependencies. |
| Load balancing | Layer-7 balancing supports weighted round robin and URL-consistent hashing. | Endpoint pooling load-balances traffic across multiple agents and can fail over to healthy backends. |
| Protocols | The project site states full support for HTTP/1.1 and HTTP/2, with ongoing development for emerging web standards and protocols. | ngrok supports HTTP, TLS, and TCP, including WebSockets, gRPC, SSH, Postgres, MQTT, and Minecraft traffic. |
| Rating on G2 | 4.1 out of 5 from 17 reviews | 4.2 out of 5 from 15 reviews |
| Scale | The project says major CDNs and content providers use it for multiple terabits per second of traffic. | ngrok says 15.3 million developers have signed up for the platform. |
| Support | Users can seek help through the Users Mailing List or ASF Slack, and code questions through the developers discussion list. | Paid support options include Dedicated On-Call with an 8 business hour SLA, plus Slack or Teams and 24×7 paging add-ons. |
| What it does | Apache Traffic Server is a fast, scalable and extensible HTTP/1.1 and HTTP/2 caching proxy. | ngrok is developer infrastructure that routes and secures traffic to applications, APIs and AI models. |
Plans
ngrok
- FreeFree
- Hobbyist$10 a month
- Pay-as-you-go$20 a month
- EnterprisePriced on request
In their own words
Apache Traffic Server
Apache Traffic Server is a free, open-source caching proxy server for HTTP/1.1 and HTTP/2. It stores frequently requested pages, images, and web service calls so they can be reused, with the stated aims of improving response time and reducing server load and bandwidth needs. It can also add keep-alive behavior, filter or anonymize requests, and balance traffic through a proxy layer. Deployment patterns include web proxy cache, reverse proxy, and cache hierarchy. As a layer 7 HTTP load balancer, it can choose next-hop servers using request attributes, weighted round robin, or URL consistent hashing. Plug-in APIs let teams add behavior such as changing headers, handling ESI requests, or implementing cache algorithms. Security options include client access controls and authentication, SSL termination, and SSL-based access control. It is self-hosted, with Linux and macOS listed as platforms. The project identifies enterprises, internet service providers, backbone providers, and large intranets as its intended audience. The listed stable release is 10.2.0; 9.2.15 is listed as the long-term support release.
ngrok
ngrok is a cloud networking platform that secures, transforms, and routes traffic to services wherever they run. Its agent sends traffic through secure tunnels without requiring firewall changes. Traffic Policy uses CEL-based rules to route requests, authenticate them, apply rate limits or web application firewall controls, and reject them. Supported traffic includes HTTP, TLS, and TCP, including WebSockets, gRPC, SSH, Postgres, MQTT, and Minecraft. The Integrations Hub offers integrations and guides for areas such as SSO, databases, Kubernetes, OAuth, webhooks, and web servers. ngrok also verifies webhook signatures for more than 70 providers, including Stripe, GitHub, Twilio, Slack, and Shopify. The free plan includes $5 one-time usage, up to 3 online endpoints, up to 1GB data transfer, up to 20k HTTP/S requests, and one team member. Paid access starts at $10/mo. On Hobbyist, endpoints stop working when usage credit runs out, until the billing cycle ends and credit resets. ngrok lists region pinning across the United States, Europe, Asia Pacific, Australia, India, Japan, and South America.