Caddy is the open-source Go web server that ships with automatic HTTPS, HTTP/3, and a clean Caddyfile. We rate it 90/100 — the easiest production-grade web server you can run in 2026.
Caddy is an open-source Go web server and reverse proxy that ships with automatic HTTPS, HTTP/3, and a Caddyfile config that fits a working site in three lines. We rate it 90/100 — the simplest production-grade web server in 2026 for anyone who would rather not own a Certbot cron job for the rest of their life.
Caddy was created in 2014 by Matt Holt while he was studying computer science at Brigham Young University, and the first public release shipped in early 2015. It became the first web server to enable HTTPS automatically and by default, and the project is now stewarded under the ZeroSSL umbrella with hundreds of contributors. The repo at caddyserver/caddy sits at 71,800+ stars and 4,700+ forks, is licensed Apache 2.0, and as of the latest stable is v2.11.2.
Where Nginx is a fast, mature C web server that defers TLS to Certbot and a cron job, Caddy bundles a managed CA stack on top of CertMagic: provisioning, renewal, OCSP stapling, and now Encrypted ClientHello (ECH) all happen inside the binary. The pitch is that you write four lines of Caddyfile, point a DNS record at the box, and your site is on TLS 1.3 with auto-renewing Let's Encrypt or ZeroSSL certificates before you finish your coffee.
x25519mlkem768 key exchange is enabled by default in 2.10+, giving forward secrecy against "harvest now, decrypt later" attacks.
Caddy is the most-recommended reverse proxy on r/selfhosted and r/homelab whenever someone asks for a simpler alternative to Nginx Proxy Manager or Traefik. The most common praise: "a five-line Caddyfile is a real production config" and "I forgot TLS even existed." On Hacker News, Matt Holt regularly shows up in comment threads to answer technical questions and the response is overwhelmingly positive — the project's CII Best Practices badge is frequently cited as a maintenance signal.
The recurring criticisms in 2026 are honest. First, Caddy is measurably slower than Nginx on raw reverse-proxy throughput — community benchmarks consistently show Nginx around 48k req/s versus Caddy's 42k req/s on a 4-core box, although the gap has narrowed since 2.0 and only matters above six-figure RPS. Second, Docker auto-discovery is not built in: if you want labels-to-routes like Traefik, you need the third-party caddy-docker-proxy module. Third, logs are JSON-only by default, which trips up newcomers used to grepping Nginx access logs. Fourth, the official Docker image deliberately does not include third-party modules — you have to use xcaddy to build a custom binary, which catches first-time users off guard.
Caddy itself is fully free and open source under Apache 2.0 — there is no paid tier, no "Enterprise Edition," and no feature is gated behind a license. The project is funded through optional corporate sponsorships that buy support, priority patches, and consulting time from the core team.
| Plan | Price | What's Included |
|---|---|---|
| Open Source | $0/month | Full Caddy server, Apache 2.0 license, all features, all modules. No paywall, no telemetry. Community support via the Caddy forum. |
| Sponsor (Individual) | From $5/month | GitHub Sponsors badge, supports continued development. No additional features. |
| Business Sponsorship | Custom (typically $1k–$10k/month) | Direct email support, prioritized issue triage, Expert Caddy access for the team, advance notice on security patches. |
| Business+ / Enterprise | Custom | Custom development hours, on-call SLA, architecture consulting, contractual support agreements. |
Best for: Solo developers running a side project on a $5 VPS; homelabbers who want a reverse proxy in front of a dozen self-hosted services; small SaaS teams who want HTTPS for thousands of customer subdomains via on-demand TLS; security-conscious teams who want ECH and post-quantum TLS without writing custom OpenSSL code.
Not ideal for: Hyperscale CDN edges where every microsecond of proxy latency matters and where Nginx or Envoy already have battle-tested tuning playbooks; teams with deep OpenResty/Lua investment; shops that need WAF features like ModSecurity 3 with a complete CRS rule set out of the box.
Pros:
Cons:
xcaddy to rebuild the binary.For 2026 greenfield projects, Caddy is the default we recommend. The 10–15% throughput gap versus Nginx only matters at scales where you already have a dedicated SRE; for everyone else, the hours saved on TLS automation, the safety of a memory-safe Go runtime, and the readability of the Caddyfile are an obvious win. We rate it 90/100 — the points it loses are for raw performance versus Nginx, the lack of native Docker discovery, and the plugin-build friction. None of those are dealbreakers for the vast majority of teams.
x25519mlkem768 is enabled by default for TLS 1.3 connections.
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