Security & Compliance
VPN & Network Security
VPNs, tunnels, zero-trust networking, and secure access tools.
Best VPN & Network Security tools by public signals
These picks are computed from scored public evidence. Use the openness column in the ranking to separate OSI-approved, source-available, open-core, proprietary, and unverified-license tools.
Use Case Rankings
Ordered by ToolVitals score, then health, shipping, confidence, GitHub stars, and name.
| # | Tool | Health | Shipping | Openness | Stars | Score | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | Tailscale Zero-config VPN built on WireGuard | 97 | 97 | OSI-approved OSS | 36.4k | 97 | Active |
| 02 | Firewalla http://firewalla.com | 97 | 97 | OSI-approved OSS | 627 | 97 | Active |
| 03 | NetBird Zero-configuration mesh VPN for business. | 97 | 96 | OSI-approved OSS | 29.2k | 97 | Active |
| 04 | Pangolin Identity-aware VPN and tunneled reverse proxy for remote access. | 96 | 97 | OSI-approved OSS | 22.7k | 97 | Active |
| 05 | Firezone Enterprise-ready zero-trust access platform built on WireGuard®. | 96 | 97 | OSI-approved OSS | 9.1k | 96 | Active |
| 06 | Headscale An open source, self-hosted implementation of the Tailscale control server | 95 | 95 | OSI-approved OSS | 43.8k | 95 | Active |
| 07 | i2pd 🛡 I2P: End-to-End encrypted and anonymous Internet | 95 | 95 | OSI-approved OSS | 4.2k | 95 | Active |
| 08 | Zentinel Security-first reverse proxy built to guard the free web. | 93 | 94 | OSI-approved OSS | 110 | 94 | Active |
| 09 | Gravitl WireGuard virtual networking platform. | 91 | 90 | OSI-approved OSS | 11.8k | 90 | Active |
| 10 | Octelium A next-gen FOSS self-hosted unified zero trust secure access platform that can operate as a remote access VPN, a ZTNA platform, API/AI/MCP gateway, a PaaS, an ngrok-alternative and a homelab infrastructure. | 87 | 93 | OSI-approved OSS | 4k | 89 | Active |
| 11 | fail2ban Daemon to ban hosts that cause multiple authentication errors | 87 | 82 | OSI-approved OSS | 18.6k | 85 | Active |
| 12 | OnionShare Securely and anonymously share files, host websites, and chat with friends using the Tor network | 85 | 76 | OSI-approved OSS | 7.1k | 82 | Active |
| 13 | TrustTunnel Obfuscated VPN protocol and client/server tooling. | 78 | 67 | OSI-approved OSS | 3.5k | 74 | Active |
| 14 | Rustunnel Open-source tunnel that scales with you. | 76 | 72 | OSI-approved OSS | 655 | 74 | Active |
| 15 | Algo VPN Set up a personal VPN in the cloud | 69 | 56 | OSI-approved OSS | 30.4k | 64 | Warning |
| 16 | Cylonix Client app alternative to Tailscale. | 53 | 41 | OSI-approved OSS | 40 | 48 | Warning |
| 17 | zrok Secure internet sharing made simple. | 34 | 22 | OSI-approved OSS | 4.7k | 29 | Critical |
| 18 | Tunnelmole Get a Public URL for your local development enviornment | 11 | 0 | OSI-approved OSS | 1.9k | 7 | Critical |
Not Scored
Tracked for context, but excluded from rankings because comparable open/source-visible evidence is unavailable.
BrowserBox
💚 Secure remote browsing anywhere, any way you like it.
ToolVitals does not score proprietary or unknown-license tools because their public source evidence is not comparable to open/source-visible projects.DockFlare
Automates Cloudflare tunnels with Docker labels.
ToolVitals does not score proprietary or unknown-license tools because their public source evidence is not comparable to open/source-visible projects.