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stunnel vs HAProxy: catalog facts
stunnel	HAProxy
Free Free under the GPL 2.0 or later, with paid commercial support and non-GPL licences…	Free HAProxy Community Edition is free and open source. HAProxy Enterprise is a paid product.
Windows, Linux, Command line	Linux, Self-hosted
Adds TLS to existing programs without code changes Supports load balancing for larger deployments	Handles extremely high connection rates with predictable latency Detailed health checking, queuing and rate limiting built in
Configured through text files, with no graphical setup Not a community project; development is controlled by the author	Configuration is its own language with a steep learning curve No native automatic certificate issuance; ACME is handled alongside it
Downloadable app	Self-hosted
Open source	Open source
License: GPL-2.0-or-later	License: GPL-2.0
No account needed	Not stated if an account is needed
Not stated if it works offline	Not stated if it works offline
Official website Full listing and sources Checked October 2, 2026	Official website Full listing and sources Checked September 22, 2026

Catalog facts only. Anything “not stated” is unconfirmed. Check full listings for details.