Feature Comparison
How Aralez compares to Nginx, HAProxy, Traefik, Caddy and Envoy
🧩 Feature Comparison
| Feature / Proxy | Aralez | Nginx | HAProxy | Traefik | Caddy | Envoy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hot Reload (Zero Downtime) | ✅ Automatic | ⚙️ Manual (graceful reload) | ⚙️ Manual | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic |
| Auto Cert Reload (from disk) | ✅ Automatic | ❌ No | ❌ No | ✅ Automatic (Let’s Encrypt only) | ✅ Automatic | ⚙️ Manual |
| Auth: Basic / API Key / JWT | ✅ Built-in | ⚙️ Basic only | ⚙️ Basic only | ✅ Config-based | ✅ Config-based | ✅ Config-based |
| TLS / HTTP2 Termination | ✅ Automatic | ⚙️ Manual config | ⚙️ Manual config | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic |
| Built-in A+ TLS Grades | ✅ Automatic | ⚙️ Manual tuning | ⚙️ Manual | ⚙️ Manual | ✅ Automatic | ⚙️ Manual |
| gRPC Proxy | ✅ Zero-Config | ⚙️ Manual setup | ⚙️ Manual | ⚙️ Needs config | ⚙️ Needs config | ⚙️ Needs config |
| SSL Proxy | ✅ Zero-Config | ⚙️ Manual | ⚙️ Manual | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic |
| HTTP/2 Proxy | ✅ Zero-Config | ⚙️ Manual enable | ⚙️ Manual enable | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic |
| WebSocket Proxy | ✅ Zero-Config | ⚙️ Manual upgrade | ⚙️ Manual upgrade | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic |
| Sticky Sessions | ✅ Built-in | ⚙️ Config-based | ⚙️ Config-based | ✅ Automatic | ⚙️ Limited | ✅ Config-based |
| Prometheus Metrics | ✅ Built-in | ⚙️ External exporter | ✅ Built-in | ✅ Built-in | ✅ Built-in | ✅ Built-in |
| Consul Integration | ✅ Yes | ❌ No | ⚙️ Via DNS only | ✅ Yes | ❌ No | ✅ Yes |
| Kubernetes Integration | ✅ Yes | ⚙️ Needs ingress setup | ⚙️ External | ✅ Yes | ⚙️ Limited | ✅ Yes |
| Request Limiter | ✅ Yes | ✅ Config-based | ✅ Config-based | ✅ Config-based | ✅ Config-based | ✅ Config-based |
| Serve Static Files | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes | ⚙️ Basic | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic | ❌ No |
| Upstream Health Checks | ✅ Automatic | ⚙️ Manual config | ⚙️ Manual config | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Automatic |
| Built With | 🦀 Rust | C | C | Go | Go | C++ |
✅ Automatic / Zero-Config — Works immediately, no setup required ⚙️ Manual / Config-based — Requires explicit configuration or modules ❌ No — Not supported
💡 Interpretation
Aralez aims to combine the simplicity of NGINX, the observability of Envoy, and the dynamic features of Traefik, all in a modern, lightweight Rust codebase.
Where most proxies require external tooling or complex configuration for dynamic updates, Aralez focuses on automatic behavior by default:
- Upstreams and certificates reload instantly with zero downtime.
- Health checks, TLS termination, and protocol upgrades happen automatically.
- Authentication and metrics are built-in, not bolted on.
- Consul and Kubernetes integration make it mesh-ready without extra agents.
- Written in safe, high-performance Rust, offering reliability and modern concurrency.
In short, Aralez is designed for developers and operators who want a fast, self-contained reverse proxy that “just works,” while still being flexible enough to scale into a service-mesh-like architecture.
⚡ Zero-Config Features
Aralez is designed to just work out of the box, minimizing setup and manual configuration. With Aralez, you get:
- Automatic protocol detection: gRPC, HTTP/2, WebSockets, and SSL are proxied correctly without extra config.
- Hot reloads & zero downtime: Upstreams and configuration changes take effect immediately without restarting the server.
- Automatic TLS / certificate updates: Drop new certificates on disk and Aralez picks them up instantly.
- Built-in authentication & rate limiting: Basic auth, API key, JWT, and request limits are ready-to-use.
- Observability & metrics: Prometheus metrics are available automatically.
- Service discovery integration: Works seamlessly with Consul and Kubernetes DNS without extra setup.