CasaOS vs Cosmos
| Tagline | Simple, elegant home cloud OS for personal servers and NAS devices | Secure self-hosting gateway and server manager with built-in privacy features |
| Category | Self-Hosting Platforms & PaaS | Self-Hosting Platforms & PaaS |
| Replaces | Heroku, Render, Netlify | Heroku, Render, Netlify |
| GitHub stars | 37k | 6.1k |
| Language | Go | Docker |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Self-host difficulty | 2/5 Easy | 2/5 Easy |
| Deploy options | Docker Manual | Docker Docker Compose |
| Managed hosting | ||
| Last updated | 0 years ago | 17 days ago |
| View repo | View repo |
Where each falls short
The honest trade-offs — what you give up with each, versus the proprietary tools they replace.
CasaOS
- No built-in CI/CD pipelines or Git-based deploy workflows like Heroku/Render
- App store limited to curated Docker images; no support for custom buildpacks
- No auto-scaling, horizontal scaling, or load balancing across multiple hosts
- SSL/TLS certificate management is basic compared to managed PaaS offerings
Cosmos
- No Git-based or CI/CD deployment pipeline for custom code
- App marketplace is smaller and less mature than CasaOS or Umbrel
- Multi-server and horizontal scaling are not supported
- Documentation and community support are limited compared to more established platforms
Bottom line
Both are a similar lift to self-host; choose CasaOS for the larger community and ecosystem. Cosmos has seen more recent development. Open each guide below for deploy steps and the full feature gap.
Cosmos
Secure self-hosting gateway and server manager with built-in privacy features