Netmaker vs Enclave Networks
A detailed comparison to help you choose between Netmaker and Enclave Networks.
Quick Verdict
3.6/5
Netmaker
0 reviews
3.5/5
Enclave Networks
0 reviews
Netmaker is rated higher (3.6 vs 3.5). Netmaker is an open source platform for creating and managing WireGuard virtual networks. Self-hosted on your infrastructure. More feature-rich than raw WireGuard with a dashboard and ACL management. Enclave Networks provides zero-trust connectivity for distributed teams, MSPs and infrastructure. It replaces traditional VPN with direct peer-to-peer tunnels that require no VPN server, no open firewall ports and no public IP exposure; connections fall back to Enclave-operated relays only when a direct path cannot be established.
Netmaker Self-hosted WireGuard network management | Enclave Networks Zero-trust private networking without VPN complexity | |
|---|---|---|
| Overview | ||
| Rating | 3.6 (0 reviews)✓ | 3.5 (0 reviews) |
| Pricing model | freemium | freemium |
| Starting price | Free tier available | Free tier available |
| Best for | DevOps teams that want self-hosted WireGuard mesh networking with a dashboard, ACLs, and site-to-site links under their own control | MSPs and IT teams connecting multi-site, multi-cloud or hybrid estates that want closed firewalls and policy-driven zero trust connectivity, with per-machine licensing that suits device fleets. |
| Features | ||
| IPv6 | ✓ | |
| DDoS protection | ||
| Automated backups | ||
| Snapshots | ||
| Managed option | ||
| Bare metal | ||
| GPU available | ||
| S3-compatible | ||
| Hourly billing | ✓ | |
| Free tier | ||
| Tags | ||
| Tags | free tieropen sourceself hostableapi access | free tierapi access |
| Visit Netmaker → | Visit Enclave Networks → | |
Netmaker
Pros
- + Free community tier is unlimited — self-hosted, Apache 2.0, unlimited networks and devices
- + Per-active-connection billing with hourly proration instead of idle seat licenses
- + Peer-to-peer WireGuard mesh keeps traffic off a central bottleneck; relay and egress gateways cover hard NAT cases
- + Deployment choice: fully self-hosted, Netmaker Cloud, or fully managed by their team
- + Dual-stack IPv4/IPv6 networks, private DNS, OAuth, ACLs; SCIM/SIEM/traffic logs on Business
Cons
- - Very small vendor (single-digit headcount, ~$2.8M raised) behind a critical-path product
- - Pricing page mixes current per-connection rates with legacy platform/network fees and a $99/month plan — billing basis is ambiguous
- - Community tier is community-supported only; SLAs are Enterprise-only
- - Self-hosting the server adds operational overhead (upgrades, database, TLS, monitoring)
- - Native mobile meshing not supported — phones connect via gateway and the standard WireGuard app
Enclave Networks
Pros
- + Per-enrolled-system pricing is simple and predictable ($8.00/mo list, $7.33/mo annual)
- + Strong cryptographic defaults: Ed25519 certificates, per-session Curve25519 ECDHE with forward secrecy, AES256-GCM tunnels
- + No VPN concentrator, no open firewall ports, no network reconfiguration — direct peer-to-peer tunnels
- + Multi-tenant portal and subnet gateways fit MSP and multi-site operations well
- + SSO/OIDC trust requirements (Entra ID, Okta, Google, Duo, JumpCloud) gate tunnel establishment
- + Generous honesty in the docs, including a frank explanation of relay fallbacks and their cost
Cons
- - Every container and every machine counts as a paid enrolled system — costs grow with fleet size
- - Free tier is non-commercial only (5 systems); no free commercial usage
- - Relayed fallback paths traverse Enclave-operated servers with higher latency and lower throughput
- - No published uptime SLA or third-party audit report we could find
- - Small vendor (Wales, small-company filings) with a thinner ecosystem than the consumer mesh brands
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