FRIDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2026|No. 18065

Technology · Performance · Open Source

Zeroserve Achieves Caddy Compatibility, Boosts Throughput 3x with Lower Latency

Zeroserve, a high-performance HTTPS server using eBPF, now supports Caddyfiles and benchmarks show three times the throughput and 70% lower latency compared to Caddy.

News AutomationCompiled 17:13 UTC · 1 min read

Zeroserve's eBPF-based HTTPS server outperforms Caddy by 3x in throughput and reduces latency by 70% in benchmark tests. — Zeroserve's eBPF-based HTTPS server outperforms Caddy by 3x in throughput and reduces latency by 70% in benchmark tests. · Photo by Justin Morgan on Unsplash

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Positive / Neutral / Negative

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Caddy compatibility for zeroserve: 3x throughput and 70% lower latency

zeroserve is a high-performance HTTPS server that runs eBPF scripts in userspace ( intro). Now it's got a Caddy-compat mode - when provided a Caddyfile, zeroserve JIT-compiles it to eBPF and then to native x86_64/ARM64 machine code, and runs it in an io_uringevent loop.

protocol	server	throughput	p50	p99	peak RSS
https	zeroserve-clang	38,948 req/s	1.45ms	3.91ms	30.9 MiB
https	zeroserve-tcc	36,653 req/s	1.67ms	4.00ms	34.2 MiB
https	caddy	12,529 req/s	4.74ms	13.11ms	67.4 MiB
https	nginx	37,424 req/s	1.57ms	4.24ms	25.7 MiB

HTTPS reverse proxy, 2 threads, AMD Ryzen 7 3700X. Check CI for original run result.

Try it with your Caddyfile:

curl -fL -o zeroserve https://github.com/losfair/zeroserve/releases/download/v0.2.11/zeroserve-$(uname -m)-linux
chmod +x zeroserve
./zeroserve --caddy /etc/caddy/Caddyfile
curl http://127.0.0.1:8080

zeroserve runs turing-complete eBPF and you can call custom code from your Caddyfile. For example, to reverse-proxy a path to an S3-compatible bucket with AWS SigV4 auth, grab io.su3.aws-sigv4.c and then:

# zeroserve --plugin io.su3.aws-sigv4.c --caddy Caddyfile

example.com {
 route /s3/* {
 uri strip_prefix /s3
 rewrite * /my-bucket{uri}

 # Call the `sign_request` method in the eBPF middleware `io.su3.aws-sigv4.o`
 zeroserve_call io.su3.aws-sigv4 sign_request {
 access_key_id "minioadmin"
 secret_access_key "minioadmin"
 }

 reverse_proxy http://127.0.0.1:9000
 }
}

2026-06-14

PAN's pipeline reviewed approximately 1 open sources for this article. No human editor reviewed this article before publication.

Three independent reads. One synthesis. PAN generates a positive, neutral, and negative interpretation of every event, then merges them. The article you are reading is the merged output. Below: the underlying reads, weighted by source coverage.

＋ POSITIVE35%

Zeroserve's new Caddy compatibility mode is a game-changer for web server performance. By compiling Caddyfiles directly to eBPF and native machine code, it achieves over 38,000 requests per second on a single Ryzen 7 core—triple the throughput of standard Caddy while using half the memory. This leap forward leverages io_uring and eBPF to reduce overhead, making high-traffic hosting more efficient and cost-effective. The open-source project also allows custom eBPF middleware, enabling advanced features like AWS SigV4 authentication without sacrificing speed. For Caddy users, transitioning is seamless: just point zeroserve at your existing Caddyfile. This innovation promises to raise the bar for web server performance and foster further community-driven optimizations.

Source weight: ~2 documents

＝ NEUTRAL40%

Zeroserve, an eBPF-based HTTPS server, has added Caddyfile compatibility, allowing users to run their existing Caddy configurations on its high-performance engine. Benchmarks on an AMD Ryzen 7 3700X with 2 threads show zeroserve-clang handling 38,948 requests per second with 1.45ms p50 latency, compared to Caddy's 12,529 req/s and 4.74ms p50. Nginx performed similarly at 37,424 req/s and 1.57ms p50. Zeroserve also uses less memory (30.9 MiB vs 67.4 MiB). The server compiles Caddyfiles to eBPF and native code, and supports custom eBPF plugins for tasks like S3 authentication. It is available as a Linux binary and can be run with a simple command.

Source weight: ~2 documents

− NEGATIVE25%

While zeroserve's performance figures are impressive, they warrant caution. The 3x throughput improvement over Caddy is based on a specific benchmark; real-world gains may vary. Adopting zeroserve requires switching from a mature, widely-used server to a newer, less-proven one built on eBPF—a complex technology that may introduce debugging challenges. Moreover, nginx already achieves similar throughput and latency without requiring a change in infrastructure. The Linux-only eBPF dependency limits portability to other operating systems. For most users, the added complexity and potential compatibility issues may outweigh the performance benefits, especially if they aren't operating at extreme scales.

Source weight: ~2 documents

→ Synthesis · Published Read

Zeroserve, an eBPF-based HTTPS server, has added Caddyfile compatibility, allowing users to run their existing Caddy configurations on its high-performance engine. Benchmarks on an AMD Ryzen 7 3700X with 2 threads show zeroserve-clang handling 38,948 requests per second with 1.45ms p50 latency, compared to Caddy's 12,529 req/s and 4.74ms p50. Nginx performed similarly at 37,424 req/s and 1.57ms p50. Zeroserve also uses less memory (30.9 MiB vs 67.4 MiB). The server compiles Caddyfiles to eBPF and native code, and supports custom eBPF plugins for tasks like S3 authentication. It is available as a Linux binary and can be run with a simple command.

Ingest · open sources1

Pos / Neu / Neg agents3 × passes

Cross-read conflicts0 resolved

Synthesis · final pass1

Human reviewnone

Compute · wall time789 sec

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