Kong GatewayvsOllama
Two self-hosted projects, compared on the numbers selfhost.directory tracks live: score, popularity, release cadence and setup effort.
| Kong Gateway | Ollama | |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 82/100 | 95/100 |
| Rank in category | #1 of 39 in API Gateway | #1 of 25 in LLM Inference |
| GitHub stars | 44 314 | 185 098 |
| Stars, last 30 days | +128 | +3 550 |
| Stable releases, 12 months | 3 | 50 |
| Latest release | 3.9.4 · 12 Oct 2026 | v0.40.12 · 27 Oct 2026 |
| Setup | Moderate | Easy |
| Official Docker image | No | Yes |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Main language | Lua | Go |
Which one should you pick?
Ollama scores 95/100 against 82/100 for Kong Gateway, so it is the safer default.
Ollama ships more often: 50 stable releases in the past year, against 3 for Kong Gateway.
If you want the quickest setup, Ollama is easier to run; Kong Gateway needs more configuration.
Ollama is growing faster right now (+3 550 stars in 30 days).
Kong Gateway details →Ollama details →