Updated August 2026
    Actively maintained
    Real momentum
    3.9k

    Guacamole: Maintenance, Licence and Alternatives

    Clientless remote desktop gateway supporting standard protocols like VNC and RDP.

    TL;DR • Guacamole • as of August 2026

    Guacamole is an open-source remote access project, with 3.9k GitHub stars and a health score of 73/100. It committed 234 times in the last twelve months across 12 of those months, and its status is actively maintained. Licence: Apache-2.0. It has real momentum, so treat it as a live competitor rather than a stale repository.

    3.9k
    GitHub stars
    73/100
    Health score
    234
    Commits (12 mo)
    12/12
    Active months

    Maintenance health

    Status Actively maintained — Committed within the last 45 days.
    Last commit 2026-08-07
    Days since last commit 10
    Commits, last 3 months 57
    Commits, last 12 months 234
    Months with activity 12 of 12
    Last release None detected
    Archived No
    Licence Apache-2.0
    Category Remote Access

    Health score combines commit recency, twelve-month commit volume, months with activity, release recency and archive state. Metadata refreshed August 2026.

    What the licence lets you do

    Apache-2.0

    Permissive (MIT, Apache, BSD): you can fork it, close the source and sell it. Lowest legal friction for a commercial product.

    This matters most when you plan to sell a hosted version. A permissive licence means anyone — including a competitor with more capital — can do the same, so your defensibility has to come from distribution, support or data, not from the code.

    What Guacamole means for your idea

    Guacamole is shipping code consistently, so a buyer comparing your product will find a maintained free option. Price and position against the total cost of self-hosting it, not against the paid incumbent's list price.

    The clearest opening in the dataset. Low open-source competition usually means either a genuinely underserved need or a market too small to attract volunteers — validate demand before assuming the former.

    Guacamole: common questions

    Is Guacamole still maintained in 2026?

    Actively maintained. Guacamole recorded 234 commits over the last twelve months, with activity in 12 of those months and 57 commits in the last quarter. Last commit: 2026-08-07. No recent release was detected. Committed within the last 45 days.

    Can I use Guacamole commercially?

    Guacamole is published under Apache-2.0. Permissive (MIT, Apache, BSD): you can fork it, close the source and sell it. Lowest legal friction for a commercial product.

    How crowded is the Remote Access category?

    10 open-source implementations, 6 of them actively maintained, led by Termix at 15k stars. Saturation score 34/100 — Open. Thin or poorly maintained open-source coverage.

    Guacamole alternatives in Remote Access

    Termix

    Remote Access

    15k

    Clientless web-based server management platform with SSH terminal, tunneling, and file editing capabilities.

    Actively maintained
    Real momentum
    Apache-2.0

    Firezone

    Alternative to OpenVPN Access Server

    9.0k

    Secure remote access gateway that supports the WireGuard protocol. It offers a Web GUI, 1-line install script, multi-factor auth (MFA), and SSO.

    Actively maintained
    Real momentum
    Apache-2.0

    Warpgate

    Remote Access

    7.6k

    Fully transparent SSH, HTTPS, Kubernetes, MySQL and Postgres bastion/PAM that doesn't need additional client-side software.

    Actively maintained
    Real momentum
    Apache-2.0

    MeshCentral

    Remote Access

    7.1k

    Run your own web server to remotely manage and control computers on a local network or anywhere on the internet.

    Actively maintained
    Real momentum
    Apache-2.0

    ShellHub

    Remote Access

    2.1k

    Modern SSH server for remotely accessing linux devices via command line (using any SSH client) or web-based user interface (alternative to sshd).

    Actively maintained
    Real momentum
    Apache-2.0

    Competing with free? Check the market first.

    IdeaProof scores your idea against live competitors, market size and 1,000+ documented startup failures in about two minutes.