OpenBao
Open-source fork of HashiCorp Vault for secrets, PKI and encryption, governed under the Linux Foundation.
What is OpenBao?
OpenBao is a server that stores secrets and hands them to authenticated clients. It keeps Vault's model and HTTP API: clients log in through an auth method (Kubernetes, JWT/OIDC, AppRole, certificates), path-based policies decide what they can reach, and secrets engines issue key-value secrets, short-lived database credentials, PKI certificates and Transit encryption. The CLI is `bao`, data sits in integrated Raft or PostgreSQL storage, and the server starts sealed until key holders or a KMS unseal it.
It is a fork of the last MPL-licensed Vault code, started in late 2023 after HashiCorp moved Vault to BUSL. The code is MPL-2.0, and the project is an OpenSSF Sandbox project under the Linux Foundation. SAP, GitLab, ControlPlane and Adfinis fund or contribute to development. There is no paid edition; support and managed hosting come from independent vendors.
2.7.2 is current (26 October 2026). 2.7.0 (23 September) added post-quantum TLS and ML-DSA certificates and moved cloud KMS seals and LDAP auth out to plugins. Namespaces and control groups, Vault Enterprise features, are free here. GitLab Secrets Manager, generally available in GitLab 19.5, is built on OpenBao.
Our review
4.0The pick if you want Vault's model under a licence that can't change on you: namespaces and control groups come free, maintainers from several companies release it often, and GitLab built its Secrets Manager on it. You still run a sealed, stateful, security-critical server yourself, the ecosystem assumes Vault first, and the security fixes keep coming: 2.6.3 and 2.7.0 fixed a chain from unauthenticated access to code execution that also affects Vault.
Pros
- + MPL-2.0 under OpenSSF governance, with no paid edition holding features back
- + Namespaces and control groups, which Vault puts in Enterprise
- + Vault-compatible API and concepts, so existing clients and much of the tooling carry over
Cons
- − All the operating work of Vault: unsealing, storage, upgrades, on-call
- − Frequent security releases, and no disclosure agreement with HashiCorp
- − Smaller ecosystem: no cross-cluster replication, and seals and some auth methods are now separate plugins
Reviewed by SeekDeploy Editorial · updated 2026-11-15. Reviews are independent — we don’t accept payment for coverage or ratings.
Should you use OpenBao?
A good fit if you're…
- Vault Community users who want off BUSL without rewriting clients, policies or Terraform
- Platform teams that need multi-tenant namespaces or approval workflows (control groups) but won't buy Vault Enterprise
- Self-managed GitLab Premium or Ultimate instances adopting GitLab Secrets Manager, which runs on OpenBao
- Regulated or sovereign-cloud setups that need open-source licensing and a choice of support vendors
Probably not for you if you're…
- Small teams whose problem is .env files shared in chat: a hosted tool is less work
- Teams with no one to own on-call for a sealed, stateful service
- Organisations that need cross-cluster replication between regions today
Pick something else if…
- you need HashiCorp's integrations, cross-cluster replication or a managed HCP cluster, and BUSL terms are fine → HashiCorp Vault
- you want a developer-friendly secrets app with a hosted option and integrations, not a Vault-style API → Infisical
- you'd rather pay per user than operate a secrets server → Doppler
Gotchas to know before you commit
- Patch fast. 2.6.3 and 2.7.0 (23 September 2026) fixed a chain from unauthenticated access to code execution via snapshot restore (GHSA-j6wc-jpvg-xfxq, CVSS v4 9.4), and 2.7.1 and 2.7.2 followed within five weeks with more security fixes (changelog, checked 2026-11-15). OpenBao no longer coordinates disclosure with HashiCorp, so the same bug can be public for one project before the other ships a fix.
- 2.7.0 removed the `file` storage backend and moved the AWS, Azure, GCP and PKCS#11 seals and LDAP, Kerberos and RADIUS auth out to plugins. Install the plugins before you upgrade; LDAP plugins on PostgreSQL storage failed until 2.7.2 (#4176, closed).
- Don't trust /sys/health alone. A standby with an invalid audit device can restart-loop while reporting healthy (#4256, open as of 2026-11-15), and listener request limits are ignored for requests forwarded from standbys (#4271, open as of 2026-11-15).
- Read release notes for API changes: 2.6.0 dropped `performance_standby` from /sys/health without a changelog entry (#3937, closed), which matters for clients such as Spring Vault that bind that field.
- SHA-1 is on its way out for FIPS. Maintainers propose replacing it in token hashing and deprecating it for Transit signatures and key import/export in 2.8.0, with removal planned for 2.9.0 (#4357, #4438, #4452, open as of 2026-11-15). Check anything that verifies old SHA-1 signatures.
OpenBao pricing
The software is free under MPL-2.0 and the project sells nothing. You pay for the servers, the people who run them, and optionally a vendor's support or managed service. The published support prices are flat per cluster: Adfinis's Secretz Enterprise starts at USD 3,300 a month for one cluster, without counting clients.
- Every feature, namespaces and control groups included
- Docker, Homebrew, deb/rpm and Helm installs
- Raft, PostgreSQL or PebbleDB storage
- Limit: Community support only (GitHub Discussions)
- Limit: No cross-cluster replication
- Support and software assurance for 1 cluster
- Unlimited clients and identities
- Limit: Office-hours SLA
- Limit: No pre-disclosure security patches
- 2 covered clusters, 24/7 SLA
- Pre-disclosure security patches
- Limit: Premium (20 clusters, roadmap priority) is contact-sales
- ControlPlane Enterprise for OpenBao: 24/7 support, priced by plugin types used
- Managed 24/7 services from Liquid Reply, bespinian, Natron and others
- Limit: No public prices
What it costs in practice
| Small team, self-supported | $0 + infrastructure A three-node Raft cluster on servers you already run. Software and licence cost nothing; the real cost is the engineers' time for upgrades, unseal setup and on-call, which varies too much to estimate. |
|---|---|
| One production cluster with vendor support | $3,300 / month Secretz Basic: 1 cluster, office-hours SLA, unlimited clients = $3,300 / month or $39,600 / year (12 x 3,300; no annual discount listed). Infrastructure is extra. |
| Prod + DR cluster, 24/7 | $7,800 / month Secretz Advanced covers 2 clusters with a 24/7 SLA: $7,800 / month or $93,600 / year. Adding services or pipelines does not change the price, unlike per-client Vault pricing. |
Estimates in USD from list prices. Your bill depends on usage, region, and discounts.
Health & activity
From openbao/openbao. Counts cover the last 90 days unless noted.
Downloads
- Homebrew ·
openbao853 installs, last 30 days - Docker Hub ·
openbao/openbao6.8M all-time pulls
What the community says
Most of the discussion is in OpenBao's own issue tracker: maintainers proposing to phase out SHA-1 in 2.8 and 2.9 for FIPS, and users reporting bugs in the 2.6 and 2.7 releases. On Hacker News, OpenBao comes up mainly as the open-source alternative to Vault and in ControlPlane's write-up of an exploit chain from unauthenticated access to remote code execution, fixed in 2.6.3 and 2.7.0.
What people like
- The Vault fork that stays open source · 3 sources
Commenters describe it as the guaranteed open-source, MPL-licensed fork of Vault, paired with OpenTofu for Terraform, and ask why anyone would pick a different tool when OpenBao has no licence restrictions.
What people complain about
- An RCE chain, and no disclosure deal with HashiCorp · 2 sources
ControlPlane published a chain of four now-patched vulnerabilities that leads from unauthenticated access to code execution in both OpenBao and Vault. The only reply points to the maintainers' decision to stop coordinating disclosure with HashiCorp.
- Failures that report success · 4 sources
Issues describe a standby stuck in a restart loop while /sys/health reports it healthy, listener request limits ignored for requests forwarded from standbys, a PKI intermediate silently given a software key instead of the requested HSM/KMS key (fixed in 2.7.2), and a documented JSON self-init example that doesn't parse.
- Upgrades that change behaviour · 2 sources
Users found that 2.6.0 dropped performance_standby from /sys/health without a changelog entry, and that moving LDAP auth out to a plugin in 2.7.0 left PostgreSQL-backed clusters without working LDAP until 2.7.2.
- Running it takes effort · 3 sources
People like it but say policies are fiddly to update, that managing OpenBao per agent sandbox adds up, and that you still need something smaller for bootstrapping before OpenBao exists.
- UI hides whitespace in keys and paths · 2 sources
A key saved with a leading space showed in the UI without it, breaking an External Secrets Operator lookup; a follow-up issue reports the same for paths and metadata in the UI and CLI.
Written by Nadia Farouk on Nov 15, 2026 after reading 27 relevant Hacker News comments, threads and GitHub issues from Aug 17, 2026 to Nov 15, 2026. Each point links to the discussions behind it, and the count shows how many sources raised it. This is a reading of public discussion, not a survey.
On Hacker News · 2 threads, 12 comments mentioning it
- Realistic RCE Exploit Chain in OpenBao and Vault5 points · 1 comments · Sep 29, 2026
- Running OpenBAO on Kubernetes with a CloudNativePG PostgreSQL Back End3 points · 0 comments · Sep 18, 2026
Most-reacted new GitHub issues · 155 opened in the window
- Proposal: Deprecate custom token IDs6 reactions · 1 comments · Oct 8, 2026
- Discussion: AI policy changes for OpenBao4 reactions · 2 comments · Sep 24, 2026
- Proposal: Migration of SHA-1-based token accessors to HMAC-SHA2563 reactions · 5 comments · Oct 13, 2026
- Proposal: Deprecate SHA-1 for transit key import and export2 reactions · 0 comments · Nov 12, 2026
- UI and CLI are not displaying trailing or leading whitespaces in paths2 reactions · 0 comments · Oct 20, 2026
Alternatives to OpenBao
HashiCorp Vault
Security & SecretsThe enterprise standard for secrets management and data protection.
Infisical
Security & SecretsOpen-core secrets platform for apps, CI, machines and AI agents, hosted or self-hosted.
Doppler
Security & SecretsSecretOps platform — sync environment secrets everywhere, stop sharing .env files.
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