# Cilium vs Flomesh Service Mesh

**Leader by Vioscale score:** Cilium

| Attribute | Cilium | Flomesh Service Mesh |
|---|---|---|
| **Vioscale score** | 62.8 (42% (low)) | 33.6 (32% (low)) |
| activity.commits_last_30d | 100 | 0 |
| adoption.dependent_repos | 103 | - |
| adoption.github_stars | 25,013 | 800 |
| deployment.options | `{"cloud":true,"self_hosted":true}` | `{"cloud":true}` |
| description.long | A cloud-native networking and security platform that uses eBPF to provide networking, observability, and security capabilities. Built for Kubernetes and cloud infrastructure with integrated observability via Hubble. | Flomesh Service Mesh (FSM) is a cloud-native service mesh solution that manages traffic between services while automatically encrypting their communication channels. It provides fine-grained access control policies to regulate which services can communicate with each other. |
| features.capabilities | `{"proxy":"envoy","data_plane":"sidecarless_ebpf","multicluster":true,"gateway_api_support":true,"built_in_observability":true}` | `{"automatic_mtls":true}` |
| language.primary | Go | JavaScript |
| license.spdx | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| platform.support | `{"cli":true,"linux":true}` | - |
| pricing | `{"type":"open_source","freeTier":true,"sourceUrl":"https://cilium.io","retrievedAt":"2026-08-13T09:27:47.184Z"}` | - |
| pricing.free_tier | yes | - |
| pricing.model | open_source | - |
| pricing.price_level | free | - |
| pricing.transparent | yes | - |
| release.cadence_days | 5 | 19 |
| release.history | `[{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.20.1","date":"2026-08-18T10:36:16Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.20.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.19.7","date":"2026-08-18T10:35:54Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.19.7"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.18.13","date":"2026-08-18T10:35:40Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.18.13"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.21.0-pre.0","date":"2026-08-03T19:58:45Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v1.21.0-pre.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.20.0","date":"2026-07-29T15:00:29Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.20.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.20.0-rc.1","date":"2026-07-21T23:28:11Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v1.20.0-rc.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.19.6","date":"2026-07-16T22:52:21Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.19.6"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.18.12","date":"2026-07-16T22:47:50Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.18.12"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.17.18","date":"2026-07-16T22:47:26Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.17.18"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.20.0-rc.0","date":"2026-07-14T02:52:53Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v1.20.0-rc.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.20.0-pre.4","date":"2026-07-03T20:50:44Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v1.20.0-pre.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.19.5","date":"2026-06-16T12:25:41Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.19.5"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.18.11","date":"2026-06-16T12:22:23Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.18.11"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.17.17","date":"2026-06-16T12:22:05Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.17.17"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.20.0-pre.3","date":"2026-06-02T00:41:32Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v1.20.0-pre.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.19.4","date":"2026-05-13T18:44:03Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.19.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.18.10","date":"2026-05-13T18:43:12Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.18.10"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.17.16","date":"2026-05-13T18:43:36Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.17.16"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.20.0-pre.2","date":"2026-05-04T23:42:00Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v1.20.0-pre.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/cilium/cilium/releases/tag/v1.19.3","date":"2026-04-15T21:06:02Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.19.3"}]` | `[{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v2.0.0","date":"2026-02-13T06:07:25Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.0.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v1.0.4","date":"2026-01-30T15:15:58Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.0.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v1.0.4-rc4","date":"2025-09-15T05:14:13Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.0.4-rc4"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v1.0.0-rc3","date":"2025-09-04T12:29:13Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.0.0-rc3"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v1.0.3-mcp-remote","date":"2025-08-22T01:30:15Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.0.3-mcp-remote"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v1.0.2-mcp-remote","date":"2025-08-06T13:25:37Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.0.2-mcp-remote"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v1.0.1-mcp-remote","date":"2025-07-17T11:07:07Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.0.1-mcp-remote"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v1.0.0-mcp-remote","date":"2025-06-28T14:42:08Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.0.0-mcp-remote"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v1.0.0-rc2","date":"2025-03-28T08:37:26Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.0.0-rc2"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v1.0.0-rc1","date":"2024-11-29T15:39:26Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.0.0-rc1"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v0.9.0","date":"2024-11-15T10:13:18Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.9.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v0.3.1","date":"2024-10-21T06:46:19Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.3.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v0.3.0","date":"2024-09-26T12:39:48Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.3.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v0.2.0","date":"2024-08-09T09:55:12Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.2.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v0.1.0","date":"2024-07-26T07:40:27Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.1.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v0.0.4","date":"2024-06-20T06:55:18Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.0.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v0.0.3","date":"2024-05-24T16:56:56Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.0.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v0.0.2","date":"2024-05-11T10:35:03Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.0.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/flomesh-io/ztm/releases/tag/v0.0.1","date":"2024-05-08T14:05:49Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.0.1"}]` |
| security.scorecard | 5.8 | - |
| security.vulnerabilities | `{"count":37,"source":"https://advisories.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/advisories?ecosystem=go&package_name=github.com%2Fcilium%2Fcilium&per_page=100","last_12m":6,"max_severity":"CRITICAL"}` | - |

## Capabilities (Service Mesh)

| Capability | Cilium | Flomesh Service Mesh |
|---|:--:|:--:|
| **Architecture** |  |  |
| Data plane | Sidecarless (eBPF) | - |
| Proxy | Envoy | - |
| **Security** |  |  |
| Automatic mutual TLS | - | ✓ |
| SPIFFE / SPIRE identity | - | - |
| **Traffic** |  |  |
| Traffic splitting / canary | - | - |
| Fault injection / resilience | - | - |
| **Scale** |  |  |
| Multi-cluster federation | ✓ | - |
| **Portability** |  |  |
| VM support (beyond Kubernetes) | - | - |
| **Observability** |  |  |
| Built-in observability | ✓ | - |
| **Standards** |  |  |
| Gateway API / GAMMA support | ✓ | - |
| **Extensibility** |  |  |
| WASM extensibility | - | - |
| **Compliance** |  |  |
| FIPS mode | - | - |
| **Ecosystem** |  |  |
| CNCF maturity | - | - |
| **Ops** |  |  |
| Commercial support / enterprise edition | - | - |

*Source: Vioscale. Generated 2026-09-01T17:29:12.544Z. "-" = undocumented, not absent.*