Altcha
Ranked 6 of 6 captcha services by recommenders
People recommend it as an easy, self-hostable proof-of-work captcha without visual puzzles. Critics say bots can wait out the challenge and that it needs a paid plan to work.
People recommend it as an easy, self-hostable proof-of-work captcha without visual puzzles. Critics say bots can wait out the challenge and that it needs a paid plan to work.
8 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 5
- criticize it
- 3
- approval share
- 63%
Recommended in 4 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 5 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- 1.6 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 4 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Easy to implement and self-hostable
“I have heard good things about them. And it looks easy to implement and can be selfhosted which is great!!”
Comment from 12 Apr 2026 in “Ask HN: What's your experience with PoW captchas against form spam?” No visual puzzles, accessible
“they are not visual captchas (proof-of-work based) and very accesssible”
Comment from 9 May 2026 in “Google Broke reCAPTCHA for De-Googled Android Users” Seen as ending the CAPTCHA argument
“Systems like Altcha put an end to this argument.”
Comment from 24 Jun 2026 in “CAPTCHAs have failed for 20 years”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Bots can wait out proof-of-work
“That doesn't really work out in reality because bots are happy to wait 5 seconds or even 5 minutes for a PoW challenge to complete.”
Comment from 24 Jun 2026 in “CAPTCHAs have failed for 20 years” Stops nothing without paid subscription
“does not stop anything unless you sign up for the monthly subscription pay per request plan from Altcha”
Comment from 12 Apr 2026 in “Ask HN: What's your experience with PoW captchas against form spam?” Has limits newer PoW captchas avoid
“a more modern PoW captcha without the limits of Altcha”
Comment from 23 Apr 2026 in “Ask HN: What's your experience with PoW captchas against form spam?”
Other captcha services people recommend
The four most recommended other captcha services, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cloudflare Turnstile | 33 | 86 | 28% | 10 | — | — |
| Google reCAPTCHA | 15 | 158 | 9% | 7 | — | — |
| hCaptcha | 6 | 10 | 38% | 4 | — | — |
| Cloudflare CAPTCHA | 6 | 22 | 21% | 4 | — | — |
| AltchaThis page | 5 | 3 | 63% | 4 | — | — |
What people said
6 of the 8 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“That doesn't really work out in reality because bots are happy to wait 5 seconds or even 5 minutes for a PoW challenge to complete.”
“Systems like Altcha put an end to this argument.”
“they are not visual captchas (proof-of-work based) and very accesssible”
“a more modern PoW captcha without the limits of Altcha”
“does not stop anything unless you sign up for the monthly subscription pay per request plan from Altcha”
“I have heard good things about them. And it looks easy to implement and can be selfhosted which is great!!”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.