# Ory Hydra

22 Hacker News commenters recommended Ory Hydra and 2 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 7 of 13 months. It meets the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** Open-source OAuth 2.0 and OpenID Connect server that people self-host, praised for running with very low CPU and memory use.

## Why people recommend it

- Very low CPU and RAM use (2 comments): "The CPU use is ridiculously small for that scale!" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48670269)) "they run Hydra on 0.6 vCPU and 200MB of RAM" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48671745))
- Well-liked by users (2 comments): "appreciate all your work Hydra" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48678991)) "thank u for Hydra, its great!" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48672759))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [Better Auth](https://hackerapproved.com/p/better-auth.md): 46 recommend
- [Clerk](https://hackerapproved.com/p/clerk.md): 19 recommend
- [Auth0](https://hackerapproved.com/p/auth0.md): 16 recommend
- [Sign in with Apple](https://hackerapproved.com/p/sign-in-with-apple.md): 7 recommend
- [WorkOS](https://hackerapproved.com/p/workos.md): 7 recommend

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Ory Hydra", https://hackerapproved.com/p/hydra/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).