# Zeroserve

17 Hacker News commenters recommended Zeroserve and 8 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 1 of 13 months.

**Verdict:** Free open-source web server that you can script with eBPF; people like the concept and benchmark results, but it lacks ACME and nginx's module ecosystem.

## Why people recommend it

- Interesting concept worth watching (4 comments): "I like the writeup and concept behind this." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48428886)) "It's an interesting new concept I like it." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48428883)) "I feel like this was made for me" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48427725))
- Strong benchmark results against nginx (2 comments): "Very interesting idea and thanks for the no bs benchmarks!" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48431086)) "Zeroserve already beats Nginx in performance." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48431704))

## What people warn about

- No ACME or plugin support (4 comments): ""Caddy compatible" minus everything that matters, like ACME and plugins." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48529161)) "Agree on lack of ACME but the codebase is far cleaner than nginx" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48531609)) "it doesn't have the features and module ecosystem of nginx" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48528053))
- Scripting over config doubted (2 comments): "I think the bet is misplaced - people prefer configuration over code and long have." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48427131)) "Now you're adding a config file separate from the scripts." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48538650))
- AI-generated code concerns (3 comments): "The usual 3400 lines lock file and AGENTS.md raise some questions about the aforementioned security" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48529258)) "All you did was ask the slop generator to make it." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48428891)) "Another vibe coded, dead in 6 month Rust project." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48530110))
- Security risk and large attack surface (3 comments): "The usual 3400 lines lock file and AGENTS.md raise some questions about the aforementioned security" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48529258)) "There's not enough improvement to justify the risk." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48426856)) "The attack surface here is enormous." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48531675))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [Apache HTTP Server](https://hackerapproved.com/p/apache-http-server.md): 52 recommend
- [lighttpd](https://hackerapproved.com/p/lighttpd.md): 10 recommend

## Cite as

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