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Networking · head to head

Cloudflare vs Eclipse Mosquitto

Cloudflare logo

Cloudflare

Networking

The web performance and security company

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Eclipse Mosquitto logo

Eclipse Mosquitto

Networking

Small, EPL-licensed MQTT broker that runs on hardware other brokers cannot

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Cloudflare free tier limited to basic features (no advanced analytics or premium features); Eclipse Mosquitto there is no clustering: Mosquitto is a single process, so high availability means building your own failover and accepting session loss on switchover.
  • They diverge on capability: Cloudflare covers Global CDN, Eclipse Mosquitto covers MQTT 5.0 support.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Cloudflare and Eclipse Mosquitto actually diverge.

Attributes where Cloudflare and Eclipse Mosquitto differ
AttributeCloudflareEclipse Mosquitto
Pricing modelfreemiumOpen source, no licence fee
PlatformsWebLinux, Windows, macOS, Docker
Founded2009Unknown

Identical on both: starting price (Free), free tier (Yes), user rating (Not yet rated), category (Networking).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Cloudflare

  • Global CDN
  • DDoS Protection
  • WAF
  • DNS
  • SSL/TLS
  • Load Balancing
  • Bot Management
  • Workers (Serverless)

Only in Eclipse Mosquitto

  • MQTT 5.0 support
  • Very small footprint
  • Bridging
  • WebSockets listener
  • Command line clients
  • Dynamic security plugin

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Cloudflare

  • Global content delivery network (CDN) with 330+ data centres worldwidenot Eclipse Mosquitto
  • DDoS protection and bot blockingnot Eclipse Mosquitto
  • Web application security and rate limitingnot Eclipse Mosquitto
  • DNS management and domain protectionnot Eclipse Mosquitto
  • Static and dynamic content cachingnot Eclipse Mosquitto
  • Serverless computing via Cloudflare Workersnot Eclipse Mosquitto
  • Database and storage services (D1, R2)not Eclipse Mosquitto
  • Performance optimisation for Core Web Vitalsnot Eclipse Mosquitto

Eclipse Mosquitto

  • A home or building automation stack where the broker must run on the same small computer as everything elsenot Cloudflare
  • An industrial gateway that buffers local telemetry and bridges selected topics to a cloud brokernot Cloudflare
  • Local development and testing of MQTT clients without provisioning a cloud IoT servicenot Cloudflare
  • An air-gapped deployment where a broker with no licence server and no phone-home behaviour is a requirementnot Cloudflare

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Cloudflare

  • Free tier limited to basic features (no advanced analytics or premium features)
  • Pro tier ($20-25/month) caps at professional websites (higher tiers needed for enterprise scale)
  • Caches only anonymous API GET responses (authenticated requests and non-GET methods not cached)
  • Geographic coverage limited to announced 330+ cities (may not cover all regions globally)

Eclipse Mosquitto

  • There is no clustering: Mosquitto is a single process, so high availability means building your own failover and accepting session loss on switchover.
  • Persistence is a local file rather than a replicated store, so a disk failure or an unclean shutdown can lose retained messages and queued QoS traffic.
  • Practical capacity is a few thousand concurrent clients on typical hardware, so a growing device fleet eventually forces a migration to a clustered broker.
  • The Eclipse Public Licence is weak copyleft rather than permissive, which some legal teams treat as a blocker when embedding the broker in a shipped commercial product.
  • There is no commercial support to buy from the project, so production incidents rely on community mailing lists or on paying a third party who happens to know the codebase.

Pricing, plan by plan

Cloudflare

Free

No published plan breakdown. See the Cloudflare review.

Eclipse Mosquitto

Free
  • Eclipse MosquittoFree
    • Eclipse Public License 2.0 with Eclipse Distribution Licence
    • MQTT 5.0, 3.1.1 and 3.1
    • No client or message limits beyond your hardware

Which should you pick?

Choose Cloudflare if

  • You need global cdn.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You also want ddos protection.
Cloudflare review

Choose Eclipse Mosquitto if

  • You need mqtt 5.0 support.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, Windows, macOS, Docker.
  • You also want very small footprint.
Eclipse Mosquitto review

Questions people ask

Is Cloudflare or Eclipse Mosquitto better?
Neither clearly leads. Cloudflare starts at Free and Eclipse Mosquitto at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Cloudflare or Eclipse Mosquitto?
Cloudflare starts at Free and Eclipse Mosquitto at Free.
Does Cloudflare or Eclipse Mosquitto run on more platforms?
Cloudflare runs on Web. Eclipse Mosquitto runs on Linux, Windows, macOS, Docker.
Can I use Cloudflare for free?
Both have a free tier, so you can try either at no cost before committing.
What is Cloudflare best used for?
Cloudflare is most often used for global content delivery network (cdn) with 330+ data centres worldwide, ddos protection and bot blocking, web application security and rate limiting, dns management and domain protection. Of those, global content delivery network (cdn) with 330+ data centres worldwide and ddos protection and bot blocking are not what Eclipse Mosquitto is typically brought in for.
What can Cloudflare do that Eclipse Mosquitto cannot?
Cloudflare covers Global CDN, DDoS Protection, WAF, DNS. Eclipse Mosquitto covers MQTT 5.0 support, Very small footprint, Bridging, WebSockets listener.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Cloudflare: Does Cloudflare have a free tier?

Yes, Cloudflare includes a free tier with generous allowances: 100k daily requests for Workers, 10 GB monthly storage for R2, and 1 GB for Workers KV.

Source
Eclipse Mosquitto: Can Mosquitto be clustered?

No. It is a single process. High availability requires an external failover arrangement you build yourself.

Cloudflare: How much does Cloudflare cost beyond the free tier?

Cloudflare uses pay-as-you-go pricing beyond free allocations, charging per million requests, per GB-month of storage, or per vCPU-second depending on the service.

Source
Eclipse Mosquitto: What licence is it?

Eclipse Public License 2.0 alongside the Eclipse Distribution License, a weak copyleft rather than a permissive licence.

Cloudflare: Does Cloudflare charge egress fees?

No, Cloudflare explicitly states no egress fees and no hidden costs; you only pay for the usage metrics specific to each service.

Source
Eclipse Mosquitto: How many clients can it handle?

A few thousand concurrent connections on ordinary hardware; beyond that, use a clustered broker.

Cloudflare: What's the Enterprise pricing model for Cloudflare?

Cloudflare Enterprise offers custom pricing and volume discounts available through direct sales for organizations with specialized needs and large-scale usage.

Source
Eclipse Mosquitto: Does it support MQTT 5?

Yes, along with 3.1.1 and 3.1.

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