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APIs · head to head

Formance vs HAProxy

Formance logo

Formance

APIs

Open source double-entry ledger and payment orchestration for money-moving software

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
HAProxy logo

HAProxy

Cloud

High-performance TCP and HTTP load balancer

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Formance formance holds no money and provides no regulatory cover, so it must be paired with a payments provider or bank, and buyers occasionally mistake a ledger for a treasury system and discover the gap late.; HAProxy configuration syntax is dense and unforgiving, with a steep initial learning curve
  • They diverge on capability: Formance covers Double-entry ledger, HAProxy covers High throughput.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Formance and HAProxy actually diverge.

Attributes where Formance and HAProxy differ
AttributeFormanceHAProxy
PlatformsLinux, Docker, Kubernetes, Web, APILinux, Docker, Kubernetes, Self-hosted
CategoryAPIsCloud

Identical on both: starting price (Free), pricing model (Open source, no licence fee), free tier (Yes), user rating (Not yet rated).

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 Formance

  • Double-entry ledger
  • Numscript transaction DSL
  • Multi-currency
  • Payments connectivity
  • Reconciliation
  • Self-hosted deployment
  • Cloud offering
  • API and SDKs

Only in HAProxy

  • High throughput
  • Layer 4 and 7
  • Health checking
  • Rate limiting and ACLs

What people use each for

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

Formance

  • A marketplace splitting a single customer payment between seller, platform fee and tax that needs the split to be atomic and auditablenot HAProxy
  • A fintech whose homegrown balances table produced numbers finance could not reconcile and now needs proper double-entry before an auditnot HAProxy
  • A payments team that wants one normalised model across several PSPs so reconciliation is not written separately for eachnot HAProxy
  • A company that wants its ledger under a licence it can keep running even if the vendor disappearsnot HAProxy

HAProxy

  • Load balancing at traffic levels where proxy efficiency shows up in the hardware billnot Formance
  • Precise traffic control — rate limits, sticky sessions, complex routing rulesnot Formance
  • TCP load balancing for databases and non-HTTP servicesnot Formance

Where each one falls short

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

Formance

  • Formance holds no money and provides no regulatory cover, so it must be paired with a payments provider or bank, and buyers occasionally mistake a ledger for a treasury system and discover the gap late.
  • Numscript is a domain-specific language your team must learn, and while it makes complex splits expressible it also means transaction logic sits outside the languages your engineers already debug well.
  • Self-hosting a ledger that must never lose or duplicate a transaction is a serious operational commitment covering backups, upgrades and Postgres tuning, which is real cost the zero licence fee hides.
  • Enterprise pricing is not published, so the difference between the free path and the supported path cannot be evaluated without a sales conversation.
  • The company is much smaller than the incumbent alternatives, and while the MIT licence protects the code it does not protect the roadmap, so features on the hosted side may arrive slowly or change direction.

HAProxy

  • Configuration syntax is dense and unforgiving, with a steep initial learning curve
  • No automatic certificate management, unlike newer servers that treat it as default behaviour
  • The built-in stats page is basic, so real observability needs exporters and dashboards
  • A dedicated load balancer is more machinery than small deployments need

Pricing, plan by plan

Formance

Free
  • Open SourceFree
    • MIT licensed core ledger
    • Numscript transaction DSL
    • Multi-currency tracking
  • Enterprise$undefined/year
    • Managed or private deployment
    • Payments connectivity and reconciliation
    • Support with response commitments

HAProxy

Free
  • HAProxyFree
    • Full functionality
    • No usage limits
    • Community support

Which should you pick?

Choose Formance if

  • You need double-entry ledger.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Web, API.
  • You also want numscript transaction dsl.
Formance review

Choose HAProxy if

  • You need high throughput.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Self-hosted.
  • You also want layer 4 and 7.
HAProxy review

Questions people ask

Is Formance or HAProxy better?
Neither clearly leads. Formance starts at Free and HAProxy at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Formance or HAProxy?
Formance starts at Free and HAProxy at Free.
Does Formance or HAProxy run on more platforms?
Formance runs on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Web, API. HAProxy runs on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Self-hosted.
Can I use Formance for free?
Both have a free tier, so you can try either at no cost before committing.
What is Formance best used for?
Formance is most often used for a marketplace splitting a single customer payment between seller, platform fee and tax that needs the split to be atomic and auditable, a fintech whose homegrown balances table produced numbers finance could not reconcile and now needs proper double-entry before an audit, a payments team that wants one normalised model across several psps so reconciliation is not written separately for each, a company that wants its ledger under a licence it can keep running even if the vendor disappears. Of those, a marketplace splitting a single customer payment between seller, platform fee and tax that needs the split to be atomic and auditable and a fintech whose homegrown balances table produced numbers finance could not reconcile and now needs proper double-entry before an audit are not what HAProxy is typically brought in for.
What can Formance do that HAProxy cannot?
Formance covers Double-entry ledger, Numscript transaction DSL, Multi-currency, Payments connectivity. HAProxy covers High throughput, Layer 4 and 7, Health checking, Rate limiting and ACLs.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Formance: Is Formance really open source?

Yes. The core ledger is MIT licensed with full source access and no deployment restrictions.

HAProxy: Is HAProxy free?

Yes, the community version is open source. HAProxy Technologies sells HAProxy Enterprise separately.

Formance: Does Formance move money?

No. It records and orchestrates movements; the actual payments happen at a PSP or bank you connect.

HAProxy: HAProxy or Nginx?

HAProxy is a specialist load balancer with deeper balancing and health-check features. Nginx also serves static content and is more approachable, which is why it is more common as a general web server.

Formance: What does the enterprise version cost?

Not published. It is an annual subscription quoted per customer.

HAProxy: Does HAProxy handle TLS certificates automatically?

No. Certificate issuance and renewal are external, unlike Caddy where it is automatic.

Formance: Do I have to use Numscript?

Yes for anything beyond the simplest transfers. It is how multi-party transactions are expressed atomically.

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