Nginx Proxy Manager vs HAProxy: Which Proxy?

Quick Verdict

Nginx Proxy Manager is the better choice for most self-hosters. Its web UI makes SSL certificate management and proxy host creation point-and-click simple. HAProxy is the more powerful load balancer, but it requires manual configuration and doesn’t have automatic Let’s Encrypt integration. Unless you need advanced load balancing features, NPM saves hours of setup time.

Overview

Nginx Proxy Manager (NPM) wraps Nginx in a web-based admin interface that handles reverse proxy configuration, SSL certificate provisioning via Let’s Encrypt, and access control — all without editing config files. It’s the most popular reverse proxy for homelabs.

HAProxy is a dedicated high-performance load balancer and reverse proxy. It’s used in production by GitHub, Reddit, and Stack Overflow. Configuration is entirely file-based (haproxy.cfg) with no graphical interface.

Feature Comparison

Feature	Nginx Proxy Manager	HAProxy
Web UI	Full admin panel	Stats page only
Automatic HTTPS	Let’s Encrypt built-in	Manual cert management
Configuration	GUI-based	Text file (haproxy.cfg)
Load balancing	Basic (round-robin)	Advanced (10+ algorithms)
Health checks	Basic	Advanced (HTTP, TCP, custom)
SSL termination	Yes (GUI-managed)	Yes (manual config)
WebSocket support	Yes	Yes
HTTP/2	Yes	Yes (frontend only in older versions)
TCP/UDP proxying	Limited	Full support
Access lists	Built-in (IP-based)	ACLs (powerful pattern matching)
Docker image	jc21/nginx-proxy-manager:2.13.7	haproxy:3.3.3
Default config	Working out of the box	None — must write from scratch
Rate limiting	Via custom Nginx config	Built-in, granular
Connection handling	Good	Exceptional

Installation Complexity

NPM is straightforward:

services:
  npm:
    image: jc21/nginx-proxy-manager:2.13.7
    ports:
      - "80:80"
      - "443:443"
      - "81:81"
    volumes:
      - npm-data:/data
      - npm-letsencrypt:/etc/letsencrypt
    restart: unless-stopped

Start it, open port 81, log in with default credentials, and start adding proxy hosts through the GUI.

HAProxy requires writing a config file before it will start:

services:
  haproxy:
    image: haproxy:3.3.3
    ports:
      - "80:80"
      - "443:443"
    volumes:
      - ./haproxy.cfg:/usr/local/etc/haproxy/haproxy.cfg:ro
    sysctls:
      - net.ipv4.ip_unprivileged_port_start=0
    restart: unless-stopped

You must write a valid haproxy.cfg with global settings, defaults, frontends, and backends. There’s no default config — it won’t start without one. SSL requires manual cert provisioning and path configuration.

NPM gets you from zero to a working reverse proxy in 5 minutes. HAProxy takes significantly longer for a first-time user.

Performance and Resource Usage

HAProxy consistently outperforms NPM in benchmarks for raw proxying throughput and concurrent connection handling. It was designed specifically for this and is used by some of the highest-traffic sites on the internet.

NPM (built on Nginx) is also fast — more than sufficient for any homelab. You’d need thousands of concurrent connections before the performance difference matters.

Metric	NPM	HAProxy
RAM usage	~80-120 MB	~30-50 MB
CPU overhead	Low	Very low
Max connections	Thousands (sufficient)	Tens of thousands

Community and Support

NPM has 25K+ GitHub stars and a massive self-hosting community. Every homelab tutorial defaults to NPM for reverse proxy setup. Documentation is community-maintained.

HAProxy has enterprise backing from HAProxy Technologies, with comprehensive official documentation. Its community is smaller in the self-hosting space but large in the enterprise world. HAProxy Technologies offers commercial support plans.

Use Cases

Choose Nginx Proxy Manager If…

• You want a GUI for managing proxy hosts
• You need automatic Let’s Encrypt certificates
• You’re new to reverse proxies
• You have fewer than 50 proxy hosts
• You want the easiest setup possible

Choose HAProxy If…

• You need advanced load balancing (weighted, least-connections, sticky sessions)
• You’re proxying TCP/UDP services (not just HTTP)
• You need granular health checks with custom scripts
• You want sub-millisecond proxy overhead
• You’re comfortable writing configuration files
• You need rate limiting with precise control

Final Verdict

NPM for homelabs, HAProxy for infrastructure engineering. Most self-hosters never need HAProxy’s advanced features and will waste time on manual SSL management and config file syntax. NPM’s GUI handles the common case — reverse proxying a few dozen self-hosted services with automatic HTTPS — far more efficiently.

Use HAProxy if you’re running services that need sophisticated load balancing, TCP proxying, or you’re building something closer to production infrastructure than a homelab.

FAQ

Can I use HAProxy behind NPM or vice versa?

Yes. A common pattern is NPM for SSL termination and simple routing, with HAProxy behind it for advanced load balancing of specific services. This combines NPM’s easy SSL management with HAProxy’s load balancing strength.

Does HAProxy support Let’s Encrypt?

Not natively. You need an external ACME client (Certbot, acme.sh) to obtain certificates and configure HAProxy to use them. This is the biggest practical disadvantage compared to NPM.

Can NPM handle multiple backends for the same service?

NPM supports basic load balancing with custom Nginx configurations, but it’s not as straightforward as HAProxy’s backend server pools. For simple round-robin between two or three instances, NPM can do it via custom config. For anything more complex, HAProxy is better.

Is HAProxy harder to troubleshoot?

HAProxy’s config validation (haproxy -c -f /path/to/config) catches errors before reload, and its stats page provides detailed connection metrics. NPM errors are harder to debug since the config is generated by the GUI. HAProxy’s explicitness is actually an advantage for troubleshooting.

Related

• How to Self-Host Nginx Proxy Manager
• How to Self-Host HAProxy
• Nginx Proxy Manager vs Traefik
• HAProxy vs Nginx
• Traefik vs HAProxy
• Best Self-Hosted Reverse Proxies
• Reverse Proxy Explained
• SSL Certificates