OpenBao vs AWS Secrets Manager
Both are alternatives to HashiCorp Vault. Here's how they stack up — verified facts, no spin.
Also searched as AWS Secrets Manager vs OpenBao — same comparison, one verdict.
OpenBao is open source (MPL-2.0) and AWS Secrets Manager is not (Proprietary (hosted service)) — so the real question is whether you want to own the secrets management stack or rent it.
OpenBao
TOP PICKVault before the licence changed — forked, MPL-2.0, run by a foundation.
OpenBao is the Linux Foundation's fork of Vault, taken from the last release before the Business Source License and continued under MPL-2.0. It is not a reimplementation or a lookalike: it is the same codebase, so the API, the CLI, the policy language and the storage format are Vault's, and migration is closer to a rename than a port. Governance is the whole point — it sits under a foundation with multiple corporate contributors rather than a single vendor who can change the terms again. Around 6.9k stars and actively developed. If your reason for looking is the licence rather than the product, this is the answer and there is not much more to decide.
AWS Secrets Manager
The obvious answer if everything already runs in AWS.
If your workloads are on AWS, Secrets Manager is already available, already inside your IAM boundary, and already covered by your compliance paperwork. It does rotation with Lambda, integrates natively with RDS, ECS and EKS, and requires no new infrastructure of any kind. It is priced per secret per month plus API calls, which is cheap for dozens of secrets and less cheap for thousands. The obvious limitation is the obvious one: it is AWS-only, so a multi-cloud estate ends up running something else alongside it, which defeats the point of a central secrets store.
Side by side
6 points of comparison, every one read from a verified field. Green marks the side that wins a row outright. A dash means we do not hold that fact — never that it is zero.
| OpenBao | AWS Secrets Manager | |
|---|---|---|
| Sovereignty ScoreOur transparent 0–100 composite for data ownership and exit cost. | 94 | 35 |
| Open source | Yes | No |
| Self-hostable | Yes | No |
| Local-first data | Yes | No |
| License | MPL-2.0 | Proprietary (hosted service) |
| Pricing | Free and open source. You run it on your own infrastructure. | Roughly $0.40 per secret per month plus a small per-10,000-API-call charge. Rates checked 2026-07-31. |
OpenBao is Macrostack's recommended HashiCorp Vault alternative, so it's our pick here.
OpenBao
Strengths
- +The same codebase — migration from Vault is close to drop-in
- +MPL-2.0 under Linux Foundation governance, not a single vendor's discretion
- +Keeps Vault's dynamic secrets, PKI and transit engines
- +Existing Vault knowledge, tooling and Terraform providers transfer directly
Trade-offs
- −Inherits Vault's operational difficulty in full — this is not the easy option
- −Smaller community than Vault, and the ecosystem is still catching up
- −No enterprise namespaces or vendor support contract
- −Divergence from upstream Vault will grow over time
AWS Secrets Manager
Strengths
- +Already inside your existing IAM, VPC and compliance envelope
- +Native rotation with RDS, Redshift and DocumentDB
- +Zero infrastructure to run or patch
- +Cheap at small secret counts
Trade-offs
- −AWS-only — useless as a central store in a multi-cloud estate
- −Per-secret pricing adds up quickly at scale
- −Far less capable than Vault for dynamic credentials and PKI
- −Deepens AWS lock-in rather than reducing it
Which one fits you
The trade-offs above, turned into a decision. Find the line that describes your team.
Choose OpenBao
if you want the source and the option to fork it, and you would rather run it on your own hardware, and your data should stay on machines you control.
Choose AWS Secrets Manager
if already inside your existing IAM, VPC and compliance envelope.
Neither, yet
if both carry a real cost you should weigh first — inherits Vault's operational difficulty in full — this is not the easy option, and aWS-only — useless as a central store in a multi-cloud estate. If either of those is a dealbreaker for your team, the shortlist is wrong rather than the choice.
OpenBao vs AWS Secrets Manager — common questions
Is OpenBao a better fit than AWS Secrets Manager for secrets management?
It depends on what you are optimising for, and the honest split is this: OpenBao scores 94 to AWS Secrets Manager's 35 on data ownership and exit cost, so it is the safer choice if you care about being able to leave. AWS Secrets Manager earns its place on a different axis — already inside your existing IAM, VPC and compliance envelope. Neither is a wrong answer for every team; the table above is the actual comparison.
What happens if we want to switch later?
OpenBao keeps its data local or in open formats, so leaving is an export rather than a negotiation. AWS Secrets Manager keeps your data on its own infrastructure, which is the part to plan for: confirm the export path before you commit, not when you are already trying to leave.
Is OpenBao free?
OpenBao: Free and open source. You run it on your own infrastructure.. The other side of this comparison, AWS Secrets Manager, is priced as Roughly $0.40 per secret per month plus a small per-10,000-API-call charge. Rates checked 2026-07-31.. "Free" here means no licence fee — if you self-host it you still pay for the server, and the running cost row above is our honest estimate of that.
Can I self-host OpenBao?
OpenBao can be self-hosted; AWS Secrets Manager cannot, so it stays on the vendor's infrastructure whatever you do.
Are OpenBao and AWS Secrets Manager both alternatives to HashiCorp Vault?
Yes — both appear in our HashiCorp Vault comparison, which is why they are worth putting side by side. People usually arrive here already having decided to move off HashiCorp Vault and now choosing between the two replacements, which is a narrower and much easier question.
Related alternative guides
Facts verified 2026-07-31. Licenses and pricing change — spotted something out of date? That's a correction we want.