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Version: vNext (upcoming release)

What is Pomerium?

Pomerium is an open source identity-aware proxy built around the principles of BeyondCorp and zero trust. It secures your internal applications, servers, services, and workloads by continually verifying a user's identity, device state, and request context before granting access.

Unlike VPN or tunnel-based approaches, Pomerium provides a scalable, modern alternative that centralizes access policy without requiring client software.

Key benefits:

  • Seamless, clientless access: No corporate VPN to install or maintain.
  • Granular enforcement: Every request is authenticated and authorized.
  • Extensible: Works across multiple environments (cloud, on-prem, hybrid).
  • Open source: Built on the BeyondCorp model. Transparent, with an active community.

How does it work?​

Pomerium intercepts and routes user traffic to protected services through an identity-aware access layer, ensuring every request is validated against your configured identity provider, policies, and device context.

In practice:

  1. Authenticate: Users sign in through your identity provider.
  2. Authorize: Pomerium checks policies to decide who gets access.
  3. Proxy: Traffic to internal apps flows through a secure, policy-enforced route.

This approach simplifies managing access to internal services—no more network-level trust. Instead, trust is tied to identity, context, and a dynamic access policy.

Why Pomerium?​

  • Streamlined: No need to juggle separate VPN clients or network ACLs.
  • Future-proof: Native zero trust posture that's ready for remote work, BYOD, or multi-cloud.
  • Fast: Deploy where your apps run; no heavy routing or hardware dependencies.
  • Secure by default: Continuous authentication and authorization ensures only valid requests get through.

Community​

  • Get updates: Join pomerium-announce or follow us on Twitter.
  • Get help: Visit Discuss for Q&A and best practices.
  • Report bugs: Search GitHub issues or open a new one if you don't see yours listed.
  • Suggest features: Check for existing feature requests, then open a new issue if needed.

Next steps​

Ready to try it out? Check out the Quick Start to spin up Pomerium and secure your first application.