No. 11 of 23 ·Software-Defined Networking Software

Open Virtual Network

Linux · Self-hosted

Freedom report

One barScore 5.2

Free tierA free tier is on its own pricing page
Open codeNo open-source code on record
Runs widely1 of 6 device platforms
DocumentedThinly documented

Open Virtual Network is ranked #11 of 23 in software-defined networking software on Freedom251. It runs on Linux, Self-hosted. There is a free plan.

Open Virtual Network plans and pricing

All plans

OVN Free Open source Apache 2 license ovn.org · 5 Oct 2026

Compared on software-defined networking software

Free plan: Yes
Deployment model: on-premises
Control-plane model: centralized
Policy segmentation: Yes
Northbound API: Yes
Supported protocols: Geneve, VXLAN, OpenFlow, OVSDB, IPsec

Best Open Virtual Network alternatives

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Two bars OpenDaylight Free tier No. 1Free6.5 Two bars TP-Link Omada Cloud-Based Controller Free tier No. 2Free6.5 One bar VMware Workstation Pro Free tier No. 3Free6.5 One bar Antrea Free tier No. 4Free6.4 One bar Cilium Free tier No. 5Free6.4 One bar Kube-OVN Free tier No. 6Free6.4

The record

Purpose: OVN is a system that supports logical network abstraction in virtual machine and container environments.
Architecture: OVN translates virtual network configurations into OpenFlow and provides a higher-level abstraction based on logical routers and switches.
Features: Listed features include distributed virtual routers, distributed logical switches, access control lists, DHCP, and a DNS server.
Overlays: OVN logical networks use tunnels or other encapsulations to isolate them from physical and virtual networks, allowing address spaces to overlap.
Mobility: Virtual machines in a logical network can migrate between physical machines without network disruption.
Gateways: OVN provides gateways to connect tunnel-based logical networks to physical networks.
Integrations: The architecture page names OpenStack Neutron’s ml2/ovn plugin and the ovn-kubernetes project as cloud management system examples.
Runtime: OVN is written in platform-independent C, runs entirely in userspace, and requires no kernel modules to be installed.
Supported systems: The generic build and installation guide covers Linux, FreeBSD, and NetBSD hosts.
Security: OVN’s security process directs vulnerability reports to the ovs-security mailing list for coordinated handling.
Transport security: OpenSSL libssl is optional but recommended for securely connecting OVN services to OVN database servers.
Support: The installation guide directs users to GitHub issues or [email protected] to report problems.
Release support: Standard term releases receive full bug-fix support for one year after initial release; LTS releases receive bug-fix support for two years and another year of critical and security fixes after a new LTS is released.
Audience: OVN is intended to be used by cloud management software.
Price from: Free

Where it ranks on Freedom251

Best Software-Defined Networking Software in 2026#11 of 23

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Sources

ovn.org/en/architecture/· checked 5 Oct 2026
ovn.org/en/· checked 5 Oct 2026
docs.ovn.org/en/latest/intro/install/general.html· checked 5 Oct 2026
docs.ovn.org/en/latest/internals/security.html· checked 5 Oct 2026
ovn.org/en/releases/· checked 5 Oct 2026