Self-hosted / open sourceCloud IaaSHeadquarters: US

OpenStack: sovereignty score and 8 European alternatives

OpenStack is open source cloud infrastructure software: a set of components that provide common services for running a cloud. It manages pools of compute, storage and networking resources through APIs or a dashboard, and supports virtual machines, bare metal and containers. Organisations install it in their own data centres to build a private cloud, work with a partner from the OpenStack Marketplace, or use one of the OpenStack-powered public clouds. Telecom operators and retailers also use it for edge systems.

OpenStack is licensed under Apache 2.0 and is a project of the OpenInfra Foundation, which became part of the Linux Foundation in 2025. Because it is software rather than a hosted service from one vendor, jurisdiction depends on who operates it. If you run it yourself or through a European provider, data stays under your own legal regime; with a third-party public cloud, check that provider's location and ownership. It is a building block for sovereign infrastructure, but needs operating expertise in-house or at a partner.

See the 8 European alternatives ↓Assess your stack with OpenStack pre-selected

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Sovereignty score

71 / 1000 = high exposure
100 = sovereign

Jurisdiction SOV-210
Headquartered in the US: CLOUD Act and FISA 702
Data residency SOV-3100
EU-only hosting
Cryptographic key sovereignty SOV-390
Self-hostable: encryption keys under your own control
Freedom from lock-in SOV-680
Open source: low switching costs
Source & runtime sovereignty SOV-4 · SOV-675
Source code auditable, forkable and self-hostable

SOV codes: the matching objective in the European Commission's Cloud Sovereignty Framework. Official source

How the score is calculated

Facts and evidence

Last checked September 21, 2026

Headquarters	US (US)Verified by hand
EU adequacy decision	Only for companies individually certified under the EU-US Data Privacy FrameworkVerified by hand
Sovereignty model	Open-source, distributedVerified by hand
Data hosting	EUVerified by hand
Open-source	YesVerified by hand
GDPR-compliant	YesVendor-stated
Hosting signal	AMAZON-AES - Amazon.com, Inc., US (US)Technically measured
Category	Cloud IaaS
Type	Product
Website	openstack.org ↗

The hosting signal shows the network that serves the vendor's website, often a CDN, and not necessarily where the service or your data is hosted. How we verify · Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Top EU-based & GDPR-compliant alternatives to OpenStack

The European alternatives to OpenStack come from our knowledge base of over 6,800 vendors. We only list vendors headquartered in the EU or the EEA; fully European-owned vendors rank before vendors with a foreign owner. For each alternative you see the country, the open-source status and a short description.

Score per alternative: 0 = high exposure, 100 = sovereign

84 European Cloud IaaS vendors are in the catalogue. View the whole category · Submit an alternative · View category on the map

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Why digital sovereignty matters with OpenStack

OpenStack is headquartered in the United States. US vendors fall under the CLOUD Act and FISA 702: US authorities can compel access to data, even when that data sits in a European data centre. That is the core of the jurisdictional exposure in our model.

Data is hosted exclusively in the EU, so OpenStack scores best on data residency.

OpenStack is open source. You can audit the source code, self-host the software and keep the encryption keys under your own control. Switching is easier because data and software are not tied to a single party.

What this means for your organisation depends on your whole stack and context. The free assessment weighs OpenStack together with your other vendors and gives a total score, a heatmap and the main risk drivers.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best European alternative to OpenStack?

It depends on your use case. Strong EU alternatives to OpenStack include Aiven, Anexia and Aruba Cloud. On this page you can compare 8 EU alternatives by jurisdiction, data residency and open-source status.

Are there open-source alternatives to OpenStack?

Our list of EU alternatives to OpenStack is mostly commercial options. Browse the category on the map for open-source choices.

Is OpenStack GDPR-compliant and where is the data hosted?

OpenStack is headquartered in US and hosts data in EU. The vendor states it is GDPR-compliant, but the data falls under non-EU jurisdiction. For full EU data residency the EU alternatives on this page usually offer more certainty.

Details and sources

Verified by handHeadquarters, owner, hosting locations and licence have been checked by us against public sources. Free of charge and for every vendor, not a paid label. Nothing in this knowledge base is taken over automatically. Last checked on September 21, 2026.

Sources

Public sources used in the latest check of this record.

Compliance evidence

The links below point to the vendor's own public documents. We only record what we found: a missing link means "not found publicly", not "not compliant".

No public compliance evidence has been recorded for this vendor yet. Do you know its DPA or subprocessor list? Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Digital sovereignty in Cloud IaaS

Cloud IaaS: Infrastructure as a Service — virtual machines, storage, networking. In this category the choice of vendor determines who has legal access to your data, where that data lives and how easily you can switch later.

Also in this category

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