There was a time when DD-WRT and OpenWrt were true alternatives and you could pick the one that best met your needs. Nowadays, the only option seems to be OpenWrt. Read in this article why and under what circumstances, DD-WRT may still be a reasonable option.
Do you need an alternative router firmware?
An alternative router firmware such as OpenWrt or DD-WRT offers many advanced features not found in the original firmware of routers. In many cases, manufacturers limit the potential of their routers in the original firmware to make the user interface easier and less error prone or to make more advanced features only available in high end routers. The alternative router firmware replaces the original router firmware on compatible routers and unlocks additional features a router can technically support.
For most users the option to unlock features and be more flexible in configuring and using the router is the main reason to move to an alternative router firmware.
Which is the best? DD-WRT or OpenWrt?
When it comes to customizing your router, nowadays DD-WRT and OpenWrt are the most popular alternative router firmware available.
Both have been around for years and are available for free. DD-WRT started off strong as alternative router firmware, offering a router-like interface and vast features. OpenWrt followed with a more flexible component based approach. In the past, many users saw DD-WRT as the easier to configure and to use firmware whereas OpenWrt was more appealing to tech-savvy users providing more advanced options. Therefore, you are still finding this reasoning in articles across the web.
We see it differently and these criteria hardly matter today. The most important criteria we see, is availability of router hardware for either firmware. Based on our research (undertaken in mid 2025), DD-WRT is supporting older router hardware only which is very hard to find on the market. Used routers offered on platforms such as ebay or often ridiculously overpriced.
For OpenWrt, on the contrary, you will be able to find new and up-to-date router hardware.
And this defines the most important decision criteria for selecting between DD-WRT or OpenWrt.
In case you would like a modern router and go beyond what the stock firmware is offering, OpenWrt is the go-to choice.
In case you would like to pimp up an old router you are already having, DD-WRT may be an option. Even more: In case you are having a fairly old router where even the original stock firmware is outdated and does not get security updates anymore, a move to DD-WRT can be a good idea as it does support lots of old routers.
Both, OpenWrt and DD-WRT, incorporate fixes for known vulnerabilities very quickly, improving your security and making you less vulnerable to attack. With that you can extend a router's lifespan with running an up-to-date firmware.
In either case, a hard prerequisite is that the router is compatible with the respective alternative firmware. So, check this first.
All other aspects for your firmware decision are secondary, we are covering them below and you can make your choice which firmware suits you best.
Should you run an alternative router firmware such as DD-WRT or OpenWrt?
Uses Cases
If you should run an alternative router firmware or not depends on the use case you are having. If your original "stock" firmware does support everything you need, then obviously there is no need to move to an alternative router firmware.
Typical uses cases that may be supported by an alternative router firmware:
- Multiple SSID support (provide several wireless networks with separate SSID)
- VPN Client Support
- VPN Server Support
- VLAN (A VLAN is, in basic terms, a group of physical interfaces on a switch that behave as if they are a separate standalone switch)
- Client Isolation Mode (a mode that can be used for Hotspots to limits clients to communicate only with the Access Point and not with other wireless clients)
- Bandwidth Management / QoS / Quality of Service (manage bandwidth relationship between individual applications or protocols)
- Dynamic DNS support
- Ad-Blocking
- Access Restrictions (restrict access on the basis of time, protocol, or destination)
- Mesh Network support
- WDS Repeater Mode
- Hotspot Portal Support
- Samba support (provide files and printers over the network)
- DMZ (Demilitarized Zone) support
- Cron support (a type of scheduler for Unix/Linux that runs given commands at designated times)
There is a risk to "destroy" your router
To run a router either with DD-WRT or OpenWrt you need to "flash" the router with a new firmware. This means the original manufacturers firmware will be overwritten by the alternative router firmware. By doing this, you will highly likely loose any warranty and there is some risk to "destroy", the community names it to "brick", the router in case something goes wrong.
The term "brick" means that the router does not support its initial use case anymore and is just an object such as a "brick".
You should be aware of this risk and be very careful when "flashing" the router. The AIRIX.NET team has flashed many routers already and never permanently "bricked" one. Many routers provides more or less easy to handle recovery methods in case something goes wrong ... but not all of them do.
Hardware compatibility checks are essential before starting any "flashing". Ensure your router model supports the firmware you want to install. Make sure to search the related DD-WRT or OpenWrt forum and websites to get information for your specific router. If available, follow it step by step and avoid shortcuts.
A topic by topic Comparison
Conceptual Difference
Both, DD-WRT and OpenWrt are Linux based and tailored to work as an alternative router firmware.
DD-WRT comes with a typical router-like user interface and most of its functionality is provided "out-of-the-box" within the firmware flashed onto the router. DD-WRT is pretty much complete, which means you don't have to install many single bits and pieces and you get a web interface to configure DD-WRT.
OpenWRT is a bit different. It feels more like a Linux operating system running on a router where you need to install additional packages for the functionality you need.
And exactly this conceptual difference may have led to the opinion of some that OpenWrt is perceived as being more complex and rather for tech-savvy people. I would argue that nowadays OpenWrt comes with a modern web user interface too and with it's well structured web resources, and up-to-date curated information, OpenWrt is not behind if compared to DD-WRT.
For non-tech-savvy individuals neither DD-WRT nor OpenWrt is a recommended option.
Supported Hardware
Obviously, not all routers available on the market can be flashed with an alternative router firmware such as DD-WRT or OpenWrt. It was already mentioned that if you are looking for support of current hardware, OpenWrt is the better option.
DD-WRT supported Routers
DD-WRT supports many different router models and it is not easy to get an overview what is available and what is working.
Various websites, and even the official web site https://dd-wrt.com , provide outdated or contradicting information.
With roughly more than 400 different firmware builds per release, the list of supported routers is quite comprehensive.
To find if your router is supported, do not use the router database provided by DD-WRT! The "router database" is not maintained and outdated.
The Supported Devices List (https://forum.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Supported_Devices) does not show up-to-date information either.
The current best practice is to go through the download folder of the latest beta build and see what routers are listed: DD-WRT » Other Downloads
Find more details how to do this here: DD-WRT: Which Router Hardware is Supported?
OpenWrt supported Routers
For OpenWrt you will find the web resources well structured and with more up-to-date and curated information. This is a clear plus for users and why we think it is much easier to navigate around compared to what is offered for DD-WRT.
OpenWrt: Which Router Hardware is Supported?
Features and Capabilities
It is impossible for me to provide a full feature comparison here. But from a pure feature perspective for routers, DD-WRT and OpenWrt provide basically a similar feature set.
When features and capabilities view goes beyond core router features, OpenWrt comes with an integrated Linux package concept to open up access to more than 27,000 additional packages. OpenWrt, if the hardware performance permits, does allow to run additional software solutions directly on the router.
Ease of Installation
The fundamental part of any alternative router firmware installation is to "flash" the router which means moving the alternative router firmware onto the hardware while overwriting the stock firmware.
We already mentioned the risk of loosing your warranty and bricking the router in the section above.
The most important first step is to identify and download the suitable firmware for your router:
DD-WRT: Which Router Hardware is Supported?
OpenWrt: Which Router Hardware is Supported?
How the flashing itself works is normally very similar in DD-WRT and OpenWrt.
In an ideal case you just go into your the current stock firmware to the area where you flash the router with updates, but instead of selecting the updated stock firmware file you select the appropriate firmware file of the alternative firmware. Be very careful with this step, as flashing the router with an unsuitable firmware may brick your router.
But if that's really that simple, you need to check for your router individually. For OpenWrt it is comparatively easy to find instructions how to flash the router: On the page where you download the firmware, you find details about flashing the specific router and experience other users made in case it is not very straightforward.
The problem with DD-WRT is that its website is not very well structured and has lots of outdated information. You may want to search different resources and draw your own conclusions.
Once you have flashed your router successfully, the next steps you need to do in DD-WRT and OpenWrt are very different.
For DD-WRT you find all the typical setup options in the new router firmware you just flashed.
For OpenWrt this is a bit different: The OpenWrt firmware does only include the very basics and you need to install the packages you actually need additionally. But here, the installation of packages is very straightforward.
Usability
The DD-WRT user interface structure is web frontend based and very similar to user interfaces from stock firmware, but it is more comprehensive and provides the more advanced features you unlocked in your router.
OpenWrt does also provide an web frontend based user interface called LuCI (Lua Control Interface, where Lua refers to the scripting language Lua*). Modularity is a key aspect of OpenWrt's interface. Users can add or remove features based on their needs by installing or removing the related packages. This flexibility allows for customization, but it does not mimic a typical router frontend. Just for completeness: OpenWrt LuCI is an option; as an alternative you can also control OpenWrt from the command line. This makes configuration changes very fast for expert users.
Being up-to-date
The DD-WRT firmware is frequently updated and new builds are made available typically multiple times in a month. But there is never a fully tested, stable, or reliable release. Each build provided is a "beta"-release and the community never updates "stable" release. In case you find a "stable" release somewhere on the internet, even if it is on the DD-WRT website, you can assume that it is exceedingly outdated and you should not use.
Therefore, in DD-WRT go with the latest beta release you can find. It also makes sense to check for other user's experience with the latest or previous builds, shared on the DD-WRT forums.
OpenWrt has a different approach as it publishes a so-called "stable" release roughly once per year. Stable release version numbers are made from the year and the month when a new stable branch was created. An additional third number indicates a service or interim release from that branch.
In addition, OpenWrt does also publish so-called Development or Snapshot releases daily. These are really test releases and they can be very unstable (see here: [OpenWrt Wiki] Development builds / snapshots*).
Recommendation is to use the latest release of the most current stable release and avoid any snapshot for other then experimental and testing purposes only.
Information on the Web & Community Support
Both, DD-WRT and OpenWrt have active and helpful communities. They can find answers to questions or troubleshoot issues easily.
The DD-WRT official webpage does look very cluttered and contains outdated and misleading information. You need to be very careful but part of information you trust. The most reliable and up-to-date information for DD-WRT is hidden in the forums, but it is not always easy to find what you need.
OpenWrt has a much better and curated official webpage. It is much easier to find the information you need and normally it is not outdated.
Conclusion
In my opinion, OpenWrt does tick all the boxes in its favour. For most uses cases, my recommendation is to go with OpenWrt instead of DD-WRT. Exceptions of this fundamental rule are cases where you already have an (old) router supported by DD-WRT and you are good to run straightforward functionality directly configurable in its user interface or if you want to continue to use an old router not supported by OpenWrt but by DD-WRT.
Choosing between DD-WRT and OpenWRT can feel overwhelming. Both have unique features that cater to different needs. You’ve seen the key differences, installation methods, and user interfaces. Now, it’s about finding what fits your situation best.
