Teleport is an access platform for companies: SSH, Kubernetes, databases and internal apps behind short-lived certificates, with session recording and audit. Paperboat is lighter: one install per machine and a sign-in, with terminals that survive disconnects, previews and tunnels.
Checked against Teleport's own documentation and pricing, November 2026. Sources are listed under the table.
Teleport runs a cluster (auth service and proxy) that every connection goes through; it is built for many servers, many people and compliance.
Paperboat is one install per machine and a sign-in. There is no network, gateway or proxy to plan, and nothing to keep running besides the machines themselves.
Teleport records sessions and plays them back afterwards; people can join a live session, and moderated sessions are an Enterprise feature. A session ends when its connection does.
Paperboat terminals run on the machine and keep running when your laptop sleeps or the network drops. When you come back, from the same computer, another one or a browser, you see what happened while you were away, and you can let someone watch or type along.
$ tsh ssh dev@devbox
$ tsh join <session-id>$ pb devbox
$ pb session share <session-id> --team <team> --allTeleport's application access puts internal apps behind its proxy for signed-in users; it doesn't publish a port to the internet.
pb preview gives a port a public HTTPS link in one command, and pb tunnel keeps a permanent address with your own domain, on every plan.
$ pb preview 3000Teleport's session recording, access requests and audit export are mature and made for regulated companies.
Paperboat has roles, single sign-on, directory sync and an audit log you can export or stream. On Team, Paperboat terminals can be recorded by rule or by hand, encrypted and archived to your own S3-compatible bucket, with every replay audited; plain SSH and remote commands are not recorded. It has no access-request workflow, so if you need approvals, or recording of every protocol, Teleport is the better fit.
Every answer in the Teleport column carries a number that links to the page of theirs that says it. Put a second tool beside it
A shell on your machine that you can leave and come back to.
Run one command on another machine and get its output and exit code.
Use ssh and the tools built on it, without managing keys or opening ports.
Send a file to a machine without setting anything up.
The secrets your programs need, delivered to the machine that runs them.
The same settings on every machine, from a repository you control.
A public link to a port on your machine, for as long as you need it.
A public address for a service that stays the same.
Your machines reach each other's ports without exposing them.
Who could read your traffic on the way.
Working with other people, and deciding who may do what.
Which parts you can run on your own servers.
Where it runs.
How you pay, and what is free.
What each product does, from its own documentation, as of November 2026. “No” means its documentation describes no such feature. Found something out of date? The other product's page wins; tell us and we fix ours.
goteleport.com/pricing/, November 2026
On Team, yes: Paperboat terminals (in the console and from pb connect) can be recorded by policy rule or by hand, encrypted, and archived to your team's own S3-compatible bucket. Every replay is an audit event. Plain SSH and remote commands are not recorded.
You can run your own relays and tunnel servers; the control plane is hosted by Paperboat.
Install Paperboat here, then on a second machine. Free for personal use, no card needed.
$ curl -fsSL https://get.pprbt.dev/install | bash > irm https://get.pprbt.dev/install.ps1 | iex