Top Serverless Open Source Projects to Watch in 2025
By Serverless Savants | June 27, 2025
The serverless landscape is evolving at breakneck speed, with open-source innovations leading the charge. As we approach 2025, these projects are redefining cloud-native development—from AI-powered frameworks to security-first architectures. Here’s what deserves your attention.
1. Next-Gen Frameworks & Runtimes
OpenFaaS 4.0
The new WebAssembly (WASM) runtime reduces cold starts by 90%, while its hybrid deployment model bridges cloud and edge. Perfect for real-time AI inference workloads.
Knative Serving 3.0
Now with automatic GPU provisioning for ML pipelines. Its GitOps-driven scaling integrates seamlessly with Tekton CI/CD workflows.
Apache OpenWhisk on Kubernetes
Enhanced distributed tracing and support for WebAssembly modules make it ideal for microservices orchestration.
2. Security & Compliance Guardians
Falco for Serverless
Real-time runtime security that detects anomalous function behavior. Its new policy engine automates PCI-DSS compliance checks.
SLS-Enforcer
Open-source tool that scans serverless configurations for least-privilege violations across AWS/Azure/GCP. Integrates into CI/CD pipelines.
“2025’s breakthroughs center on intelligent resource orchestration—projects like OpenFaaS 4.0 use predictive scaling to pre-warm functions based on ML patterns. This eliminates the ‘cold start tax’ for critical workloads.”
3. Observability & Debugging
Thundra 3.0
Now offers distributed tracing across hybrid deployments (cloud + edge). Its AI-assisted root-cause analysis cuts debug time by 70%.
Lumigo Open Source
Visualizes complex event-driven workflows and detects cost-inefficient patterns in real-time. Integrates with OpenTelemetry.
4. AI/ML Integration Pioneers
Serverless ML
Framework for deploying PyTorch/TensorFlow models on spot-instance GPUs. Features auto-scaling down to zero when idle.
BentoML 2.0
Unified platform for packaging and serving LLMs as serverless APIs. Supports GPU sharing across concurrent functions.
5. Developer Experience Revolution
Serverless Dev Tools
Local testing suite that emulates cloud events (S3, DynamoDB streams) offline. Now with VSCode plugin support.
WasmEdge Serverless Framework
Runs JavaScript/Rust/Python functions at edge locations with sub-millisecond startup. 50% cheaper than traditional FaaS.
Why These Projects Matter
These tools solve 2025’s critical challenges: cost predictability (BentoML’s GPU sharing), zero-trust security (SLS-Enforcer), and hybrid deployment flexibility (OpenFaaS 4.0). Expect them to shape enterprise serverless strategies through 2026.
