head to head · open source
portainer vs kics
portainer has 38,524 GitHub stars, 2,906 forks, 757 open issues and last shipped yesterday. kics has 2,701 stars, 381 forks, 312 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. portainer leads on adoption by 1,326% (38,524 vs 2,701 stars). portainer is written in TypeScript under Zlib; kics is written in Open Policy Agent under Apache-2.0. portainer has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, kics 14%. portainer was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (hacktoberfest), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| portainer | kics | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 39K | ★ 2.7K |
| License | Zlib | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Open Policy Agent |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.9K | ⑂ 381 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick portainer if
- You weight community size — 39K stars and counting
- You want the Zlib license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick kics if
- You want the kics feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Open Policy Agent
- You evaluated both and kics fits your workflow better
About portainer
Portainer Community Edition is a free, lightweight container management UI for Docker, Swarm, Podman, Kubernetes, and ACI environments, distributed under the zlib licence and aimed at homelab operators, hobbyists, students, and anyone experimenting with containers on their own hardware.
read the full portainer overview →
About kics
KICS is an open source security scanner for infrastructure as code projects. The project name stands for Keeping Infrastructure as Code Secure, and the repository describes it as a tool for finding security vulnerabilities, compliance issues, and infrastructure misconfigurations early in the development cycle. It is published by Checkmarx under the Apache 2.0 license and is associated with the cloud native, DevSecOps, and application security ecosystems. The repository also lists topics such as infrastructure as code, security, and vulnerability detection.
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Frequently asked questions
Is portainer or kics more popular?
portainer has 38,524 GitHub stars and kics has 2,701. portainer has the larger community by that measure.
Are portainer and kics free?
Both are open source. portainer is licensed under Zlib and kics under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between portainer and kics?
portainer is written in TypeScript and kics in Open Policy Agent. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, portainer or kics?
Choose portainer if you want the larger community (38,524 stars) or its Zlib licence terms. Choose kics if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.