head to head · open source
prowler vs openscap
prowler has 14,830 GitHub stars, 2,389 forks, 371 open issues and last shipped yesterday. openscap has 1,816 stars, 451 forks, 59 open issues and last shipped 7 days ago. prowler leads on adoption by 717% (14,830 vs 1,816 stars). prowler is written in Python under Apache-2.0; openscap is written in XSLT under LGPL-2.1. prowler has attracted 16% as many forks as stars, openscap 25%. prowler was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (compliance), 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
| prowler | openscap | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 15K | ★ 1.8K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | LGPL-2.1 |
| Written in | Python | XSLT |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-11 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.4K | ⑂ 451 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick prowler if
- You weight community size — 15K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick openscap if
- You want the openscap feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the LGPL-2.1 license terms
- Your stack matches XSLT
- You evaluated both and openscap fits your workflow better
About prowler
Prowler is an Apache 2.0, Python based open source cloud security platform that automates security and compliance assessments across AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud through thousands of ready to use checks, aimed at cloud security, compliance, and DevSecOps teams that need continuous posture management without a commercial licence.
read the full prowler overview →
About openscap
OpenSCAP is a NIST Certified SCAP 1.2 toolkit for security compliance work in the SCAP ecosystem. It centers on the oscap command line tool, which lets users load, scan, validate, edit, and export SCAP documents. The project covers compliance, CPE, data streams, OVAL, scanning, and XCCDF, so it can serve as a core tool for checking systems against machine readable security benchmarks.
read the full openscap overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is prowler or openscap more popular?
prowler has 14,830 GitHub stars and openscap has 1,816. prowler has the larger community by that measure.
Are prowler and openscap free?
Both are open source. prowler is licensed under Apache-2.0 and openscap under LGPL-2.1. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between prowler and openscap?
prowler is written in Python and openscap in XSLT. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, prowler or openscap?
Choose prowler if you want the larger community (14,830 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose openscap if its feature set, stack or LGPL-2.1 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.