head to head · open source
thc-hydra vs fsociety
thc-hydra has 12,369 GitHub stars, 2,682 forks, 50 open issues and last shipped 3 months ago. fsociety has 1,850 stars, 214 forks, 24 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. thc-hydra leads on adoption by 569% (12,369 vs 1,850 stars). thc-hydra is written in C under AGPL-3.0; fsociety is written in Python under MIT. thc-hydra has attracted 22% as many forks as stars, fsociety 12%. fsociety was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (penetration-testing), 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
| thc-hydra | fsociety | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 12K | ★ 1.9K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Written in | C | Python |
| Last push | 2026-07-30 | 2026-10-12 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.7K | ⑂ 214 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick thc-hydra if
- You weight community size — 12K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick fsociety if
- You want the fsociety feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and fsociety fits your workflow better
About thc-hydra
Hydra is an AGPL 3.0 licensed, C based login cracker that attacks dozens of network protocols in parallel, built for security researchers and penetration testing consultants who need to demonstrate how easily a remote system can be reached with weak credentials.
read the full thc-hydra overview →
About fsociety
fsociety is a modular penetration testing framework written in Python, distributed under the MIT licence, and intended for security practitioners who want one command line entry point for discovering and running the tools they need.
read the full fsociety overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is thc-hydra or fsociety more popular?
thc-hydra has 12,369 GitHub stars and fsociety has 1,850. thc-hydra has the larger community by that measure.
Are thc-hydra and fsociety free?
Both are open source. thc-hydra is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and fsociety under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between thc-hydra and fsociety?
thc-hydra is written in C and fsociety in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, thc-hydra or fsociety?
Choose thc-hydra if you want the larger community (12,369 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose fsociety if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.