head to head · open source
thc-hydra vs scilla
thc-hydra has 12,409 GitHub stars, 2,685 forks, 50 open issues and last shipped 3 months ago. scilla has 1,274 stars, 143 forks, 6 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. thc-hydra leads on adoption by 874% (12,409 vs 1,274 stars). thc-hydra is written in C under AGPL-3.0; scilla is written in Go under GPL-3.0. thc-hydra has attracted 22% as many forks as stars, scilla 11%. scilla 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 | scilla | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 12K | ★ 1.3K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | C | Go |
| Last push | 2026-07-30 | 2026-10-22 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.7K | ⑂ 143 |
| 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 scilla if
- You want the scilla feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and scilla fits your workflow better
About thc-hydra
H Y D R A (c) 2001 2023 by van Hauser / THC Many modules were written by David (dot) Maciejak @ gmail (dot) com BFG code by Jan Dlabal Licensed under AGPLv3 (see LICENSE file) Please do not use in military or secret service organizations, or for illegal purposes. (This is the wish of the author and non binding. Many people working in these organizations do not care for laws and ethics anyway. You are not one of the "good" ones if you ignore this.) NOTE: No, this is not meant to be a markdown doc! old school! Hydra in the most current GitHub state can be directly downloaded via Docker: INTRODUCTION Number one of…
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About scilla
🏴☠️ Information Gathering tool 🏴☠️ DNS / Subdomains / Ports / Directories enumeration Coded with 💙 by edoardottt Share on Twitter! Install • Get Started • Examples • Changelog • Contributing • License Installation 📡 Homebrew Snap Golang Building from source You need Go ( =1.23) Building from source for Linux and Windows Linux Edit the /.config/scilla/keys.yaml file if you want to use API keys. One liner: git clone && cd scilla && go get ./... && make linux Windows Note that the executable works only in cariddi folder (Alias?). Create a keys.yaml file if you want to use API keys. Using Docker Examples 💡…
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Frequently asked questions
Is thc-hydra or scilla more popular?
thc-hydra has 12,409 GitHub stars and scilla has 1,274. thc-hydra has the larger community by that measure.
Are thc-hydra and scilla free?
Both are open source. thc-hydra is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and scilla under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between thc-hydra and scilla?
thc-hydra is written in C and scilla in Go. 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 scilla?
Choose thc-hydra if you want the larger community (12,409 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose scilla if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.