head to head · open source
vuls vs Tracecat
vuls has 12,324 GitHub stars, 1,247 forks, 92 open issues and last shipped 4 days ago. Tracecat has 3,889 stars, 439 forks, 137 open issues and last shipped yesterday. vuls leads on adoption by 217% (12,324 vs 3,889 stars). vuls is written in Go under GPL-3.0; Tracecat is written in Python under AGPL-3.0. vuls has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, Tracecat 11%. Tracecat was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (security), 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
| vuls | Tracecat | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 12K | ★ 3.9K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Go | Python |
| Last push | 2026-11-01 | 2026-11-04 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.2K | ⑂ 439 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick vuls if
- You weight community size — 12K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Tracecat if
- You want the Tracecat feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and Tracecat fits your workflow better
About vuls
Vuls: VULnerability Scanner Vulnerability scanner for Linux/FreeBSD, agent less, written in Go. Twitter: @vuls en Abstract For a system administrator, having to perform security vulnerability analysis and software update on a daily basis can be a burden. To avoid downtime in a production environment, it is common for a system administrator to choose not to use the automatic update option provided by the package manager and to perform update manually. This leads to the following problems. The system administrator will have to constantly watch out for any new vulnerabilities in NVD (National Vulnerability…
About Tracecat
The agentic security automation platform. Introduction Tracecat is the open source security automation platform for teams and AI agents. Prompt to automations : build end to end automations with agents, workflows, cases, and tables from your own agent harness (e.g. Claude code, Codex, OpenCode). Code native : sync custom Python scripts from your Git repo into Tracecat. All in one : agents, workflows, lookup tables, and case management. Everything security teams need to automate work in one place. Deployment options : sign up for Tracecat managed Cloud, or self host with Docker, AWS Fargate, or Kubernetes Helm…
read the full Tracecat overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is vuls or Tracecat more popular?
vuls has 12,324 GitHub stars and Tracecat has 3,889. vuls has the larger community by that measure.
Are vuls and Tracecat free?
Both are open source. vuls is licensed under GPL-3.0 and Tracecat under AGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between vuls and Tracecat?
vuls is written in Go and Tracecat 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, vuls or Tracecat?
Choose vuls if you want the larger community (12,324 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose Tracecat if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.