Choosing a security scanning tool is difficult because the category spans API discovery, Kubernetes posture, cloud compliance, code, and vulnerability testing rather than one common workflow. This September 2026 snapshot uses the supplied ToolVitals scores, health signals, shipping signals, descriptions, openness labels, and license labels to make the comparison more concrete.

It ranks open/source-visible tools only by ToolVitals score descending, then by health and shipping for equal composite scores. GitHub stars are context only, not a ranking input, so popularity does not override the ToolVitals ordering.

Rankings

Rank Tool Openness License Health Shipping GitHub Stars Score Status
1 Akto OSI-approved OSS MIT 98 98 1513 98 🟢 Excellent
2 Kubescape OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 98 98 11723 98 🟢 Excellent
3 Prowler OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 98 97 14770 97 🟢 Excellent
4 Snyk OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 98 97 5657 97 🟢 Excellent
5 DefectDojo OSI-approved OSS BSD-3-Clause 97 97 4930 97 🟢 Excellent
6 MegaLinter OSI-approved OSS AGPL-3.0 97 97 2580 97 🟢 Excellent
7 OWASP Noir OSI-approved OSS MIT 97 97 1423 97 🟢 Excellent
8 Dalfox OSI-approved OSS MIT 97 96 5287 97 🟢 Excellent
9 OSV.dev OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 97 96 2917 97 🟢 Excellent
10 Strix OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 97 96 61393 97 🟢 Excellent
11 Prosopo CAPTCHA OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 96 96 298 96 🟢 Excellent
12 Nuclei OSI-approved OSS MIT 96 95 31077 96 🟢 Excellent
13 Trivy OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 96 94 37842 95 🟢 Excellent
14 lopper OSI-approved OSS MIT 93 94 2 93 🟢 Excellent
15 Faraday OSI-approved OSS GPL-3.0 92 94 6713 93 🟢 Excellent
16 OpenA2A OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 91 92 20 92 🟢 Excellent
17 sqlmap OSI-approved OSS GPL-2.0 90 94 38385 91 🟢 Excellent
18 Copacetic OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 91 87 1703 89 🟢 Excellent
19 FoxGuard OSI-approved OSS MIT 90 88 294 89 🟢 Excellent
20 OpenAnt OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 90 85 747 88 🟢 Excellent
21 powerpipe OSI-approved OSS AGPL-3.0 88 85 522 87 🟢 Excellent
22 Web-Check OSI-approved OSS MIT 87 86 34714 87 🟢 Excellent
23 Nettacker OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 89 82 5558 86 🟢 Excellent
24 Presidio OSI-approved OSS MIT 89 81 10786 86 🟢 Excellent
25 Pentest AI OSI-approved OSS MIT 84 88 1656 86 🟢 Excellent
26 vulnerability-spoiler-alert OSI-approved OSS MIT 81 85 159 83 🟢 Excellent
27 Steampipe OSI-approved OSS AGPL-3.0 79 70 7950 75 🟢 Good
28 PayloadsAllTheThings OSI-approved OSS MIT 73 58 80711 67 🟢 Good
29 Pentagi OSI-approved OSS MIT 68 44 22625 58 🟡 Fair
30 Xingrin OSI-approved OSS MIT 61 40 657 53 🟡 Fair
31 ExtensionShield OSI-approved OSS MIT 58 39 102 50 🟡 Fair
32 Lynis OSI-approved OSS GPL-3.0 55 34 16303 47 🟡 Fair
33 Gitleaks OSI-approved OSS MIT 54 25 29191 43 🟡 Fair
34 Dokuru OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 45 28 8 39 🔴 Needs Attention
35 AgentFence OSI-approved OSS MIT 38 13 61 28 🔴 Needs Attention
36 Redlyne OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 37 15 39 28 🔴 Needs Attention
37 CloudRec OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 29 15 192 24 🔴 Needs Attention
38 Lodestar Forge OSI-approved OSS GPL-3.0 24 0 109 14 🔴 Needs Attention
39 Deepfence ThreatMapper OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 18 2 5321 12 🔴 Needs Attention
40 Agentic Radar OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 5 0 1048 3 🔴 Needs Attention
41 CodeAnalysis OSI-approved OSS GPL-2.0 4 0 1845 2 🔴 Needs Attention
42 NodeJSSCAN OSI-approved OSS GPL-3.0 3 0 2574 2 🔴 Needs Attention
43 Metlo OSI-approved OSS MIT 2 0 1784 1 🔴 Needs Attention
44 OpenClarity OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 0 0 1460 0 🔴 Needs Attention
45 VMC OSI-approved OSS Apache-2.0 0 0 93 0 🔴 Needs Attention

Top 3 Highlights

Akto is the highest-ranked tool in this snapshot, with a ToolVitals score of 98, health score of 98, and shipping score of 98. Its supplied description focuses on API security across discovery, posture, and CI/CD testing. It carries the openness label OSI-approved OSS and the license label MIT; its 1,513 GitHub stars are context only.

Kubescape ranks second with a ToolVitals score of 98, health score of 98, and shipping score of 98. Its supplied description covers Kubernetes security in IDEs, CI/CD pipelines, and clusters, including risk analysis, security, compliance, and misconfiguration scanning. It carries the openness label OSI-approved OSS and the license label Apache-2.0; its 11,723 GitHub stars are context only.

Prowler ranks third with a ToolVitals score of 97, a health score of 98, and a shipping score of 97. Its supplied description presents it as a cloud security platform that automates security and compliance across any cloud environment. It carries the openness label OSI-approved OSS and the license label Apache-2.0; its 14,770 GitHub stars are context only.

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