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StackPatch vs Grype — honest comparison

Grype is Anchore's OSS scanner — built around the SBOM workflow (consume what Syft produces). StackPatch is a hosted CVE patch-ops layer for live Linux servers. Different inputs, different audiences. Here's the honest side-by-side.

github.com/anchore/grype anchore.com

Side-by-side feature matrix

Green = clear advantage. Red = clear disadvantage. Grey = neutral. Email us if you spot an inaccuracy in the Grype column.

Dimension
Grype
StackPatch
Price
Free, OSS (Apache-2.0)
$99 lifetime founder seat / monthly tiers
Source code
Public — github.com/anchore/grype
Closed source (bash + Python agent is plain text, read before pipe)
Setup time
5 min for a single scan; need to feed it images / SBOMs / dirs
5 sec: curl scan.sh | bash; install.sh adds the cron + agent for you
Primary input
Container images, SBOMs (Syft), filesystem dirs
A live Linux host (reads its own /etc/os-release + dpkg/apk/rpm)
OS coverage
Alpine, Amazon Linux, CentOS, Debian, RHEL, Ubuntu, Wolfi, etc.
Ubuntu + Debian + Alpine + AlmaLinux + Rocky Linux
Cron + alerting
You build it (or use Anchore Enterprise)
Hourly inventory + 30-min CVE poll + email/webhook alerts on new findings
Audit URL
You get JSON/SARIF; building a customer-facing report is your job
Public audit URL per server, share with prospects during diligence
Container mode
Excellent — Anchore Syft + Grype is the canonical OSS pipeline
Inventory of Docker image names only; does NOT scan image contents
SBOM generation
Yes (via Syft); Grype consumes SBOMs natively
No SBOM mode; generates inventory directly from package manager
CVE database
Auto-downloads grype-db; you maintain the cache + cron the refresh
We run the pollers (USN, Debian, Alpine, OSV); your scan hits fresh data
Best for
CI pipelines that scan SBOMs + container images at build time
Solo founder / 2-person SaaS that wants the answer in 5 min on a server

Pick Grype if

Your CI builds SBOMs and you want to fail bad ones.

  • You generate SBOMs (Syft, CycloneDX, SPDX) and want to scan them at build time.
  • You build container images and want a kubectl-friendly fail-CI gate.
  • You want full data control — Grype runs entirely on your infra.
  • You have engineering time to wire scan output into your alerting.

Pick StackPatch if

Your Linux VPS is the production runtime, not just a build artifact.

  • You run 1–10 Linux servers and care about the live OS posture, not the SBOM at build time.
  • You don't generate SBOMs; you have a running box and want it patched.
  • You want the exact apt / apk / dnf one-liner per finding, not a CVE link.
  • You want a public audit URL to share with customers during security diligence.
Run the free quickscan

Try the free quickscan first.

5 seconds, no signup. Works on any Ubuntu/Debian/Alpine/AlmaLinux/Rocky box.

Run the free quickscan See StackPatch ($99 lifetime)

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