ACL2 vs cvc5
ACL2
acl2.org
cvc5
cvc5.github.ioSide by side
| Figure | ACL2 | cvc5 |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | — | Free |
| Free plan | — | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | — | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | Yes |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| API | — | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 0 | 1 |
| Spec score · Formal Verification Tools | 7.8 (#14) | 8.7 (#1) |
| Integrations | The Community Books include interfacing tools for file I/O, operating-system access, raw Common Lisp libraries, and connections to other programs. | The project lists applications using cvc5, including Kind 2 and QMaxUSE as backend solvers, and TRLC through PyVCG for proving absence of runtime errors. |
| Purpose | ACL2 combines a Lisp-based programming language for formal models with a reasoning engine that can prove properties about those models. | cvc5 is an efficient open-source automatic theorem prover for satisfiability modulo theories problems. |
| Support | ACL2 users can get help through the acl2-help mailing list, which the site recommends to new users. | The project directs bug reports to its GitHub issue tracker and questions, feature requests, and contributions to GitHub Discussions. |
Plans
In their own words
cvc5
cvc5 is a free, open-source solver for satisfiability modulo theories problems. It determines whether first-order formulas are satisfiable or valid across combinations of background theories, including arrays, bit-vectors, floating-point numbers, arithmetic, and strings. It also has a Syntax-Guided Synthesis engine for synthesizing functions against those theories.
The solver can run as a standalone command-line tool or be used as a library, with C++, C, Java, and Python APIs. Its binary accepts SMT-LIB v2 and SyGuS-IF input, and it can produce proofs and unsatisfiable cores to explain unsatisfiability results. The project links to an online interface for running SMT-LIB scripts and provides source releases and binaries for Linux, macOS, and Windows. cvc5 is led jointly by Stanford University and the University of Iowa. Research and commercial use are described as essentially unrestricted. The default license is modified BSD; using optional GPLv3 dependencies makes the combined work subject to GPLv3.