CGPulse vs Cloud Custodian

CGPulse scans Azure and AWS resources for misconfigurations and tracks cloud compliance against policy rules and frameworks. Its coverage lists 621 rules across 19 frameworks, including Azure, AWS and cross-cloud policies. Scanning uses read-only access and does not modify cloud resources. Users can review supported fixes before applying them; fixes marked dangerous require a warning and confirmation. The service can generate Terraform, Bicep and CLI remediation templates, while a YAML editor lets users create custom rules. It also provides a REST API and an MCP server for AI assistants including Claude and Copilot. CGPulse is available on the web and through an API, with Free, Team and Business plans. Free costs nothing and allows two cloud accounts and 10 scans monthly; Team costs €99 a month and Business costs €299 a month. Team and Business list a 7-day free trial. CGPulse describes itself as a posture assessment tool, not a certified compliance audit.

Cloud Custodian manages cloud resources through policies written in YAML. Each policy names a resource type, filters for selecting resources, and actions to apply to matches. It supports security policy enforcement, compliance, tag policies, cleanup of unused resources, and cost management for AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud Platform resources. Policies can respond to provider events through serverless features or run on a cron schedule. Users can validate policies and preview matching resources in dry-run mode before actions execute. Runs can produce policy metrics, structured resource records, and logs for cloud metrics, storage, and logging services. Documented event connections include AWS CloudWatch Events and Config Rules, Azure EventGrid, and GCP AuditLog and Pub/Sub. Installation is documented for Linux, macOS, and Windows, with Docker and Kubernetes operation also described. Kubernetes, Tencent Cloud, and OpenStack support are in beta; Terraform integration is in alpha. Cloud Custodian is free at free and open source under Apache 2.0. An AWS constraint is that event-triggered policies run only in the same region and account, while periodic policies may run elsewhere.