w3af vs Wapiti
w3af
w3af.orgWapiti
wapiti-scanner.github.ioSide by side
| Figure | w3af | Wapiti |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | Free |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | Yes | — |
| Windows | — | Yes |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| API | Yes | — |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 1 |
| Spec score · Dynamic Application Security Testing Software | 8.2 (#7) | 7.9 (#10) |
| Integrations | The documentation describes Metasploit integration and suggests sending vulnerabilities to an internal issue tracker through its REST API. | It uses the Wappalyzer database to fingerprint web technologies and report related CVE information, and its SSL/TLS module uses sslscan. |
| Purpose | w3af is an open-source web application security scanner for developers and penetration testers to identify and exploit vulnerabilities. | Wapiti audits websites and web applications with black-box scans that crawl deployed pages and test scripts and forms with payloads. |
| Support | For installation issues, the guide directs users to create a ticket and include their Linux distribution, dependency-install script, pip freeze output, and Python version. | The project directs users to its FAQ, wiki, and GitHub issues for help and bug reports. |
| Vulnerability coverage | The project repository says the scanner can identify more than 200 vulnerabilities, including cross-site scripting, SQL injection, and OS command injection. | Its modules cover issues including SQL injection, XSS, file disclosure, command execution, XXE, SSRF, open redirects, and file upload vulnerabilities. |
Plans
In their own words
w3af
w3af is a free, open-source web application security scanner for vulnerability assessments and penetration tests. It can identify more than 200 vulnerabilities, including cross-site scripting, SQL injection, and OS command injection. Its workflow starts with crawler plugins that find URLs and injection points, continues with audit plugins that check for vulnerabilities, and can use attack plugins to exploit findings. Other plugin types cover infrastructure detection, request and response analysis, output, brute force, request modification, and evasion.
Users can scan and analyze results in a GTK graphical interface or a console. Web application payloads can interact with Metasploit when an exploit provides exec() capability. Developers can use the REST API from development languages and run it in Docker; scripts and the API also support automation. The project documents Linux and macOS installation, including running in Docker without installing w3af dependencies. It is available for Linux, macOS, web, API, and self-hosted deployment. REST API traffic over HTTP is unencrypted, so the documentation recommends added protection such as an SSL proxy for publicly reachable deployments.
Wapiti
Wapiti is a free, open-source command-line scanner for auditing websites and web applications with black-box crawling and injected tests. Its modules check SQL and LDAP injection, cross-site scripting, file disclosure, command execution, XXE, SSRF, open redirects, file uploads, and TLS configuration. It can scan REST APIs from OpenAPI files and inspect security headers, cookie flags, CSP settings, and related controls. Authentication options include Basic, Digest, NTLM, login forms, browser-cookie import, and custom Python scripts. Wapiti supports HTTP, HTTPS, and SOCKS5 proxies, browser exploration through a man-in-the-middle proxy, and headless Firefox crawling. Reports can be exported as HTML, XML, JSON, TXT, CSV, or Markdown. Users can limit scope, exclude URLs, adjust crawler behavior, set time limits, and control concurrent tasks. Installation uses pip and requires Python 3.12, 3.13, or 3.14. It runs on Linux, macOS, and Windows through WSL, with self-hosted deployment.