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Cybersecurity · head to head

Sardine vs Syft

Sardine logo

Sardine

Cybersecurity

Device intelligence and behaviour biometrics for fraud and compliance

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Syft logo

Syft

Cybersecurity

Generates a software bill of materials from images, filesystems and archives

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Syft has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Sardine signal quality depends on the SDK being embedded in your own web and mobile clients, so fraud improvements become dependent on your app release cycle and any coverage gap is a blind spot.; Syft lockfile parsing can drop packages silently. An open issue filed in August 2026 reports the yarn v1 cataloguer returning 118 of 745 packages with no error raised, which means a complete bill of materials and an 84 percent incomplete one look identical to the caller.
  • They diverge on capability: Sardine covers Device intelligence, Syft covers Multi-format output.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Sardine and Syft actually diverge.

Attributes where Sardine and Syft differ
AttributeSardineSyft
Starting priceOn requestFree
Pricing modelquoteOpen source, no licence fee
Free tierNoYes
PlatformsWeb, iOS, AndroidmacOS, Linux, Windows, Docker

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated), category (Cybersecurity).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Sardine

  • Device intelligence
  • Behaviour biometrics
  • Scam detection
  • Onboarding risk scoring
  • AML transaction monitoring
  • Dispute and chargeback handling
  • Rules editor

Only in Syft

  • Multi-format output
  • Broad ecosystem coverage
  • Binary classifiers
  • In-toto attestations
  • Library and CLI
  • Pairs with Grype

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Sardine

  • A neobank losing money to authorised push payment scams where the customer genuinely approved the transfernot Syft
  • A crypto exchange trying to detect accounts being operated by remote access rather than by their ownernot Syft
  • A fintech seeing synthetic identity signups that pass document verification but share device characteristicsnot Syft
  • A lender wanting first party fraud signals at application time that a credit bureau file does not containnot Syft

Syft

  • Producing a bill of materials for a customer or regulator that requires onenot Sardine
  • Feeding an inventory into a vulnerability scanner rather than scanning images directlynot Sardine
  • Recording what shipped in a build so a future disclosure can be answered quicklynot Sardine
  • Public sector work where an SBOM is a contractual deliverablenot Sardine

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Sardine

  • Signal quality depends on the SDK being embedded in your own web and mobile clients, so fraud improvements become dependent on your app release cycle and any coverage gap is a blind spot.
  • Behavioural and device telemetry collection needs a documented lawful basis under GDPR, and EU privacy reviews frequently delay rollouts that were scoped as engineering work.
  • Pricing is per session or per active user, so a consumer product with many low value sessions pays in proportion to traffic rather than to fraud exposure.
  • As a younger private company it lacks the enforcement-tested audit history that a bank examiner expects, which makes it a harder sell inside a regulated bank than inside a fintech.
  • It is strongest on session-time signals and weaker as a system of record for long horizon AML typologies, so larger institutions end up running it alongside a traditional monitoring platform rather than instead of one.

Syft

  • Lockfile parsing can drop packages silently. An open issue filed in August 2026 reports the yarn v1 cataloguer returning 118 of 745 packages with no error raised, which means a complete bill of materials and an 84 percent incomplete one look identical to the caller.
  • Fidelity varies sharply by ecosystem. Conan for C and C++, Haskell and Terraform get cataloguer support with no licence data, no dependency relationships and no file ownership, so a C and C++ shop gets the least from it.
  • Binary classification yields no licence or dependency metadata, and vendored or statically linked code is exactly where supply chain risk hides, so the blind spot and the risk overlap.
  • Incorrect CPE values and CPE collisions are recorded as open issues, and since Grype matches on CPE and PURL, an inventory error becomes a false negative in the security report downstream.
  • An inventory is not a risk assessment. Even a perfect bill of materials says a vulnerable version is present, never that the vulnerable function is called, and the triage burden lands entirely on the reader.

Pricing, plan by plan

Sardine

On request
  • Sardine$undefined/year
    • Priced per user session or per monthly active user
    • Annual contract with volume commitment
    • SDK for web, iOS and Android

Syft

Free
  • SyftFree
    • Apache-2.0
    • No usage limits
    • Community support
  • Anchore Enterprise$undefined/year
    • Policy enforcement and reporting
    • Federal and commercial tiers
    • Pricing not published, quoted on request

Which should you pick?

Choose Sardine if

  • You need device intelligence.
  • You work on Web, iOS, Android.
  • You also want behaviour biometrics.
Sardine review

Choose Syft if

  • You need multi-format output.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on macOS, Linux, Windows, Docker.
  • You also want broad ecosystem coverage.
Syft review

Questions people ask

Is Sardine or Syft better?
Neither clearly leads. Sardine starts at On request and Syft at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Sardine or Syft?
Syft has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at On request for Sardine and Free for Syft.
Does Sardine or Syft run on more platforms?
Sardine runs on Web, iOS, Android. Syft runs on macOS, Linux, Windows, Docker.
Can I use Syft for free?
Yes. Syft has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Sardine starts at On request.
What is Sardine best used for?
Sardine is most often used for a neobank losing money to authorised push payment scams where the customer genuinely approved the transfer, a crypto exchange trying to detect accounts being operated by remote access rather than by their owner, a fintech seeing synthetic identity signups that pass document verification but share device characteristics, a lender wanting first party fraud signals at application time that a credit bureau file does not contain. Of those, a neobank losing money to authorised push payment scams where the customer genuinely approved the transfer and a crypto exchange trying to detect accounts being operated by remote access rather than by their owner are not what Syft is typically brought in for.
What can Sardine do that Syft cannot?
Sardine covers Device intelligence, Behaviour biometrics, Scam detection, Onboarding risk scoring. Syft covers Multi-format output, Broad ecosystem coverage, Binary classifiers, In-toto attestations.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Sardine: Does Sardine do document verification?

It focuses on device, behavioural and transaction signals, and integrates identity verification providers rather than being one. Treat it as complementary to a KYC vendor.

Syft: Does Syft find vulnerabilities?

No. It produces an inventory. Grype, from the same company, matches that inventory against vulnerability feeds. They are separate tools and the distinction is frequently lost.

Sardine: What does it need from us to work?

An SDK in your web and mobile applications plus transaction feeds. Without the client side collector you lose the signals that differentiate it.

Syft: Does anything in the Anchore stack do reachability analysis?

No. Neither Syft, Grype nor the commercial Anchore platform performs call graph or reachability analysis, so none of them tells you whether a vulnerable code path is actually invoked.

Sardine: Is pricing published?

No. It is quoted, typically per session or per monthly active user with an annual volume commitment.

Syft: Is it a CNCF or OpenSSF project?

No. It is single-vendor open source owned by Anchore, with no foundation governance. That is a different licence risk profile from Sigstore.

Syft: What does Anchore Enterprise cost?

Not published. The pricing page is contact-sales only, with named but unpriced commercial and federal tiers.

Syft: How do I know my SBOM is complete?

You largely cannot, which is the honest answer. Silent partial parsing is a known open defect, so a bill of materials used for compliance should be spot-checked against a known dependency list.

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