Cutter vs radare2 vs Ghidra

Side by side, as alternatives to IDA Pro. Rows that differ are highlighted; the strongest value in a row is marked. Unknown means no source yet.

Cutterrizinorg/cutter

radare2radareorg/radare2

GhidraNationalSecurityAgency/ghidra

IDA Propaid product

Cost and coverage

Price

$0 software; you run it

IDA Free available; IDA Home from $365/year; IDA Pro Essential from €1,099/year, Expert from €4,999/year, Ultimate from €8,599/year (annual billing only) source ↗

Disassembly

Partly

Yes

Decompilation

Partly

Yes

Debugging

Partly

Yes

AI-assisted analysis

Yes

Jobs covered

2 of 4 jobs

3 of 4 jobs

All 4

Popularity and activity (from GitHub)

Stars

20,067

25,111

92,167Top

—

Gain this week

Unknown

—

Signal

Building history

—

Commits / 4 wk

590Top

196

—

Latest release

v2.5.0 · 2026-06-30

6.2.4 · 2026-10-05Top

Ghidra_12.1.4_build · 2026-09-21

—

Commits / 12 wk

1,240

606

—

People committing / 12 mo

17+

54+

106+

—

Issues opened / closed, 30 days

4 / 1

24 / 44

81 / 56

—

Facts, with sources on each project page

Runs on my machine?Differs

Yes, desktop application

Yes, command-line tool on your own machine

Yes, desktop application on your own machine; also runs headless

Hosted by the vendor

Code licenceDiffers

GPL-3.0 (copyleft)

Mostly LGPLv3 (version suffix not stated); plugins and dependencies vary, some GPL

Apache-2.0

—

Model weights licence

No model weights

—

Commercial useDiffers

Yes, under GPL-3.0 copyleft conditions

Yes under LGPL-3.0 conditions; GPL parts can be left out with --without-gpl

Yes, Apache-2.0

—

Paid services needed?

None required

Subscription

HardwareDiffers

Not documented

4 GB RAM, 1 GB storage; dual monitors suggested

—

Operating systemsDiffers

Windows, macOS (x86_64 and arm64), Linux AppImage

Windows, Linux, macOS, BSDs, Android, iOS and more

Windows 10 (1809+), Linux, macOS 10.13+; 64-bit only

—

Setup effortDiffers

Easy; release binaries, Homebrew cask, Chocolatey or Scoop

Easy with release binaries (.deb, .pkg, Windows zip); source install via sys/install.sh is recommended

Medium; install JDK 25 64-bit, then unzip the release and run ghidraRun

—

Stars over time

Switch to Growth % to compare projects of different sizes fairly.

Cutter
radare2
Ghidra

Focus a point, use arrow keys, or tap for its value.

Tracked daily since 15 Oct 2026. Dashed history: estimated from public records of when people starred the repo. Lines connect observations only; gaps contain no measured points.

Growth % starts at each project's first observed point in the shown range. Zero-star starts are unavailable.

Notes for a video or post

A plain summary with today's date and a link to the sources. Check each project page before you publish.

Cutter vs radare2 vs Ghidra (as alternatives to IDA Pro)
Figures from RepoQuarry, 21 Oct 2026. Sources: https://repoquarry.dev/compare?ids=cutter,radare2,ghidra&product=ida-pro

IDA Pro: IDA Free available; IDA Home from $365/year; IDA Pro Essential from €1,099/year, Expert from €4,999/year, Ultimate from €8,599/year (annual billing only)
Cutter: free software; does 2 of 4 IDA Pro jobs
radare2: free software; does 3 of 4 IDA Pro jobs
Ghidra: free software; does 3 of 4 IDA Pro jobs

- Cutter: 20,067 GitHub stars, 4 commits in 12 weeks, licence GPL-3.0 (copyleft)
- radare2: 25,111 GitHub stars, 1,240 commits in 12 weeks, licence Mostly LGPLv3 (version suffix not stated); plugins and dependencies vary, some GPL
- Ghidra: 92,167 GitHub stars, 606 commits in 12 weeks, licence Apache-2.0

Where they differ:
- Runs on my machine?: Cutter Yes, desktop application; radare2 Yes, command-line tool on your own machine; Ghidra Yes, desktop application on your own machine; also runs headless
- Code licence: Cutter GPL-3.0 (copyleft); radare2 Mostly LGPLv3 (version suffix not stated); plugins and dependencies vary, some GPL; Ghidra Apache-2.0
- Commercial use: Cutter Yes, under GPL-3.0 copyleft conditions; radare2 Yes under LGPL-3.0 conditions; GPL parts can be left out with --without-gpl; Ghidra Yes, Apache-2.0
- Hardware: Cutter Not documented; radare2 Not documented; Ghidra 4 GB RAM, 1 GB storage; dual monitors suggested
- Operating systems: Cutter Windows, macOS (x86_64 and arm64), Linux AppImage; radare2 Windows, Linux, macOS, BSDs, Android, iOS and more; Ghidra Windows 10 (1809+), Linux, macOS 10.13+; 64-bit only
- Setup effort: Cutter Easy; release binaries, Homebrew cask, Chocolatey or Scoop; radare2 Easy with release binaries (.deb, .pkg, Windows zip); source install via sys/install.sh is recommended; Ghidra Medium; install JDK 25 64-bit, then unzip the release and run ghidraRun

Stars show popularity, not quality. Check each project page before publishing.

Want share images and a ready video description? Open a project's creator kit.

Numbers: GitHub, fetched nightly. Facts: read from each project's own documentation, with the source on its page. How we check. rizinorg/cutter ↗radareorg/radare2 ↗NationalSecurityAgency/ghidra ↗

Cutter vs radare2 vs Ghidra

Stars over time

Notes for a video or post

Cookie preferences

Report a problem