AD Tripwires vs Hornet: Side-by-Side Comparison (2026)
Features, pricing, ratings, and pros & cons — compared head-to-head.
AD Tripwires is a commercial honeypots & deception tool by Horizon3.ai. Hornet is a free honeypots & deception tool. Compare features, ratings, integrations, and community reviews side by side to find the best honeypots & deception fit for your security stack.
CST VerdictBased on our analysis of NIST CSF 2.0 coverage, core features, company size fit, deployment model, here is our conclusion:
Mid-market and enterprise security teams that treat Active Directory as a detection problem, not just a hardening problem, should evaluate AD Tripwires. It deploys honeypot objects directly into AD to catch reconnaissance and lateral movement before it reaches production assets, and the integration with Horizon3.ai's NodeZero platform means you validate that your tripwires actually work against your real attack surface. Skip this if your team lacks the AD expertise to maintain decoy objects or if you're looking for a tool that also handles response automation; AD Tripwires is detection and alerting only.
Small teams running SSH-exposed infrastructure who need fast honeypot deployment without licensing friction should start with Hornet; its multiple virtual hosts and sandboxed filesystems let you simulate realistic attack surfaces that catch reconnaissance patterns agentless tools miss. The free pricing and 24 GitHub stars signal active maintenance from practitioners rather than enterprise-first bloat. Skip this if you need persistent threat intelligence feeds or automated response integration; Hornet excels at tactical deception but treats detection as the end goal, not the start of your incident workflow.
