Cloud Custodian (c7n) vs PacBot: Side-by-Side Comparison (2026)
Features, pricing, ratings, and pros & cons — compared head-to-head.
Cloud Custodian (c7n) is a free cloud security posture management tool. PacBot is a free cloud security posture management tool. Compare features, ratings, integrations, and community reviews side by side to find the best cloud security posture management fit for your security stack.
CST VerdictBased on our analysis of available product data, here is our conclusion:
Platform engineering teams managing multi-cloud infrastructure at scale will get the most from Cloud Custodian because its YAML-based policy engine lets you write once and enforce across AWS, Azure, and GCP simultaneously, something most CSPM tools force you to configure separately. 5,794 GitHub stars and active community contributions mean you're inheriting battle-tested policies rather than starting from scratch. Not the right fit if you need point-and-click policy management or expect vendor support; Cloud Custodian demands engineering resources to deploy and maintain, and you're responsible for the policy logic.
Security teams managing multi-cloud infrastructure at scale who need policy enforcement that actually executes should evaluate PacBot, particularly if you're already invested in infrastructure-as-code workflows. The policy-as-code model means compliance rules live in version control alongside your configs, eliminating the drift between declared and enforced security posture that plagues most CSPM tools. Skip this if your organization needs a vendor-managed SaaS experience with hand-holding; PacBot's open-source architecture demands engineering time to operationalize and customize for your specific cloud footprint.
