hivex vs RegRippy: 2026 Comparison
hivex is a free digital forensics and incident response tool. RegRippy is a free digital forensics and incident response tool. Compare features, ratings, integrations, and community reviews side by side to find the best digital forensics and incident response fit for your security stack.
CST VerdictBased on our analysis of available product data, here is our conclusion:
Forensics teams and incident responders who need to extract and parse Windows Registry hives for timeline reconstruction should reach for hivex; its C API eliminates the friction of shelling out to binary tools and lets you script registry analysis into custom workflows. At 145 GitHub stars with active maintenance, it's lightweight enough to embed in larger forensic pipelines without dependency bloat. Skip this if you need GUI-driven registry browsing or automated anomaly detection; hivex is a library for practitioners who code, not a packaged forensics platform.
Incident responders and forensic analysts working Windows environments will appreciate RegRippy for one reason: it replaces RegRipper's aging Perl codebase with Python 3, making it actually maintainable and extensible for modern incident response workflows. The 207 GitHub stars and active development signal this is no abandoned pet project; you're getting a tool that forensic teams are actually using in production. Skip this if your team needs a GUI or commercial support; RegRippy is CLI-first and community-supported, which suits solo practitioners and lean SOCs far better than enterprises expecting vendor handholding.
