HonTel vs HoneyUp: 2026 Comparison
HonTel is a free honeypots & deception tool. HoneyUp 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 available product data, here is our conclusion:
Security teams running legacy infrastructure with exposed Telnet ports should deploy HonTel to catch reconnaissance activity that IP reputation lists miss; it's free and requires minimal setup, making it practical for resource-constrained ops teams managing aging systems. With 162 GitHub stars and active maintenance, the tool delivers reliable signal for a narrowly focused attack surface. Skip this if your environment has already eliminated Telnet entirely or if you need honeypots covering SSH, HTTP, or databases; HonTel does one thing well and stops there.
Teams running web applications who want to catch attackers early will benefit from HoneyUp's simplicity: it's a free uploader honeypot that requires minimal setup and blends into your application without overhead. The tool's lightweight footprint and zero cost make it practical for resource-constrained teams to deploy multiple instances across dev and production environments. Skip HoneyUp if you need sophisticated multi-vector deception or centralized honeypot management; this is a single-purpose trap, not an orchestrated deception platform.
