LOKI vs Stairwell: 2026 Comparison
LOKI is a free threat hunting tool. Stairwell is a commercial threat hunting tool by Stairwell. Compare features, ratings, integrations, and community reviews side by side to find the best threat hunting fit for your security stack.
CST VerdictBased on our analysis of NIST CSF 2.0 coverage, core features, integrations, company size fit, here is our conclusion:
SOC analysts and incident responders on tight budgets need LOKI for fast, offline IOC matching against file systems and memory dumps without dependencies or licensing friction. The tool's 3,730 GitHub stars and zero-cost deployment mean you can scale hunting across dozens of endpoints without procurement cycles, and its YARA rule compatibility lets you reuse existing detection logic. Skip LOKI if your team needs centralized logging, alert tuning, or behavioral analytics; it's a scanner, not a platform, and requires you to manage rules and findings yourself.
Mid-market and enterprise SOC teams who need to move fast on file-based indicators will find Stairwell's hash and IOC lookup engine faster than bouncing between five different threat intelligence feeds. The tool's integration with Cortex, Chronicle, and CrowdStrike means your analysts can pivot from detection to malware variant discovery without leaving their existing workflows, and the private YARA vault lets you test and store detection logic without exposing your methodology to external platforms. Skip this if your primary pain is endpoint visibility or compliance reporting; Stairwell is built for teams that hunt actively and need to confirm whether a file hash actually matters before escalating.
