No. 6 of 23 ·Code Clone Detection Tools

NiCad

Windows · Mac · Linux · Self-hosted

Freedom report

Three barsScore 6.5

Free tierA free tier is on its own pricing page
Open codeNo open-source code on record
Runs widely3 of 6 device platforms
DocumentedPlans, terms and facts published

NiCad is ranked #6 of 23 in code clone detection tools on Freedom251. It runs on Linux, macOS, Self-hosted, Windows. There is a free plan.

NiCad plans and pricing

All plans

Free and open source Free MIT-licensed software · requires OpenTxl 11 or later github.com · 4 Oct 2026

Compared on code clone detection tools

Free plan: Yes
Clone detection method: hybrid
Scan scope: repository
Self-hosted option: Yes

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The record

Purpose: NiCad is a near-miss source code clone detection system.
Analysis granularity: It analyzes source code at file, function, or block granularity.
Languages: Included language plugins cover C, C#, Java, Python, PHP, Ruby, WSDL, and ATL.
Extensibility: Plugins for other languages can be added when a TXL grammar is available.
Customization: Configuration files support customized renaming, filtering, abstraction, and normalization before comparison.
Reports: Results include clone pairs and clone classes in XML-like formats, with optional browsable HTML reports.
Detection threshold: The default near-miss difference threshold is 0.30, and 0.00 means exact clones.
Cross-system detection: NiCadCross reports fragments from one system that appear as clones in a second system.
Platforms: The README says NiCad should compile and run on Linux and macOS, and in Cygwin or MSYS2 (MinGW) on Windows.
Dependencies: NiCad 7.0 requires OpenTxl 11 or later; building its comparison tools requires Turing+ 6.2 or later.
Install and use: It can be run from its directory for personal use or installed system-wide with the provided installation script.
License: The project uses an MIT-style license permitting use, modification, distribution, sublicensing, and sale subject to its stated conditions.
Support: The repository's Issues page currently shows no open issues and says issue creation is restricted.
Release: The latest listed release is Open NiCad 7.0.1, described as the first open-source release of the clone detector.
Price from: Free

Where it ranks on Freedom251

Best Code Clone Detection Tools in 2026#6 of 23

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Sources

github.com/CordyJ/Open-NiCad· checked 4 Oct 2026
github.com/CordyJ/Open-NiCad/blob/main/LICENSE.txt· checked 4 Oct 2026
github.com/CordyJ/Open-NiCad/issues· checked 4 Oct 2026
github.com/CordyJ/Open-NiCad/releases· checked 4 Oct 2026