Side by side

Conpot vs Cowrie

Both stand on honeypot software. Which one you can start free with, which one lets you read the code, and what each costs once you pay.

Conpot

Free plan LinuxSelf-hosted

Choose Conpot if you need a free, self-hosted honeypot for industrial control system attack intelligence and want to customize the emulated environment. Look elsewhere if you need software with a warranty or want shared data without setting up HPFriends access.

Visit Conpot

Cowrie

Free plan LinuxSelf-hosted

Cowrie offers SSH and Telnet monitoring with session replay, file capture, and multiple logging integrations. Its self-hosted setup and listed local requirements are worth considering before deployment.

Visit Cowrie

The facts

	Conpot	Cowrie
Free plan	Yes	Yes
Open source	Not published	Not published
Runs on	Linux, Self-hosted	Linux, Self-hosted
Lowest paid plan	Not published	Free or on request
Plans published	None	1
Maker	Not published	Not published
Website	github.com	cowrie.org
On honeypot software	#7 of 21	#3 of 21

Conpot: what it does well

Free and open source under GPL-2.0.
Default profile presents Siemens S7-200 emulation and four protocols.
Deployable with Docker, PyPI, or source.
Custom templates and port changes are supported.
ConpotFS proxies files through a controlled location.

What to know first

Host installation requires Python 3.10 or newer.
HPFeeds is disabled by default.
Shared data access requires an HPFriends account and authentication key.
The license provides the software without warranty.

Cowrie: what it does well

Free and open source under a BSD license
Fake filesystem keeps default-mode commands off the real host
Records timed sessions for later replay
Captures fetched and uploaded files
Many output plugins, including Splunk and Elasticsearch

What to know first

Self-hosted deployment
Local requirements include Python 3.11+ and python-virtualenv
LLM backend is experimental

Alternatives to Conpot Alternatives to Cowrie The whole list