Architecture comparison

Stella Ops vs Grype

Grype is a strong vulnerability scanner for container and SBOM inputs.
Stella extends scan output into promotion decisions with signed, replayable evidence.

Last reviewed: 2026-02-10

Decision criteria

How this comparison is evaluated

Each vendor page is scored against the same five technical dimensions for consistent decision support.

Deployment model: Target coverage, self-hosting posture, and runtime assumptions.
Evidence model: How decisions are justified, signed, and exported for review.
Replayability: Ability to re-run historical decisions with identical inputs.
Offline capability: Behavior in disconnected or sovereign environments.
Policy model: Gate expressiveness, explainability, and workflow integration.

Proof and methodology links: Full market matrix | Evidence and Audit | Operations and Deployment | Decision Capsule spec

Scope difference

Grype (from Anchore) is excellent at fast, accurate vulnerability detection. But when the auditor asks "why did you mark CVE-2024-1234 as not affected?", Grype can't help you.

Stella Ops saves everything: the SBOM, the advisory state, the reachability proof, and a cryptographic seal. Replay any scan months later with identical results.

Dimension-by-dimension comparison

Decision dimension	Grype	Stella Ops
`CVE?Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures - a unique identifier for a publicly known security vulnerability` detection	Yes	Yes
`SBOM?Software Bill of Materials - a complete list of all packages and dependencies in your software` integration	Yes (via Syft)	Yes (built-in)
Offline operation	Yes	Yes
Scan speed	Fast	Fast
`Reachability?Analysis that proves whether vulnerable code is actually called by your application — filtering out false positives from scanner noise` analysis	No	Yes
Audit-ready evidence	No	Yes
Deterministic replay	No	Yes
`VEX?Vulnerability Exploitability eXchange - machine-readable statements about whether vulnerabilities are actually exploitable in your context` support	Basic	Full (`OpenVEX?An open standard format for VEX statements about vulnerability exploitability`)
Multi-source advisories	Yes	Yes (30+)
Regional compliance	No	`FIPS?Federal Information Processing Standards - U.S. government cryptographic standards for secure systems`, `GOST?Russian national cryptographic standards (GOST R 34.10/34.11) required for government systems`, `SM2?Chinese national public key cryptography standard (part of ShangMi suite) required for regulated industries`
License	Apache 2.0	BUSL-1.1

The Audit Problem

Scene: It's 6 months after deployment. An auditor asks why CVE-2024-1234 was marked "not affected" when you shipped.

With Grype

"We... checked at the time? The advisories have changed since then. We can't prove what we saw."

With Stella Ops

"Here's the scan record. It shows the exact advisory state from that day, the reachability analysis proving the vulnerable code path wasn't called, and a cryptographic signature proving nothing was modified."

Workflow Comparison

Grype Workflow

Terminal

$ grype myapp:latest
NAME        INSTALLED  FIXED-IN   TYPE  VULNERABILITY   SEVERITY
openssl     3.0.1      3.0.2      rpm   CVE-2024-1234   High
libxml2     2.9.4      2.9.14     rpm   CVE-2024-5678   Critical
...
(487 total vulnerabilities)

You get the list. Now manually investigate each one.

Stella Ops Workflow

Terminal

$ stella scan myapp:latest
✓ 487 CVEs found
✓ 475 NOT REACHABLE (with proof)
! 12 REACHABLE

Scan record: myapp-2024-01-15.json
  - SBOM snapshot
  - Advisory state (frozen)
  - Reachability proofs
  - Cryptographic seal

Actionable results + audit evidence in one scan.

Beyond Scanning: Deployment

Grype is a scanner — it finds vulnerabilities but doesn't orchestrate releases.

Stella Ops is a complete release control plane with built-in deployment execution:

Deployment Targets

→ Docker Compose deployments
→ Docker Swarm clusters
→ AWS ECS / Fargate
→ HashiCorp Nomad
→ Scripted deployments (.NET 10)

Infrastructure Integration

→ SSH/WinRM remote deployment
→ HashiCorp Vault for secrets
→ HashiCorp Consul for service registry
→ Environment?A logical deployment target (e.g. dev, staging, prod) that tracks its own release history, promotion rules, and policy gates promotions (Dev→Stage→Prod)
→ Approval workflows

Scan → Gate → Deploy → Export evidence — all in one platform.

Use Them Together

Already using Grype + Syft? Stella Ops can import their output and add reachability analysis + audit evidence:

Terminal

$ syft myapp:latest -o cyclonedx-json | stella analyze --save-record
Importing CycloneDX SBOM from Syft...
Running reachability analysis...
✓ Enhanced with reachability data
✓ Scan record saved

Fit guidance by deployment and evidence needs

Grype-only fit

⬢ You just need vulnerability detection
⬢ Audit evidence isn't required
⬢ You have capacity to manually triage
⬢ You prefer Apache 2.0 licensing

Stella fit

⬢ You need reachability analysis
⬢ Auditors require evidence trails
⬢ You want deterministic, replayable scans
⬢ Regional compliance matters
⬢ You're drowning in false positives

Methodology: This comparison is based on publicly available documentation, release notes, and hands-on evaluation as of February 2026. Capabilities change over time. Verify current behavior with each vendor's official documentation.

Stella Ops is committed to accurate, fair comparisons. If you believe any information is outdated or incorrect, please contact hello@stella-ops.org.

Evaluate scanner output versus release decision evidence

Compare vulnerability detection depth with promotion governance, replay behavior, and audit-readiness requirements.

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