Choose Kryptic over HashiCorp Vault when you need secrets this week, without staffing a Vault cluster.
Kryptic injects secrets through a local daemon. Log in once. After that, npm run dev, dotnet run, and F5 receive secrets over a local socket. The daemon, CLI, SDKs, and encryption engines are open source (GPL-3.0 and Apache-2.0). The server stores ciphertext it cannot open. Machine identities are unlimited and never consume a seat.
github.com/dev-krypticHashiCorp Vault is secrets as infrastructure: policies, auth methods, dynamic database credentials, PKI, agent templates. That power is real. It is also a program. Without a platform team, the rollout becomes a project of its own.
| Kryptic | Vault | Why it matters | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open source | OffersYes. Daemon and CLI are GPL-3.0. Encryption engines and SDKs are Apache-2.0, at github.com/dev-kryptic. The control plane is commercial. | OffersYes. You operate a cluster (or pay for a hosted control plane). | Anything that can see a secret in plaintext is published. You can verify the blind store without an NDA. |
| Blind store | OffersThe server stores ciphertext only. There is no decrypt path. | Does notThe cluster serves plaintext to authorized clients. | A store that can decrypt values server-side can also be breached or compelled into decrypting them. |
| Self-hosting | OffersFull platform on Business and Enterprise. Docker Compose or Helm. | OffersYes. Self-managed Vault or a hosted control plane. | Cloud is fine until compliance asks where the control plane lives. Then you need a product you can run, not a cluster you invent. |
| Nothing on disk | OffersDecrypted values live in daemon memory for at most five minutes, then inside the running process. | PartialLocal development commonly falls back to exported or synced files. | AI coding agents index the working directory. A .env on disk is one prompt away from a chat log. |
| Kryptic | Vault | Why it matters | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Time to first local secret | OffersInstall, login, run. | Does notCluster, auth method, policy, agent, then the app. | Vault adoption is an infrastructure program. Kryptic adoption is an install. |
| Daily workflow | OffersLogin once, then npm run dev, dotnet run, or F5. | Does notVault Agent, templates, or a custom sidecar. | Vault Agent targets production-shaped runtimes. Kryptic targets the laptop, then uses machine identities for the rest. |
| Language packages | Offers.NET, Node.js, Python, Java, Go, Ruby, C++, Rust. One-line inject. | PartialAPI and community libraries. You design the local story. | Developers should not hold long-lived Vault tokens on a laptop. |
| Kryptic | Vault | Why it matters | |
|---|---|---|---|
| SSO on Free | OffersGoogle, Microsoft, and GitHub on every plan, including Free. | PartialIdentity is an auth method you configure. | You should not need an enterprise contract to stop sharing a password manager login. |
| Audit log on Free | OffersImmutable audit log on Free (7-day retention). Values are never logged. | PartialYou build the audit story on the cluster. | An audit trail that waits on an upgrade is a sales page. |
| Machine identities | OffersUnlimited and free. They never consume a developer seat. | PartialCost is the people and infrastructure that run Vault. | Every developer is followed by pipelines, previews, and pods. Billing those as seats makes the bill track infrastructure, not people. |
| CI/CD and Kubernetes | OffersMachine identities, CI export, REST API, and a Kubernetes operator on every plan. | PartialAvailable, often with identity or plan limits. | Production delivery should not be a different product from local development. |
Kryptic wrote this comparison. HashiCorp Vault details are as advertised on its public pricing and documentation pages in September 2026. Products change, so check HashiCorp Vault's current pages before you decide.
To get secrets into local apps, CI, and Kubernetes without a Vault program. Kryptic is a product: daemon, login, SDK line. The clients that see plaintext are open source. Vault remains the toolkit for dynamic credentials and PKI once you staff it.
Yes, for developer secrets, onboarding, and keeping .env files off laptops. No, if you need Vault as a low-level engine for dynamic database credentials and PKI. Many orgs will want Vault for infrastructure and Kryptic for developers.
The daemon, CLI, SDKs, and encryption engines are open source. The control plane is a commercial product you can self-host on Business and Enterprise. You get a licence, not a cluster you have to design.
No. Dynamic or leased secrets are not a Kryptic feature. Kryptic versions static secrets, supports references and org-catalog keys, and rotates values that daemons and operators pick up automatically.
