Key takeaways
- Snyk Open Source finds known vulnerabilities and license issues; malicious packages are flagged once they are in its database.
- Free advisory scanners cover known CVEs and reported malware for most small teams.
- For unreported malware, Togoder Security has an AI model read every dependency's source; only files nobody has scanned before count against your balance or plan.
- Snyk's paid plans are priced per developer; a prepaid or flat price is usually cheaper for small teams that only need malware checks.
- Keep Snyk if you use its SAST, container or IaC scanning, fix PRs or reporting.
Snyk is a broad application security platform. Snyk Open Source, its dependency product, is software composition analysis: it identifies the packages you use and matches them against a vulnerability database to report CVEs, license problems and the upgrade that fixes them. That database also lists malicious packages once they are reported. What Snyk Open Source does not set out to do is read the code of every dependency to find malware nobody has reported yet.
So if your real worry is the next compromised package, the question is not "what is cheaper than Snyk" but "what catches malware, and what does it cost".
A low-cost setup that covers both
- Known vulnerabilities and reported malware, free: OSV-Scanner or npm audit in CI, Dependabot alerts on GitHub,
pip-audit,cargo auditorgovulncheckfor other ecosystems. - Install-time hardening, free: commit lockfiles, install with
npm ci, and disable or allow-list install scripts (how). - Unreported malware, prepaid or flat monthly: run Togoder Security on your lockfile when dependencies change, before a release, or in a CI job. Every file is read by an AI model; cached files are free.
Togoder Security vs Snyk Open Source
| Togoder Security | Snyk Open Source | |
|---|---|---|
| Purpose | Find malicious or risky code in dependencies | Find known vulnerabilities and license issues |
| How | AI reads the source of every file | Matches versions against Snyk's database |
| Unreported malware | Yes, with false positives | Not its focus |
| Known CVEs, fix PRs, licenses | No | Yes |
| Ecosystems | npm, PyPI, crates.io, Go, RubyGems, Packagist | Most major ecosystems |
| Pricing | Prepaid balance from $20, or plans from $30/month; no seats; only new files count | Free plan with limited tests; paid plans per developer |
Prices of other tools change often; check their pricing pages. Facts about other tools reflect public documentation as of November 2026.
What Togoder Security costs
Parsing your lockfile, the quote, public reports and scans where every file was scanned before are free. Scanning new code takes a prepaid balance or a monthly plan. A balance is topped up from $20; each scan is quoted first and deducted at the quoted price. Monthly plans run from $30 for 100M LLM tokens of new code per 30 days to $1,999 for 10B, for any number of developers. Both work with API keys, and only files that have never been scanned by anyone count. Popular packages are usually already cached, so re-scanning a project after a few dependency bumps only counts the changed files.
Other alternatives
Socket is the closest commercial product focused on malicious packages (free plan, paid per-developer plans). GuardDog and Aikido Safe Chain are free tools. See the full comparison.
Frequently asked questions
What is a cheap alternative to Snyk for supply chain malware detection?
Use a free advisory scanner such as OSV-Scanner or npm audit for known issues, and Togoder Security for AI review of dependency source code, from a prepaid balance or on a monthly plan from $30, with no per-seat pricing. Free tools like GuardDog and Aikido Safe Chain are also worth a look.
Does Snyk scan for malicious packages?
Snyk's vulnerability database includes malicious packages after they are reported, and Snyk flags those. Reading the code of every dependency to find unreported malware is not what Snyk Open Source is built for.