cytopia/pwncat

Health v2 · maintenance only

Adoption not part of the score

1954 stars · 213 forks observed · 2026-08-28

What it is AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, 2026-08-30, confidence not recorded

pwncat is a Python-based netcat replacement and reverse/bind shell handler with firewall and IDS/IPS evasion, self-injecting shells, and port forwarding. It is fully scriptable via the Pwncat Scripting Engine (PSE) and works as a drop-in complement to netcat, ncat, or socat.

Use cases

• catch and manage reverse shells during pentests
• set up local and remote port forwarding
• evade firewalls and IDS/IPS when connecting back
• automatically deploy unbreakable reconnecting reverse shells to a target
• script send/receive network actions with Python
• pivot through compromised hosts
• replace netcat or ncat with a more featureful tool

When to choose

• you need a scriptable netcat with reverse shell handling and self-injection for penetration testing
• you want reconnecting 'unbreakable' reverse shells or IDS evasion features
• you need port forwarding and pivoting from a single CLI tool

When to avoid

• you only need basic netcat functionality on a minimal system
• you need an actively developed tool - the last release was 2022
• you want an interactive post-exploitation shell framework rather than a netcat-style utility

Facets

cli-tool · maturity maintenance

security networking cli proxy security penetration-testing networking cli python netcat reverse-shell bind-shell port-forwarding ids-evasion pivoting pentesting pse self-injecting-shell command-line linux macos

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