SQLCipher

Health v2 · maintenance only

Adoption not part of the score

7254 stars · 1402 forks observed · 2026-08-28

What it is AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, 2026-08-29, confidence not recorded

SQLCipher is an open-source fork of SQLite that adds full-database 256-bit AES encryption, tamper detection, and strong key derivation. It is a C library that can be embedded in applications on virtually any platform, with drop-in compatibility with standard SQLite APIs.

Use cases

• encrypt a local SQLite database file with AES-256
• store sensitive user data securely on mobile devices
• protect embedded application databases at rest
• convert a plaintext SQLite database to an encrypted one
• add tamper detection to a local database
• build an app that requires encrypted storage for compliance

When to choose

• you use SQLite and need transparent, on-the-fly encryption of the entire database file
• you need a mature, widely deployed embedded database encryption solution with minimal performance overhead
• you want application-level cryptography with zero configuration and multiple crypto provider options

When to avoid

• you need a client-server database with network access controls rather than file-level encryption
• you need encryption of individual columns or fields rather than the whole database file
• you require a pure managed-language solution without native C dependencies

Facets

library · maturity stable

database security cryptography databases security developer-tools cross-platform windows c sqlite encryption aes-256 embedded-database database-encryption android ios linux macos

Member repositories

For agents

markdown · JSON · MCP: product_card(name="sqlcipher/sqlcipher")