GravityKit
GravityKit folds every GravityView extension into one Pro plugin.
Comparison · Infra & APIs
Clair vs ClickHouse
A side-by-side editorial comparison of Clair and ClickHouse — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
Clair vs ClickHouse: at a glance
What is Clair?
Clair 4.10 RC can read SBOMs to match Java vulnerabilities.
Clair cut its first 4.10.0 release candidate on November 13, eleven months after 4.9.0. Its Java indexers can now read CycloneDX SBOM files and treat them as the source of truth, and Red Hat's VEX data now covers Maven advisories, so Java packages in Red Hat images can be matched. It also reduces memory use when many packages share a source package.
What is ClickHouse?
ClickHouse is shipping six active version branches in parallel — but the captured feed has only tags, no notes.
What's visible in the captured feed is high-cadence GitHub release tagging across at least six parallel branches in two weeks: 25.8.x-lts, 25.10.x, 25.12.x, 26.1.x, 26.2.x, and 26.5.x. Each entry is title-only with no release notes captured. The branch fan-out is itself meaningful — ClickHouse is maintaining LTS plus several stable branches simultaneously, which is the cadence pattern of a mature OSS database serving enterprises that pin to specific minor versions.
Clair vs ClickHouse: editorial side-by-side
Clair
2.5INFRA · APIS
Clair 4.10 RC can read SBOMs to match Java vulnerabilities.
◆ Current state
Clair cut its first 4.10.0 release candidate on November 13, eleven months after 4.9.0. Its Java indexers can now read CycloneDX SBOM files and treat them as the source of truth, and Red Hat's VEX data now covers Maven advisories, so Java packages in Red Hat images can be matched. It also reduces memory use when many packages share a source package.
◆ Where it's heading
Since 4.8 Clair has moved from Red Hat's older OVAL data to VEX, and each release follows Red Hat's security data more closely. 4.10 adds SBOMs as an input, so Clair can match what an image's own manifest declares, not only what it finds on disk.
◆ Prediction
More 4.10 release candidates and then a final are likely; the long gap between releases suggests that could take weeks.
ClickHouse
5.0INFRA · APISANALYTICS
ClickHouse is shipping six active version branches in parallel — but the captured feed has only tags, no notes.
◆ Current state
What's visible in the captured feed is high-cadence GitHub release tagging across at least six parallel branches in two weeks: 25.8.x-lts, 25.10.x, 25.12.x, 26.1.x, 26.2.x, and 26.5.x. Each entry is title-only with no release notes captured. The branch fan-out is itself meaningful — ClickHouse is maintaining LTS plus several stable branches simultaneously, which is the cadence pattern of a mature OSS database serving enterprises that pin to specific minor versions.
◆ Where it's heading
Without per-release content we can't comment on feature direction. The branch shape says enterprise-grade backporting is alive and well; the new 26.5 branch starting in late April implies a forward-development cycle is underway alongside the maintenance work. Worth fixing the changelog ingest to pull release-note bodies from GitHub before the next pass — there's a real signal here being lost.
◆ Prediction
Once the scraper captures release-note bodies, expect to see continued cherry-pick patches on 25.x-LTS for at least 12 more months in parallel with 26.x feature work. Unable to predict feature direction from version tags alone.
Alternatives to Clair and ClickHouse
Other Infra & APIs products tracked by Sparkpulse, ranked by recent ship velocity. Each card links to a full editorial trajectory and lets you pivot into a head-to-head comparison with either Clair or ClickHouse.
Payload CMS
Payload's v4 beta.9 keeps every past image crop and raises the Node floor again.
Nautobot
Nautobot 3.3 alpha 2 adds test helpers and a cable location filter after 3.2.9's token-leak fix.
Shuffle
Shuffle tags builds almost daily, but the notes are empty.
KrakenD
KrakenD's community edition is shipping only dependency bumps.
Velociraptor
Velociraptor's recent releases are mostly about patching CVEs.
See all Clair alternatives → · See all ClickHouse alternatives →
Recent activity from Clair and ClickHouse
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 13h agoClairClair 4.10 RC reads CycloneDX SBOMs for Java matching
- 6mo agoClickHousePatch on 25.8 LTS branch (notes not captured)
- 6mo agoClickHousePatch on 26.2 stable branch (notes not captured)
- 6mo agoClickHousePatch on 25.12 stable branch (notes not captured)
- 6mo agoClickHousePatch on 25.10 stable branch (notes not captured)
- 6mo agoClickHousePatch on 25.12 stable branch (notes not captured)
- 6mo agoClickHousePatch on 25.12 stable branch (notes not captured)
- 11mo agoClairClair 4.9 moves CVSS data to NVD's 2.0 feeds
- 2y agoClairClair 4.8 replaces Red Hat OVAL data with VEX
- 2y agoClairClair 4.7.4 changes the default layer download location
- 2y agoClairClair 4.7.3 requires TLS 1.2 or newer
- 3y agoClairClair 4.7.2 drops the retired CRDA source
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between Clair and ClickHouse?
They serve adjacent needs but don't currently overlap on shipped themes. ClickHouse is currently shipping more aggressively (velocity 5.0 vs 2.5), with 0 editorial sparks in the last 30 days against 0. See the at-a-glance table above for a side-by-side breakdown of velocity, recent sparks, and editorial themes.
Is Clair better than ClickHouse?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. ClickHouse is currently shipping more aggressively (velocity 5.0 vs 2.5), with 0 editorial sparks in the last 30 days against 0. For your specific use case, the alternatives sections above list other Infra & APIs products to evaluate alongside.
What are the best alternatives to Clair?
Top Clair alternatives in Infra & APIs are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "Clair alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/clair for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to ClickHouse?
Top ClickHouse alternatives in Infra & APIs are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "ClickHouse alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/clickhouse for the full list with editorial commentary on each.