CuratedMCP vs Shieldly: Which is Better in 2026?
A comprehensive comparison of CuratedMCP and Shieldly covering features, pricing, use cases, and which tool is the right choice for your needs.
⚡ Quick Verdict
Choose CuratedMCP if:
- →You need one-command discovery of mcp servers across six ai clients or a–f machine grade against a risk-classified catalog of 70+ reviewed servers
Choose Shieldly if:
- →You want more affordable paid plans (from $19/mo)
- →You need detects wildcards, risky passrole, notaction traps and public principals or privilege escalation path detection across chained policies
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CuratedMCP vs Shieldly: At a Glance
Pricing Comparison: CuratedMCP vs Shieldly
Understanding the pricing differences between CuratedMCP and Shieldly is crucial for making the right choice. Here's how their plans compare side by side.
CuratedMCP Pricing
Shieldly Pricing
💡 Pricing takeaway: Both CuratedMCP and Shieldly offer free tiers, making it easy to try before you buy. Compare the specific plans to find the best value for your use case.
Feature-by-Feature Comparison
Here's how every feature from CuratedMCP and Shieldly stacks up.
What Makes Each Tool Unique
🔵 Unique to CuratedMCP
Features available in CuratedMCP but not in Shieldly:
- ✓One-command discovery of MCP servers across six AI clients
- ✓A–F machine grade against a risk-classified catalog of 70+ reviewed servers
- ✓Runs locally; no config data leaves the machine, no account needed
- ✓Non-zero exit on high-risk findings for use as a CI gate
- ✓Catalog queryable from an AI client via CuratedMCP's own MCP server
- ✓Hub installs a server once and syncs it to every client
🟣 Unique to Shieldly
Features available in Shieldly but not in CuratedMCP:
- ✓Detects wildcards, risky PassRole, NotAction traps and public principals
- ✓Privilege escalation path detection across chained policies
- ✓Graded score per analysis, usable as a workflow gate
- ✓Five analyses with no signup; browser-only linter and trust-policy explainer
- ✓Compliance panel mapping findings to CIS, SOC 2 and NIST
- ✓AWS account connect with auto-scan, webhooks and Slack alerts on the Team tier
Use Case Recommendations
Best for: CuratedMCP
CuratedMCP addresses a blind spot that appeared as soon as MCP took hold: servers are configured per-machine and per-client, which makes them invisible to any network-side AI gateway. CuratedMCP puts an open-source agent on the endpoint instead. One command discovers every MCP server configured across Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Cursor, Windsurf, GitHub Copilot and Gemini, flags the shadow servers nobody approved, and grades the machine A–F against a risk-classified catalog of over 70 human-reviewed servers — in roughly 60 seconds, entirely locally, with no configuration data leaving the machine and no account required. The scan exits non-zero on high-risk findings, which makes it usable directly as a CI gate rather than only as a report. The same catalog is queryable from an AI client via CuratedMCP's own MCP server, so an agent can check a server's risk classification before installing it. The Hub component installs a server once and syncs it across every client, replacing the per-client config sprawl that causes shadow servers in the first place. Two further components are in earlier stages: Sentinel, a local policy guard in early access, and TokenShield, a measured token ledger in beta. The product is MIT licensed and free for individual developers; the commercial tier is fleet-wide visibility, an org allowlist pushed to every machine, and an audit log of MCP tool calls for engineering organisations.
Ideal use cases:
- •Teams or individuals who need one-command discovery of mcp servers across six ai clients
- •Teams or individuals who need a–f machine grade against a risk-classified catalog of 70+ reviewed servers
- •Teams or individuals who need runs locally; no config data leaves the machine, no account needed
- •Teams or individuals who need non-zero exit on high-risk findings for use as a ci gate
- •Anyone focused on mcp workflows
- •Anyone focused on security workflows
Best for: Shieldly
Shieldly analyses AWS policy documents — IAM policies, CloudFormation templates, S3, Lambda, SQS, KMS and SNS resource policies, plus cost policies — and returns a graded security assessment rather than a raw linter dump. The specific things it looks for are the ones that do not show up as syntax errors: wildcard actions and resources, risky PassRole grants, NotAction traps, public principals, and privilege escalation paths where a policy that looks bounded chains into something that is not. Each analysis returns a score, which is the part that makes it usable as a gate in a workflow rather than a report someone reads once. There is a genuinely low-friction on-ramp: paste an IAM policy JSON into the homepage and get a graded analysis with no signup at all, five free analyses before an account is needed, plus browser-only free tools — an IAM policy linter and a trust-policy explainer — that upload nothing and log nothing. Paid tiers add a cost advisor, analysis history, a compliance panel mapping findings to CIS, SOC 2 and NIST, a watchlist with alerts, a policy diff viewer, and at the team level a direct AWS account connection with automatic scanning, webhooks, Slack alerts and multi-account support.
Ideal use cases:
- •Teams or individuals who need detects wildcards, risky passrole, notaction traps and public principals
- •Teams or individuals who need privilege escalation path detection across chained policies
- •Teams or individuals who need graded score per analysis, usable as a workflow gate
- •Teams or individuals who need five analyses with no signup; browser-only linter and trust-policy explainer
- •Anyone focused on aws workflows
- •Anyone focused on iam workflows
🛡️ Other AI Security & Testing Tools to Consider
CuratedMCP and Shieldly aren't the only options. Here are other popular tools in the same space:
Lineation
Security control plane for AI agents — zero-trust agent identity, LLM and MCP gateways, policy-as-code, and prompt-injection defense
Axtary
Payload-bound authorization for AI agents — human approval is cryptographically tied to the exact action, so a changed payload is denied
Tracecat
Open-source SOAR for AI-native security teams — agents, cases, and workflows with human approval gates
Trestle
Local secret scanner with an MCP server so coding agents check their own output
Agentmetry
Local, open-source flight recorder that tags AI agent activity with MITRE ATT&CK
ZeroLeaks
Continuous AI red teaming for agents, endpoints and MCP tools, with unlimited scans on every plan
Is one of these your tool?
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Frequently Asked Questions
Is CuratedMCP better than Shieldly?
It depends on your needs. CuratedMCP offers 6 key features including One-command discovery of MCP servers across six AI clients and A–F machine grade against a risk-classified catalog of 70+ reviewed servers, while Shieldly provides 6 features including Detects wildcards, risky PassRole, NotAction traps and public principals and Privilege escalation path detection across chained policies. CuratedMCP uses a freemium model with a free tier, while Shieldly is freemium with free access available. Choose based on which features and pricing model align with your requirements.
Is CuratedMCP cheaper than Shieldly?
Shieldly is cheaper, starting at $19/month compared to CuratedMCP's $29/year. Both tools offer free tiers, so you can try each before committing. Always check the official websites for the most current pricing.
Can I use CuratedMCP and Shieldly together?
Yes, many users combine CuratedMCP and Shieldly in their workflow. CuratedMCP excels at one-command discovery of mcp servers across six ai clients, while Shieldly shines with detects wildcards, risky passrole, notaction traps and public principals. Using both allows you to leverage the strengths of each tool, though this means managing two subscriptions — though free tiers can help manage costs.
What's the main difference between CuratedMCP and Shieldly?
While both are ai security & testing tools, CuratedMCP emphasizes one-command discovery of mcp servers across six ai clients, whereas Shieldly is known for detects wildcards, risky passrole, notaction traps and public principals. The best choice depends on your specific workflow and feature priorities.
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