{"slug": "binary-ninja", "name": "Binary Ninja", "category": "other", "category_name": "Other software", "description": "", "recommenders": 7, "commenters": 11, "warners": 0, "score": 7.036, "rising": -0.96, "first": "2026-01-12", "latest": "2026-10-01", "why": "I much prefer Binary Ninja for the task of building up an understanding of large binaries", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 7, "neutral": 7, "compare": 1, "warn": 0}, "spark": [0, 0, 2, 4, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "I much prefer Binary Ninja for the task of building up an understanding of large binaries", "kind": "", "icon": true, "domain": "binary.ninja", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://binary.ninja", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["Binary Ninja"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 791081105, "item_id": 49442569, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49442569", "by": "not_a9", "date": "2026-08-26", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "https://sidekick.binary.ninja/", "excerpt": "I guess Hex-Rays and Vector35 must be hallucinating their effects for, say, reverse engineering. OFC rev isn't be all and end all of computing but the effect LLMs had on security research and adjacent spaces (say, CTF) is interesting https://github.com/HexRaysSA/ida-nexus https://sidekick.binary.ninja/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "How much of HN is AI?"}, {"id": 752731442, "item_id": 47045715, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47045715", "by": "EE84M3i", "date": "2026-02-17", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "binary ninja is very easy to explore and has many fewer surprises", "excerpt": "Last time I used them - Ghidra, and to some extent IDA, had UXes that were very difficult for new users to pick up and frequently deviate from standard expectations for modern desktop apps because they have two decades of baggage. In contrast binary ninja is very easy to explore and has many fewer surprises.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ghidra by NSA"}, {"id": 752581568, "item_id": 47036348, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47036348", "by": "alexrp", "date": "2026-02-16", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I much prefer Binary Ninja for the task of building up an understanding of large binaries", "excerpt": "Binary Ninja deserves a mention in these threads: https://binary.ninja I've used IDA, Ghidra, and Binary Ninja a lot over the years. At this point I much prefer Binary Ninja for the task of building up an understanding of large binaries with many thousands of types and functions. It also doesn't hurt that its UI/UX feel like something out of this century, and it's very easy to automate using Python scripts.", "context": "", "use_case": "Reverse engineering", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ghidra by NSA"}, {"id": 752581168, "item_id": 47036323, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47036323", "by": "xvilka", "date": "2026-02-16", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Binary Ninja supports some of them as well, highly recommend.", "excerpt": "Binary Ninja supports some of them as well, highly recommend.", "context": "", "use_case": "Reverse engineering", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ghidra by NSA"}, {"id": 748207648, "item_id": 46762978, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46762978", "by": "apaprocki", "date": "2026-01-26", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Check out Binary Ninja if you haven\u2019t. Especially if you have large binaries!", "excerpt": "Check out Binary Ninja if you haven\u2019t. Especially if you have large binaries!", "context": "", "use_case": "binary analysis", "switched_from": "", "story": "DDD was a great debugger \u2013 what would a modern equivalent look like today?"}]}], "caveats": [], "who": [{"by": "b8", "context": "security analyst job seeker", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49926178", "date": "2026-10-01"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["reverse engineering", "binary analysis", "disassembler/decompiler", "reverse engineering binaries"], "compared": [{"slug": "burp-suite", "name": "Burp Suite", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "ida-pro", "name": "IDA Pro", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "ghidra", "name": "Ghidra", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "amazon-web-services", "name": "Amazon Web Services", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47011548", "title": "Ghidra by NSA", "mentions": 6}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49922568", "title": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (October 2026)", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49497712", "title": "One Nix flake to rule them all", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49435728", "title": "How much of HN is AI?", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48357724", "title": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (June 2026)", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47975570", "title": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (May 2026)", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-02": {"neutral": 2, "compare": 1, "recommend": 4}, "2026-03": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-06": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-07": {}, "2026-08": {"recommend": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {"neutral": 1}}, "versions": [], "version_unnamed": 0, "family_ref": null, "runs_on": null, "lines": [], "quotes": [{"id": 798818849, "item_id": 49926178, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49926178", "by": "b8", "date": "2026-10-01", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Burp Suite, Binary Ninja etc.", "excerpt": "Seeking: Any role that I can use my technical skills in. Security analyst, consultant, technical support etc. Location: Louisiana Remote: Yes, and/or on-site. I'm experienced with both. Willing to relocate: Yes Technologies: AWS, Java (SRC review), C++/C (SRC Review), C# (Basic), Burp Suite, Binary Ninja etc. R\u00e9sum\u00e9/CV: Full resume on request. Email: mcorkern1@tulane.edu GitHub: https://github.com/qf0 Misc: I have ov", "context": "security analyst job seeker", "use_case": "reverse engineering", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (October 2026)"}, {"id": 792000722, "item_id": 49500045, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49500045", "by": "jchw", "date": "2026-08-30", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "a Nix flake for the proprietary Binary Ninja disassembler/decompiler", "excerpt": "I'm not entirely sure if it's a good idea per se, but hell, what's the point in making everything properly lazy if you couldn't. I mean me personally, I routinely use 20-30 flake inputs for large system configurations and I've never really minded this at all. The only real concern I have is that overriding Nixpkgs to avoid duplicates can occasionally break since the dependency may not be ready for the latest Nixpkgs,", "context": "", "use_case": "disassembler/decompiler", "switched_from": "", "story": "One Nix flake to rule them all"}, {"id": 791081105, "item_id": 49442569, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49442569", "by": "not_a9", "date": "2026-08-26", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "https://sidekick.binary.ninja/", "excerpt": "I guess Hex-Rays and Vector35 must be hallucinating their effects for, say, reverse engineering. OFC rev isn't be all and end all of computing but the effect LLMs had on security research and adjacent spaces (say, CTF) is interesting https://github.com/HexRaysSA/ida-nexus https://sidekick.binary.ninja/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "How much of HN is AI?"}, {"id": 773809505, "item_id": 48363094, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48363094", "by": "b8", "date": "2026-06-01", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Technologies: AWS, Java (SRC review), C++/C (SRC Review), C# (Basic), Burp Suite, Binary Ninja etc.", "excerpt": "Seeking: Any role that I can use my technical skills in. Security analyst, consultant, technical support etc. Location: Louisiana Remote: Yes, and/or on-site. I'm experienced with both. Willing to relocate: Yes Technologies: AWS, Java (SRC review), C++/C (SRC Review), C# (Basic), Burp Suite, Binary Ninja etc. R\u00e9sum\u00e9/CV: Full resume on request. Email: mcorkern1@tulane.edu GitHub: https://github.com/qf0 Misc: I have ov", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (June 2026)"}, {"id": 769052449, "item_id": 48065778, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48065778", "by": "b8", "date": "2026-05-08", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Binary Ninja", "excerpt": "Seeking: Any role that I can use my technical skills in. Security analyst, consultant, technical support etc. Location: Louisiana Remote: Yes, and/or on-site. I'm experienced with both. Willing to relocate: Yes Technologies: AWS, Java (SRC review), C++/C (SRC Review), C# (Basic), Burp Suite, Binary Ninja etc. R\u00e9sum\u00e9/CV: Full resume on request. Email: mcorkern1@tulane.edu GitHub: https://github.com/qf0 Misc: I have ov", "context": "security consultant, two years at NCC Group and Black Lantern Security", "use_case": "Reverse engineering", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (May 2026)"}, {"id": 755554162, "item_id": 47222135, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47222135", "by": "b8", "date": "2026-03-02", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Burp Suite, Binary Ninja", "excerpt": "Seeking: Any role that I can use my technical skills in. Security analyst, consultant, technical support etc. Location: Louisiana Remote: Yes, and/or on-site. I'm experienced with both. Willing to relocate: Yes Technologies: AWS, Java (SRC review), C++/C (SRC Review), C# (Basic), Burp Suite, Binary Ninja etc. R\u00e9sum\u00e9/CV: Full resume on request. Email: mcorkern1@tulane.edu GitHub: https://github.com/qf0 Misc: I have ov", "context": "security consultant, 2+ years blue team", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (March 2026)"}, {"id": 752820720, "item_id": 47051295, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47051295", "by": "1vuio0pswjnm7", "date": "2026-02-17", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "", "excerpt": "Source code: https://codeload.github.com/Vector35/binaryninja-api/tar.gz/refs/tags/stable/5.2.8722", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ghidra by NSA"}, {"id": 752731442, "item_id": 47045715, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47045715", "by": "EE84M3i", "date": "2026-02-17", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "binary ninja is very easy to explore and has many fewer surprises", "excerpt": "Last time I used them - Ghidra, and to some extent IDA, had UXes that were very difficult for new users to pick up and frequently deviate from standard expectations for modern desktop apps because they have two decades of baggage. In contrast binary ninja is very easy to explore and has many fewer surprises.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ghidra by NSA"}, {"id": 752622416, "item_id": 47038901, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47038901", "by": "1vuio0pswjnm7", "date": "2026-02-16", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "The Linux free trial version is a 400MB .zip file including a 255.2MB", "excerpt": "The Linux free trial version is a 400MB .zip file including a 255.2MB \"binaryninja\" shared binary https://github.com/Vector35/binaryninja-api/releases/download/stable%2F5.2.8614/binaryninja_free_linux.zip", "context": "", "use_case": "reverse engineering binaries", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ghidra by NSA"}, {"id": 752593760, "item_id": 47037110, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47037110", "by": "ActorNightly", "date": "2026-02-16", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "", "excerpt": "Also this. https://github.com/jart/blink", "context": "", "use_case": "Binary analysis", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ghidra by NSA"}, {"id": 752581568, "item_id": 47036348, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47036348", "by": "alexrp", "date": "2026-02-16", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I much prefer Binary Ninja for the task of building up an understanding of large binaries", "excerpt": "Binary Ninja deserves a mention in these threads: https://binary.ninja I've used IDA, Ghidra, and Binary Ninja a lot over the years. At this point I much prefer Binary Ninja for the task of building up an understanding of large binaries with many thousands of types and functions. It also doesn't hurt that its UI/UX feel like something out of this century, and it's very easy to automate using Python scripts.", "context": "", "use_case": "Reverse engineering", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ghidra by NSA"}, {"id": 752581168, "item_id": 47036323, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47036323", "by": "xvilka", "date": "2026-02-16", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Binary Ninja supports some of them as well, highly recommend.", "excerpt": "Binary Ninja supports some of them as well, highly recommend.", "context": "", "use_case": "Reverse engineering", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ghidra by NSA"}, {"id": 750259632, "item_id": 46891227, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46891227", "by": "sintax", "date": "2026-02-04", "version": null, "stance": "compare", "quote": "or Binary Ninja's WARP", "excerpt": "or Binary Ninja's WARP : https://docs.binary.ninja/guide/warp.html // https://github.com/vector35/warp", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Ghidra MCP Server \u2013 110 tools for AI-assisted reverse engineering"}, {"id": 749734113, "item_id": 46858382, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46858382", "by": "b8", "date": "2026-02-02", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Burp Suite, Binary Ninja etc.", "excerpt": "Seeking: Any role that I can use my technical skills in. Security analyst, consultant, technical support etc. Location: Louisiana Remote: Yes, and/or on-site. I'm experienced with both. Willing to relocate: Yes Technologies: AWS, Java (SRC review), C++/C (SRC Review), C# (Basic), Burp Suite, Binary Ninja etc. R\u00e9sum\u00e9/CV: Full resume on request. Email: mcorkern1@tulane.edu GitHub: https://github.com/qf0 Misc: I have ov", "context": "two years security consulting and blue team", "use_case": "Reverse engineering", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (February 2026)"}, {"id": 748207648, "item_id": 46762978, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46762978", "by": "apaprocki", "date": "2026-01-26", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Check out Binary Ninja if you haven\u2019t. Especially if you have large binaries!", "excerpt": "Check out Binary Ninja if you haven\u2019t. Especially if you have large binaries!", "context": "", "use_case": "binary analysis", "switched_from": "", "story": "DDD was a great debugger \u2013 what would a modern equivalent look like today?"}, {"id": 745461825, "item_id": 46591364, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46591364", "by": "weinzierl", "date": "2026-01-12", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "They are as good as it gets when it comes to not choking on unusual binaries", "excerpt": "The famous \"A Whirlwind Tutorial on Creating Really Teensy ELF Executables for Linux\" tutorial has some good answers for you. https://www.muppetlabs.com/~breadbox/software/tiny/teensy.html In short: Compilers don't help l, but with a good macro assembler it is quite convenient. Maybe the author used custom tooling but the assembler route is the easiest if you only need this once or a couple of times. To the second qu", "context": "", "use_case": "Reverse engineering", "switched_from": "", "story": "This game is a single 13 KiB file that runs on Windows, Linux and in the Browser"}]}