Core Impact and Cobalt Strike are two powerful tools that help organizations assess the security of their environments. Though they share the same goal of providing insights to help bolster security efforts, they are otherwise distinct tools with unique features.

Core Impact is a penetration testing tool, primarily used for exploitation and lateral movements in various environments. Cobalt Strike, on the other hand, is threat emulation software, primarily used to simulate adversarial post-exploitation scenarios, and to support Red Team operations.

While these tools have clear differences, they are still both tools used for evaluating cybersecurity, so there are understandably a few key features that overlap. However, even these overlapping features have their own distinctions within each tool. This document provides an overview of the key functionalities of each of these tools, their similarities, and how they can be used together to amplify your pen testing efforts.