Security Tools

TLS Cipher Suite Reference

Search or browse common TLS cipher suite names to see whether each is considered strong, acceptable, or weak/deprecated.

TLS_AES_256_GCM_SHA384Strong

TLS 1.3 cipher suite — current best practice.

TLS_AES_128_GCM_SHA256Strong

TLS 1.3 cipher suite — current best practice.

TLS_CHACHA20_POLY1305_SHA256Strong

TLS 1.3, especially fast on devices without AES hardware acceleration.

ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384Strong

TLS 1.2 with forward secrecy and AEAD encryption — widely recommended.

ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256Strong

TLS 1.2 with forward secrecy and AEAD encryption — widely recommended.

ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384Acceptable

Forward secrecy, but CBC mode instead of AEAD — acceptable but not preferred.

AES256-GCM-SHA384Acceptable

AEAD encryption, but no forward secrecy (static RSA key exchange).

DES-CBC3-SHAWeak/Deprecated

3DES — deprecated due to the Sweet32 birthday attack.

RC4-SHAWeak/Deprecated

RC4 has known biases making it cryptographically broken — disabled in all modern browsers.

TLS_RSA_WITH_NULL_SHAWeak/Deprecated

NULL cipher provides no encryption at all.

EXP-RC4-MD5Weak/Deprecated

A 1990s-era US export-grade cipher, trivially breakable today.

Covers a representative sample, not every cipher suite that exists — check your server or client's actual negotiated suite against current guidance (e.g. Mozilla's TLS configuration recommendations) for a full audit.

How to use this tool

  1. 1Search for a cipher suite name.
  2. 2See its security rating and a brief explanation.

Frequently asked questions

Where would I see a cipher suite name to look up?+

In a TLS/SSL scan report (like Qualys SSL Labs), a browser's connection security details, or your web server's TLS configuration file.