Cracking may refer to:

• Cracking, the formation of a fracture or partial fracture in a solid material studied as fracture mechanics
  • Performing a sternotomy
• Fluid catalytic cracking, a catalytic process widely used in oil refineries for cracking large hydrocarbon molecules into smaller molecules
• Cracking (chemistry), the decomposition of complex organic molecules into smaller ones
• Cracking joints, the practice of manipulating one's bone joints to make a sharp sound
• Cracking codes, see cryptanalysis
• Whip cracking
• Safe cracking
• Crackin', band featuring Lester Abrams
• Packing and cracking, a method of creating voting districts to give a political party an advantage

In computing:

• Another name for security hacking; the practice of defeating computer security.
• Password cracking, the process of discovering the plaintext of an encrypted computer password.
• Software cracking, the defeating of software copy protection.