Acunetix vs Contrast Security Protect comparison

Why PeerSpot?

Invicti and Contrast Security are both solutions in the Application Security Tools category. Invicti is ranked #16 with an average rating of 8.0, while Contrast Security is ranked #36. Invicti holds a 2.4% mindshare in AS, compared to Contrast Security’s 1.1% mindshare. Additionally, 89% of Invicti users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Contrast Security users who would recommend it.

Acunetix

Read 36 Acunetix reviews

11,992 Views
5,756 Comparison Views

89% willing to recommend

Contrast Security Protect

Read 3 Contrast Security Protect reviews

2,299 Views
2,184 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Acunetix

Contrast Security Protect

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 8, 2024

Acunetix and Contrast Security Protect compete in application security testing. While Acunetix is known for usability and pricing, Contrast Security Protect wins favor for advanced security features.

Features: Acunetix is valued for its comprehensive vulnerability scanning, automation abilities, and detailed reporting tools. Contrast Security Protect is noted for runtime application self-protection, dynamic analysis, and real-time threat detection.

Room for Improvement: Acunetix can enhance integration with development workflows, reporting details, and speed in processing. Contrast Security Protect could improve usability, reduce performance impact, and streamline its feature complexity.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Acunetix is praised for its straightforward setup and responsive support. Contrast Security Protect requires more deployment time due to its complexity but offers comprehensive customer service.

Pricing and ROI: Acunetix is competitively priced, attractive to small and medium businesses, offering a solid ROI. Contrast Security Protect has a higher initial cost but suggests greater ROI for large enterprises due to its extensive features.

To learn more, read our detailed Acunetix vs. Contrast Security Protect Report (Updated: September 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Acunetix vs. Contrast Security Protect

September 2026

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Acunetix

Ranking in Application Security Tools

16th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Static Application Security Testing (SAST) (11th), Vulnerability Management (30th), DevSecOps (8th)

Contrast Security Protect

Ranking in Application Security Tools

36th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

5.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Application Security Tools category, the mindshare of Acunetix is 2.4%, down from 2.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Contrast Security Protect is 1.1%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Security Tools Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Acunetix	2.4%
Contrast Security Protect	1.1%
Other	96.5%

Application Security Tools

Featured Reviews

Rahul Kumar

Senior Engineer - Penetration Tester at a government with 10,001+ employees

Identifies vulnerabilities across bulk web applications but needs better support and cleaner reports

The best feature Acunetix offers is the centralized dashboard and the quality of reports it generates, which includes various options for selecting reports and developer options for directly sharing the reports with developers. The centralized dashboard of Acunetix gives visibility into the security aspects of mass applications; for instance, with more than 200 applications, it provides a valuable overview of findings and necessary fixes, along with a high-level summary that helps us achieve compliance through monthly and sometimes weekly scanning. In terms of reporting, Acunetix is excellent because it can generate different types of reports, such as an executive summary report, detailed reports, and developer reports that can be shared directly with developers. Acunetix positively impacts my organization by helping identify outdated libraries and applications, including legacy applications vulnerable to old attacks based on OWASP Top 10, thus aiding in compliance checks for PCI DSS and OWASP. Acunetix provides a centralized report with compliance-related aspects and a vulnerability timeline, effectively helping reduce vulnerabilities and save time.

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ToddMcAlister

Lead Application and Data Security Engineer at a insurance company with 5,001-10,000 employees

It provides us with more in-depth visibility into ongoing attacks.

I rate Contrast Security Protect eight out of 10. Overall, it's a solid product, but I deduct a couple of points because of the interface and some shortcomings in the reporting. If you have a large enterprise where you're dealing with a lot of servers, then it makes sense not to use the internal MySQL database. You should use something like Oracle or Microsoft SQL, but if you don't have many transactions, the embedded MySQL database works great.

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Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"Acunetix has an awesome crawler. It gives a referral site map of near targets and also goes really deep to find all the inputs without issues. This was valuable because it helped me find some files or directories, like web admin panels without authentication, which were hidden."

"It comes equipped with an internal applicator, which automatically identifies and addresses vulnerabilities within the program."

"After two years it's about 300%."

"The scalability is good. The scalability is more than good because it can operate both as a standalone and it can be integrated as part of applications. So that really makes it a very, very versatile solution to have."

"Every organization who has their assets over the internet and are exposed to a public website needs to have vulnerability assessment using Acunetix."

"The automated approach to these repetitive discovery attempts would take days to do manually and therefore it helps reduce the time needed to do an assessment."

"Overall, the tool is efficient enough to identify and track your vulnerabilities and it's good for intelligence scanning purposes."

"By integrating with CI/CD tools, it enables a shift-left approach in the development process."

More Acunetix pros

"The Protect solution allows applications to continue to run, even with known vulnerabilities, but will report or block attempts to exploit the vulnerabilities."

"The solution has excellent real-time capabilities."

"Contrast Security's support is great. They're willing to spend a lot of time on your problem."

"The product gives a few false positives. We get 99 percent true positives."

"Protect provides us with more in-depth visibility into ongoing attacks."

Cons

"Acunetix needs to be dynamic with JavaScript code, unlike Netsparker which can scan complex agents."

"The pricing is a bit on the higher side."

"The costs for the licensing have changed and it's not in our favor which is why we're now looking at other options."

"While we do have it integrated with other solutions, it could still offer more integrations."

"Our experience with Acunetix has not been good, so we are in the process of switching solutions."

"When monitoring the traffic we always have issues with the bandwidth consumption and the throttling of traffic."

"The jargon used makes it difficult for project managers to understand the issues, and the technical explanations used make it difficult for developers to understand issues. These things should be simplified much more. That would be very helpful for us when explaining to them what needs to be fixed. The report output needs to be simplified."

"There is room for improvement in the pricing."

More Acunetix cons

"We're not using it much anymore because we had some performance issues."

"Protect's reporting GUI is very basic. To get all statuses from the APIs, we needed to write our own KPI dashboard to provide reports."

"There's room for improvement in the initial setup."

"Contrast Security Protect needs to improve integration."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is a little high, and moreover, it's kind of domain-based."

"The cost is based on two types of licenses, ConsultLite, and ConsultPlus, as well as the number of domains that are scanned."

"All things considered, I think it has a good price/value ratio."

"When compared with other products, the pricing is a little bit high. But it gives value for the price. It serves the purpose and is worthwhile for the price we pay."

"The price is exceptionally high."

"Acunetix was around the same price as all the other vendors we looked at, nothing special."

"The costs aren't very expensive. It costs around $3000 or $4000."

"The solution is expensive."

More Acunetix pricing and cost advice

Information not available

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Computer Software Company

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

17%

Manufacturing Company

Construction Company

Outsourcing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	18
Midsize Enterprise	7
Large Enterprise	19

No data available

Questions from the Community

What is your primary use case for Acunetix Vulnerability Scanner?

In a typical enterprise environment, Acunetix is mainly used for visibility, detection, and investigation across network traffic. The main use cases usually fall into a few core areas, with primary...

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What advice do you have for others considering Acunetix Vulnerability Scanner?

I advise that Acunetix is the best option. Invest time in proper initial configuration and scope definitions. The tool is powerful, but its effectiveness depends heavily on how the authenticated ar...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Acunetix?

Everything is perfect and good, including the pricing and all related aspects.

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Compared 9% of the time

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Compared 9% of the time

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Compared 7% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Acunetix

September 2026

Download Acunetix product report

Buyer's Guide

Application Security Tools

September 2026

Download Contrast Security Protect product report

Also Known As

AcuSensor

Contrast Protect

Overview

Acunetix is a dynamic application security tool used globally for web application vulnerability scanning, focusing on SQL injection and cross-site scripting.

Acunetix provides a comprehensive web vulnerability assessment platform designed for identifying and remediating security threats. Users benefit from its ability to schedule scans, boasting a fast detection rate for common vulnerabilities. The tool's centralized dashboard helps organizations with compliance monitoring and features such as crawling and login sequence enhancements, contributing depth to its security assessments. Despite high praise for its integration capabilities and automated scanning that saves time, pricing and false positives present challenges. Organizations often use Acunetix to maintain internal security and evaluate pre-release environments.

What are Acunetix's main features?

Comprehensive Reporting: Detailed reports assist in security analysis and compliance audits.
User-Friendly Interface: Simple navigation enhances user experience.
Scheduled Scans: Automation of scans allows for continuous monitoring.
Fast Detection: Quickly identifies vulnerabilities like SQL injection and cross-site scripting.
Integration Capabilities: Scalable solutions with compatibility across applications.
Crawling & Login Sequence: Improves depth in security analysis.

What benefits should businesses look for in reviews?

Low False Positive Rate: Accurate vulnerability detection saves time in analysis.
Time Efficiency: Automated scans reduce manual workload, improving team productivity.
Scalability: Integration features help accommodate growth and complexity.
Compliance Support: Centralized dashboard supports regulatory compliance checks.

In industries like finance, healthcare, and technology, Acunetix assists in protecting sensitive data through robust scanning and reporting capabilities. Its ability to perform dynamic assessments makes it a chosen tool in regulatory environments and development settings, offering both internal security inspections and pre-release evaluations.

Invicti

Contrast Security Protect is an innovative security solution designed to provide continuous protection for applications through real-time analysis and automatic detection of vulnerabilities, ensuring robust safeguard measures during development and deployment phases.

Designed for advanced application security, Contrast Security Protect integrates seamlessly into DevOps workflows, offering continuous monitoring and protection against potential threats. Its intelligent architecture delivers in-depth insights and real-time analytics, enabling faster intervention to prevent breaches and maintain operational integrity. Facilitation of risk management is enhanced by in-app guidance and prompt alerts, supporting developers in addressing vulnerabilities efficiently.

What are the key features of Contrast Security Protect?

Real-Time Monitoring: Constantly checks applications for security breaches and vulnerabilities as they run.
Automated Threat Detection: Identifies and neutralizes threats without manual intervention.
Developer-Focused Insights: Provides actionable insights for developers to improve application security promptly.
Seamless DevOps Integration: Ensures smooth incorporation into existing DevOps practices.
In-App Guidance: Offers guidance within the application for resolving vulnerabilities.

What benefits and ROI can users expect?

Enhanced Security Posture: Offers continuous protection, reducing the risk of data breaches.
Increased Efficiency: Minimizes manual effort for identifying and correcting vulnerabilities.
Operational Integrity: Maintains uninterrupted business operations by mitigating threats swiftly.
Cost Savings: Reduces potential expenses related to data breaches and compliance penalties.

Contrast Security Protect is particularly beneficial in industries with stringent compliance requirements such as finance and healthcare, where application security is critical. By implementing these solutions, organizations in these sectors can effectively manage risk while ensuring compliance, enhancing overall security infrastructure.

Contrast Security

Sample Customers

Joomla!, Digicure, Team Random, Credit Suisse, Samsung, Air New Zealand

Williams-Sonoma, Autodesk, HUAWEI, Chromeriver, RingCentral, Demandware.

Buyer's Guide

Acunetix vs. Contrast Security Protect

September 2026

Free Report: Acunetix vs. Contrast Security Protect

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