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BMC Helix Cloud Security vs Orca Security comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 17, 2024

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

Qualys TotalCloud
Sponsored
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
8th
Ranking in Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
8th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
46
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (11th), Container Security (11th), SaaS Security Posture Management (SSPM) (2nd), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (7th)
BMC Helix Cloud Security
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
26th
Ranking in Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
36th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Orca Security
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
6th
Ranking in Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
7th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
41
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (7th), Container Security (9th), API Security (2nd), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (6th), Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (7th), Cloud Detection and Response (CDR) (2nd), AI Security (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) category, the mindshare of Qualys TotalCloud is 1.8%, up from 1.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of BMC Helix Cloud Security is 1.6%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Orca Security is 5.4%, down from 6.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Orca Security5.4%
Qualys TotalCloud1.8%
BMC Helix Cloud Security1.6%
Other91.2%
Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2859021 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr Security Engineer at a tech vendor with 5,001-10,000 employees
Risk-based triage has transformed container security and now prioritizes high-impact threats
The best features Qualys TotalCloud offers currently include managing cloud infrastructure and container security while facing major challenges such as alert fatigue. Traditional vulnerability scanners flag hundreds of CVEs on short-lived Kubernetes containers, some of which have no internet exposure or are gone before we can even triage them. I leverage Qualys TotalCloud to move beyond static CVSS. I use it to implement runtime exposure, correlation risk reprioritization, and shift-left integration. This notifies developers to fix a base image upstream rather than patching live ephemeral instances. In my work with cloud and container security, the biggest operational hurdle was alert fatigue. I use Qualys to shift left from static CVSS severity to context-aware risk prioritization. I correlated raw vulnerability data with real-time risk factors such as public network exposure, active runtime execution, or overly permissive IAM roles. This allows us to immediately drop the priority of isolated containers and escalate lower-severity CVEs that sit on an exposed, high-risk path. We can map these findings directly back to our CI/CD pipelines so developers can patch the root base images upstream. We have drastically cut down the signal-to-noise ratio, saved a lot of manual hours doing triage work, and ensured engineering effort goes directly towards high-impact risk reduction.
GregoireSoukiassian - PeerSpot reviewer
Consultant at Ministry of Research and Education
Effectively addresses security concerns but could use enhancement in terms of integration
BMC Helix Cloud Security has room for improvement in terms of integrating its various features. It currently consists of separate point solutions that don't flow together as seamlessly as they could. This lack of integration, unlike platforms like ServiceNow, may be due to historical factors. Enhancing this integration would make it a more compelling choice from a business perspective and offer a smoother user experience. In the next release of BMC Helix Cloud Security, I would like to see additional features, particularly AI integration, which has already been announced. AI integration could bring more precision to the platform, making it even more interesting and effective.
Nykole Denoo - PeerSpot reviewer
Cyber Security Analyst at BNY
Cloud risk visibility has transformed how I prioritize threats and reduce unnecessary spend
From my perspective, Orca Security is a really good tool. I would say one area I would like to see CNAPP platforms get is more intelligence when it comes to risk prioritization, which correlates with vulnerability, exposing assets, identities, and active threats to help the security team focus on risks that are more likely to be exploited. I am a huge advocate for automation. I also think deeper automation for remediation or stronger integration with ticketing and CI/CD pipelines or more customization would help. Executive reporting would help the security team respond significantly faster and communicate risk more effectively if those kinds of improvements are made.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Qualys TotalCloud has significantly improved our organization by automating our reporting processes, reducing the time spent on report creation from two hours to less than fifteen to twenty minutes."
"The dashboards are particularly valuable as they offer a comprehensive view of the environment, highlighting any misconfigurations."
"The biggest strengths of Qualys TotalCloud are that it is pretty good at cloud visibility, has easy integration, and also has multi-cloud compatibility."
"I found the initial setup user-friendly."
"I would rate Qualys TotalCloud ten out of ten."
"The agent and agentless scanning in TotalCloud, particularly the FlexScan method, is incredibly valuable. With traditional scanning approaches, we had to give IP ranges and whitelist IPs. All that is now simplified. FlexScan requires minimal intervention, and after configuration, it automatically collects data and performs necessary scans."
"The most valuable feature of Qualys TotalCloud is the visibility it provides."
"The best feature would be the ability to create policies. It is easy to control and update policies as required."
"The most valuable aspects of BMC Helix Cloud Security are its security features and regulatory compliance capabilities."
"The features that I've found most valuable are its container security aspect. I also like its vulnerability management tools."
"The cool feature of Helix Cloud Security is that you can do all that — understand and remediate issues — in one dashboard, based on the different policies that are available for security, out-of-the-box."
"Using this solution is an eye-opener; having that holistic view is the biggest eye-opener because you understand, from any of your connected cloud accounts, what your vulnerabilities are with it."
"It is a good tool to make sure that your containers are safe and sound."
"Role-based security is a valuable feature."
"It's also multi-cloud. You can look at several cloud providers: AWS, Azure, or GCP."
"The best feature is time to value. With very minimal effort, you are able to have a cohesive view into your security posture on one or multiple cloud accounts, particularly if you are dealing with multicloud. If you have Azure and AWS deployments, you might have multiple subscriptions in Azure and usually multiple accounts in AWS. You may even be doing some GCP work (around Google Cloud Platform). It's very difficult to manage a common set of policies, even less reporting, across multiple subscriptions, accounts, and cloud environments. What BMC Helix Cloud Security does is provide a unified view or single pane of glass as to your baseline. Then, it also facilitates the ability for Level 1 or 2 operations support to take action and report on security vulnerabilities."
"With the way it works, having visibility across the org is hands down the biggest benefit for us."
"Orca is much better than their competitor; they're the best in their space, they're the best in the security tool industry, and they're probably the best in terms of companies that I've worked with in general."
"Orca Security has helped significantly to reduce the time it took to identify or prioritize cloud security alerts because of the way it provides a centralized view of risk and correlated findings across the cloud environment."
"Overall, I think Orca Security is the leader because of the strategic features I mentioned."
"It covers our entire multi-cloud environment in a single view and tells us everything we need to know about our vulnerability footprint."
"I find Orca Security's CIEM feature invaluable, as it focuses on entitlement and posture management, identifying assets with older OS versions, and asset misconfiguration."
"Orca Security is the best one for me because it delivers all the things that I need and more."
"Orca Security has helped our organization become compliant and maintain high standards because any organization with multiple products needs to be compliant, especially when it comes to underlying infrastructure and cloud resources."
 

Cons

"A feature improvement could be the inclusion of Windows OS support for container security, as it is currently only supported for Linux."
"Overall, we are satisfied with it. However, the response part of the Cloud Detection and Response (CDR) module can be improved. It is not yet in place according to requirements; it is not completely available even though the module has been released."
"I think Qualys TotalCloud needs to improve its handling of zero-day vulnerabilities and supply chain management because modern ransomware attacks not only target prime critical infrastructures but also the supply chain system."
"In a future release, I suggest that zero-day vulnerabilities should be predicted in advance using AI technologies. The system is not 100% secure yet, so proactive threat hunting could be enhanced to be more proactive than the current system."
"Enhancing clarity regarding its compliance capabilities would be beneficial, as the current scope is limited in geographic coverage."
"An area for improvement would be to focus on risks related to AI, such as large language models and potential data leakage."
"Qualys' customer service provides quality answers, but the response time is long, even though it is within the SLA."
"There should be improvement from a dashboard perspective when collecting and showcasing data to lead management."
"We've had some with issues connectors. The connectors have seemed to have caused a little bit of trouble, perhaps with the APIs trying to scan the environment. The only time I've had to reach out to tech support was for that. It seems it may not have been scanning correctly or I wasn't seeing data within a specific time. But we've set up a couple of connectors in the past couple of weeks and they actually scanned the AWS environment and we had data within about 10 minutes. It's working a lot faster and I think they're making improvements as they go."
"Every organization out there doesn't rely on just one control body. They use FISMA control. They may use HIPAA, CIS, PCI, or SOX, then blend them. One of the things that is now in big demand for BMC Helix Cloud Security is content. That's the next journey in its lifespan, making it easier for the community to share and collaborate on content for security controls that can be measured and remediated."
"The UI could be more user-friendly."
"BMC Helix Cloud Security has room for improvement in terms of integrating its various features."
"We've had some issues with connectors; the connectors have seemed to cause a little bit of trouble, perhaps with the APIs trying to scan the environment."
"I want the role-based security feature to be improved."
"The biggest challenge now, which is a good problem to have, with BMC Helix is content."
"I think its TOA interfaces are still not that comfortable. The UI could be more user-friendly, easier to use."
"Orca Security can improve the way that a customer can create auto-remediation without depending on support to do that."
"Another improvement would be that, in addition to focusing on endpoint compliance, they would focus on general compliance."
"I would like to see an option to do security checks on a code level."
"Some visualizations and dashboards in Orca Security were not as clear to me; even though I can edit and modify them as much as I prefer, the dashboards that came with the application were not ideal."
"Some dashboards could be a little more personalized for each company and have more options to show the real data we need for our leadership."
"Orca Security could improve its ticket creation process. Currently, it allows for creating tickets in only one bucket, which requires monitoring to redirect tickets to the appropriate team."
"Orca Security could support its own ticketing tool, which would be helpful for security personnel so they would not need to integrate with any other ticketing tool."
"The presentation of the data in the dashboard is a little bit chaotic."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Qualys TotalCloud is cost-efficient and was selected for its value compared to other products."
"TotalCloud's price is about right where I would expect it to be."
"It isn't cheap, but it's reasonable. It helps us to manage things with very few resources."
"Its price seems higher compared to other tools, but it is worth it. If they could adjust the pricing and make it comparable with other tools, that would be great."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers competitive pricing given its comprehensive suite of features, including integration, assessment, remediation, and detection capabilities, all within a single platform."
"The pricing is comparable. It is built into our other product, so I cannot piecemeal it. It is a part of our subscription."
"While Qualys TotalCloud's pricing is currently acceptable, it is becoming increasingly expensive and may soon be considered overpriced."
"The pricing for TotalCloud is attractive and competitive in the market. Given the features, especially the dashboard, I have no concerns regarding pricing."
"The pricing is based on an annual subscription, upfront, and it's based on cloud assets. Whether your assets are in Azure and AWS combined, the tool tells you how many assets are being scanned and that's the number used for pricing."
"It is a subscription model with term licensing that is usually yearly. This includes, not only the product, but support and maintenance. It is based on cloud assets. Therefore, if you have 100 cloud assets, those cloud assets are measured based on evaluation or transactions. For example, if I'm evaluating that cloud asset for CIS compliance, PCI compliance, and AWS best practices, that asset gets evaluated three times, as those are three transactions. However, the license model is based on peak asset usage. So, over a year, if you deploy 100, 1000, 500, and then 2000 assets, you will be charged for the 2000 peak of assets managed by Helix Cloud Security."
"We have a total of 25 licenses for this solution. The solution is on a pay-and-you-use model."
"The price is a bit expensive for smaller organizations."
"I think their pricing model is aligned with market demand. Of course, Orca could probably better align their pricing model with the needs of smaller businesses as well as some larger-scale enterprises with millions of assets. But in all fairness, I think the Orca sales team has been accommodating and ensured that we're happy with the pricing."
"The pricing depends on how many assets you have running in your cloud and how many environments you have. If you have a dev environment, test environment, and a production environment then it's really important that you have coverage for all of them."
"While it's competitive with Palo Alto Prisma, I think Orca's list price is very high. I would advise Orca to lower it because, at that price, I might consider alternatives like Wiz, which also offers agentless services."
"Orca Security charges are based on cloud workloads. So, it's based on workloads. If we look at one feature, it might be expensive."
"The most expensive solution is Palo Alto. They claim to be very robust. The next most expensive is Wiz, followed by Orca and all the rest."
"Its license is a bit expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
16%
Outsourcing Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Construction Company
19%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Performing Arts
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Outsourcing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business14
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise34
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business18
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise16
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Qualys TotalCloud?
In terms of improvement, remediation still belongs to the cloud team, which is one of the issues we faced with Qualys...
What is your primary use case for Qualys TotalCloud?
My main use case for Qualys TotalCloud is regarding the cloud visibility that we were not having previously. Previous...
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What needs improvement with Orca Security?
Regarding how Orca Security can be improved, I think there is not much; it is fully completed and it is great.
What is your primary use case for Orca Security?
My main use case for Orca Security is to secure infrastructure, course, and service. A specific example of how I use ...
What advice do you have for others considering Orca Security?
My advice to others looking into using Orca Security is to practice and study the platform in test scenarios. My impr...
 

Also Known As

Qualys TotalCloud with FlexScan
TrueSight Cloud Security, SecOps Policy Service
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
NHS, Vodafone, Kansas City Life, SKY Italia, Cybera
BeyondTrust, Postman, Digital Turbine, Solarisbank, Lemonade, C6 Bank, Docebo, Vercel, and Vivino
Find out what your peers are saying about BMC Helix Cloud Security vs. Orca Security and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
913,806 professionals have used our research since 2012.