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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
7.3
Number of Reviews
39
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (11th), Container Security (11th), SaaS Security Posture Management (SSPM) (1st), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (6th)
BMC Helix Cloud Security
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
25th
Ranking in Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
38th
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)
6th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
35
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (10th), Container Security (8th), API Security (3rd), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (5th), Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (7th), Cloud Detection and Response (CDR) (2nd), AI Security (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) category, the mindshare of Qualys TotalCloud is 1.5%, up from 1.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of BMC Helix Cloud Security is 1.2%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Orca Security is 4.9%, down from 6.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Orca Security4.9%
Qualys TotalCloud1.5%
BMC Helix Cloud Security1.2%
Other92.4%
Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
 

Featured Reviews

RO
IT Security Expert at Alior Bank S.A.
Unified risk scoring has improved our cloud visibility and simplifies remediation priorities
Qualys TotalCloud provides unified vulnerability and threat assessment across both IAS and SaaS. This solution provides a single prioritized view of risk, which helps reduce the work I would have to do. We are no longer based on CVSS; we are based on Qualys risk scoring, which is based on CVSS plus internal findings made by Qualys, and then assigns its own score. The TruRisk insight feature has found a small number of assets with high vulnerability scores, though I am cautious since some information is classified. Qualys TotalCloud has positively impacted our bank's performance, and we have definitely seen benefits after implementing this solution.
DG
Portfolio Manager/ Helix Administrator at Frontier Communications
A highly scalable and straightforward solution with a knowledgeable support team
We work on a third-party shared environment. It wouldn’t have been feasible for a smaller company. My company was actually the first one to do it. Just like any cloud security, it pays to do your research and have complimentary security involved. The product can’t be the be-all and end-all tool for your security. Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.
reviewer2800203 - PeerSpot reviewer
Assistant Manager at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
Cloud posture management has improved remediation and optimizes costs with contextual risk insights
Since I have not used Orca Security for 10 months, I am uncertain what areas still need improvement, as they may have rolled out features that addressed issues I faced in the past. However, I can say the tool is good. A few things could potentially be improved, particularly regarding false positives and the UI. What I observed is that they release updates to the platform without notifying the customer. Every time the UI is upgraded, they release something without notification. This could be a slight improvement. If they released some kind of notification to just inform the customer about UI changes, the customer would be aware of the changes that Orca Security is making in the backend.

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."
"Qualys TotalCloud's most valuable features are its cloud security posture management, Kubernetes, and container security capabilities."
"I highly recommend Qualys TotalCloud to other users."
"One of Qualys' best features is its categorization, which allows us to see the types of assets, their security postures, and the AI-powered version of the tool."
"The most valuable feature of Qualys TotalCloud is the visibility it provides."
"TotalCloud's best feature is the integration of cloud accounts. It helps with the risk and security posture management of our cloud infrastructure."
"Qualys TotalCloud provides a single, prioritized view based on requirements such as identifying the most vulnerable assets and calculating the average time to remediate vulnerabilities."
"It is a good tool to make sure that your containers are safe and sound."
"Role-based security is a valuable feature."
"The features that I've found most valuable are its container security aspect. I also like its vulnerability management tools."
"It's also multi-cloud. You can look at several cloud providers: AWS, Azure, or GCP."
"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."
"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."
"The most valuable aspects of BMC Helix Cloud Security are its security features and regulatory compliance capabilities."
"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."
"It's for protection. It's an agentless tool. We don't need to install anything at a customer's premises. We can just scan the entire assets in the cloud."
"The reporting and automated remediation capabilities are valuable to me. They're real game-changers."
"The best features of Orca Security include its ability to perform a lot of security controls without requiring any installation of agents, making it very easy to set up."
"I would rate the quality of support as nine stars out of ten due to their quick and helpful responses."
"The product itself is really good. It helped us streamline the way we access our servers."
"The initial setup is very easy."
"Orca Security has patented technologies. It's an agentless solution, so you don't need to install an agent. Instead, it contacts your account provider and fetches metadata, eliminating the need for snapshots or reserved space to copy client infrastructure."
"If I consider the analogy of the house, I expected to be able to see under the floor, what I did not expect was to be able to see behind all of the walls and through the ceiling and through the roof and into the basement, and everywhere."
 

Cons

"In TotalCloud, I would suggest improvements in policy checks to cater to various inventory types like VPCs, subnets, S3 buckets, or IAMs. There is a lack of data segregation according to criticality or inventory."
"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."
"The main area needing improvement is integration. Although the team is strengthening TotalCloud, integration can be enhanced with SIEM, SOAR, ITSM, and other sources."
"The downside is only in container security, but it has not been a long time since they introduced these models."
"In my opinion, what can be improved in Qualys TotalCloud includes pricing and container scanning."
"A feature improvement could be the inclusion of Windows OS support for container security, as it is currently only supported for Linux."
"Qualys TotalCloud needs to enhance its scanning capabilities in the IP domain, as it currently lacks the functionality to resolve IPs to their corresponding domain names."
"TotalCloud could improve its scanning of niche devices like Wi-Fi dongles and USB modems because they are often untested. It covers everything else, like laptops, mobile devices, and Bluetooth IoT devices. They can improve on the small IoT devices because hackers and testers use these."
"The UI could be more user-friendly."
"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 think its TOA interfaces are still not that comfortable. The UI could be more user-friendly, easier to use."
"The biggest challenge now, which is a good problem to have, with BMC Helix is content."
"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."
"I want the role-based security feature to be improved."
"BMC Helix Cloud Security has room for improvement in terms of integrating its various features."
"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."
"I experienced some problems with custom tags in Orca Security where I tried to separate the environment for business units so I could ask the tech lead responsible for that vulnerability to fix them."
"I think Orca could give me more alerts. It could give me a dashboard with all the specific types of alerts I want to see for the day. It should just be one click."
"I think the downside of Orca Security is the reports."
"They can expand a little bit in anti-malware detection. While we have pretty good confidence that it's going to detect some of the static malware, some of the detections are heuristics. There could be a growth in the library from where they're pulling their information, but we don't get a lot of those alerts based on the design of our products. In general, that might be an area that needs to be filled since they offer it as a service within it."
"I would be happy if they offered more automatic remediation options. They're working on that, but the more the better. For example, if they want you to harden a server, they would offer a hardening script that would be more aware of what's going on."
"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."
"The documentation for Orca Security could be improved."
"I have concerns about OCI support. When I work with Orca Security, the support for OCI is limited, so I cannot effectively work with the OCI environment."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers cost-effective licensing flexibility."
"Although Qualys TotalCloud is relatively expensive due to its unique automation features, its cost-effectiveness is rated an eight out of ten, with ten being the most costly."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers good pricing that is affordable and competitive with the market. Our partnership also provides us with additional benefits."
"The cost is high, but it meets our organizational needs."
"TotalCloud's price is about right where I would expect it to be."
"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."
"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."
"Orca Security charges are based on cloud workloads. So, it's based on workloads. If we look at one feature, it might be expensive."
"Orca is very competitive when compared to the alternatives and is not the most expensive in the market, that's for sure."
"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."
"Its license is a bit expensive."
"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."
"The price is a bit expensive for smaller organizations."
"Orca Security is cheaper compared to other solutions in the same space."
"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."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Construction Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Construction Company
16%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Performing Arts
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Construction Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise29
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise11
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Qualys TotalCloud?
Areas that need improvement in every solution include the remediation part. The remediation steps should be simple en...
What is your primary use case for Qualys TotalCloud?
Our use case involves the assets that we have under cloud, the assets exposed to the internet, and the internal appli...
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What needs improvement with Orca Security?
Orca Security could benefit from more agentic workflows, where agentic workflows could be integrated with Orca Securi...
What is your primary use case for Orca Security?
Orca Security serves as a centralized solution within our organization that offers scanning of all issues found in ou...
What advice do you have for others considering Orca Security?
The advice I would give is that you can make good use of the issues depending on different organizational use cases. ...
 

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: May 2026.
900,747 professionals have used our research since 2012.