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Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis vs FOSSA comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 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

Checkmarx Software Composit...
Ranking in Software Composition Analysis (SCA)
8th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
FOSSA
Ranking in Software Composition Analysis (SCA)
9th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.9
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Software Composition Analysis (SCA) category, the mindshare of Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis is 2.5%, down from 3.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of FOSSA is 3.4%, down from 4.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Software Composition Analysis (SCA)
 

Featured Reviews

Tharindu Malwenna - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient library identification and upgrade suggestions improve application security
We have many third-party libraries in our organization. I used Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis to identify all the libraries we use and determine whether they are used or unused within the application Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis provides identification of libraries and…
Hanumanth Ramsetty - PeerSpot reviewer
Proactively mitigate deployment vulnerabilities with seamless dependency tracking
Before using FOSSA, we could only identify issues after deployment in the Cloud Run. Now, with FOSSA, we identify dependency issues or vulnerabilities during the CI phase itself. This proactive approach has eliminated the need to search the internet for solutions, as FOSSA provides updated recommendations automatically. This has made the process more efficient and mitigated risks before deployment.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The tool's visual scan analysis shows me all the libraries' vulnerabilities and license types. It helps identify the most complex issues with licenses. It provides good visibility. SCA shows me all libraries that are vulnerable and the extent of their vulnerability."
"The product is stable and scalable."
"One of the strong points of this solution is that it allows you to incorporate it into a CICB pipeline. It has the ability to do incremental scans. If you scan a very large application, it might take two hours to do the initial scan. The subsequent scans, as people are making changes to the app, scan the Delta and are very fast. That's a really nice implementation. The way they have incorporated the functionality of the incremental scans is something to be aware of. It is quite good. It has been very solid. We haven't really had any issues, and it does what it advertises to do very nicely."
"What's most valuable in Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis is its ability to identify vulnerabilities in open-source components, especially if some critical issues exist."
"Checkmarx unifies all the features in its service."
"The customer service and support were good."
"We were able to reduce the number of vulnerable libraries by 50%, leading to significant operational improvement."
"The most valuable feature of Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis is the comprehensive security scan."
"Policies and identification of open-source licensing issues are the most valuable features. It reduces the time needed to identify open-source software licensing issues."
"The most valuable feature is definitely the ease and speed of integrating into build pipelines, like a Jenkins pipeline or something along those lines. The ease of a new development team coming on board and integrating FOSSA with a new project, or even an existing project, can be done so quickly that it's invaluable and it's easy to ask the developers to use a tool like this. Those developers greatly value the very quick feedback they get on any licensing or security vulnerability issues."
"FOSSA provided us with contextualized, easily actionable intelligence that alerted us to compliance issues. I could tell FOSSA exactly what I cared about and they would tell me when something was out of policy. I don't want to hear from the compliance tool unless I have an issue that I need to deal with. That was what was great about FOSSA is that it was basically "Here's my policy and only send me an alert if there's something without a policy." I thought that it was really good at doing that."
"I found FOSSA's out-of-the-box policy engine to be accurate and that it was tuned appropriately to the settings that we were looking for. The policy engine is pretty straightforward... I find it to be very straightforward to make small modifications to, but it's very rare that we have to make modifications to it. It's easy to use. It's a four-category system that handles most cases pretty well."
"The support team has just been amazing, and it helps us to have a great support team from FOSSA. They are there to triage and answer all our questions which come up by using their product."
"The scalability is excellent."
"FOSSA suggests solutions for dependency mismatches."
"FOSSA is easy to use and set up, provides relatively accurate results, and doesn't require armies of people to get value from its use."
 

Cons

"I would rate the scalability a seven out of ten."
"Some of the recommendations provided by the product are generic. Even if the recommendations provided by the product are of low level, the appropriate ones can help users deal with vulnerabilities."
"Personally, I currently use it as a standalone tool without integrating it with other systems, and it meets my needs adequately. As a suggestion, I request on considering to add a "what if" feature to the application. Currently, when the tool identifies issues and suggests updates, if I want to explore different scenarios, I need to prepare another file, turn it into a ZIP, and run the analysis again. It would be more convenient if there was a "what if" option in the GUI. This feature could simulate a run, allowing me to quickly check the impact of changing one or more files or versions without the need for a full rerun."
"I have received complaints from my customers that the pricing could be improved."
"It can have better licensing models."
"The quality of technical support has decreased over time, and it is not as good as it used to be."
"Parts of the implementation process could improve by making it more user-friendly."
"The solution could improve by determining the success factor of an upgrade, which is currently lacking."
"I would like the FOSSA API to be broader. I would like not to have to interact with the GUI at all, to do the work that I want to do. I would like them to do API-first development, rather than a focus on the GUI."
"The technical support has room for improvement."
"I wish there was a way that you could have a more global rollout of it, instead of having to do it in each repository individually. It's possible, that's something that is offered now, or maybe if you were using the CI Jenkins, you'd be able to do that. But with Travis, there wasn't an easy way to do that. At least not that I could find. That was probably the biggest issue."
"The solution provides contextualized, actionable, intelligence that alerts us to compliance issues, but there is still a little bit of work to be done on it. One of the issues that I have raised with FOSSA is that when it identifies an issue that is an error, why is it in error? What detail can they give to me? They've improved, but that still needs some work. They could provide more information that helps me to identify the dependencies and then figure out where they originated from."
"On the dashboard, there should be an option to increase the column width so that we can see the complete name of the GitHub repository. Currently, on the dashboard, we see the list of projects, but to see the complete name, you have to hover your mouse over an item, which is annoying."
"If you have thousands of applications, organizing them all into teams or tags is challenging."
"One thing that can sometimes be difficult with FOSSA is understanding all that it can do. One of the ways that I've been able to unlock some of those more advanced features is through conversations with the absolutely awesome customer success team at FOSSA, but it has been a little bit difficult to find some of that information separately on my own through FAQs and other information channels that FOSSA has. The improvement is less about the product itself and more about empowering FOSSA customers to know and understand how to unlock its full potential."
"FOSSA does not show the exact line of code with vulnerabilities, which adds time to the process as we have to locate these manually."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The license model is somewhat perplexing as it comprises multiple aspects that can be confusing for customers. The model is determined by the number of registered users and the number of projects being scanned, along with a third component that adds to the complexity."
"My customers need to pay for the licensing part, and they need to opt for an annual subscription."
"We don't have a license. The usage is limited to one, two, three, five, or ten people. It is currently used for all projects, and there are plans to increase its usage."
"It is a little bit high priced. It would be better if it was a little less expensive."
"Pricing for Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis needs to be competitive."
"Its price is reasonable as compared to the market. It is competitively priced in comparison to other similar solutions on the market. It is also quite affordable in terms of the value that it delivers as compared to its alternative of hiring a team."
"FOSSA is not cheap, but their offering is top-notch. It is very much a "you get what you pay for" scenario. Regardless of the price, I highly recommend FOSSA."
"FOSSA is a fairly priced product. It is not either cheaper or expensive. The pricing lies somewhere in the middle. The solution is worth the money that we are spending to use it."
"The solution's cost is a five out of ten."
"The solution's pricing is good and reasonable because you can literally use a lot of it for free."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
36%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Computer Software Company
9%
Educational Organization
4%
Manufacturing Company
26%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Educational Organization
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis?
The tool's visual scan analysis shows me all the libraries' vulnerabilities and license types. It helps identify the most complex issues with licenses. It provides good visibility. SCA shows me all...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis?
Pricing is complex and high for small organizations but offers great benefits for larger organizations. It is notably different compared to competitors like GitHub Advanced Security.
What needs improvement with Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis?
The solution could improve by determining the success factor of an upgrade, which is currently lacking.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for FOSSA?
The solution's pricing is good and reasonable because you can literally use a lot of it for free. You have to pay for the features you need, which I think is fair. If you want to get value for free...
What needs improvement with FOSSA?
FOSSA does not show the exact line of code with vulnerabilities, which adds time to the process as we have to locate these manually. Some other tools like Check Point or SonarQube provide exact lin...
What is your primary use case for FOSSA?
I have worked with FOSSA primarily to manage the dependencies in our projects. For example, if I take a Spring Boot application, FOSSA helps in identifying mismatches or unsupported dependencies th...
 

Also Known As

CxSCA
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

AXA, Liveperson, Aaron's, Playtech, Morningstar
AppDyanmic, Uber, Twitter, Zendesk, Confluent
Find out what your peers are saying about Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis vs. FOSSA and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
851,604 professionals have used our research since 2012.