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Contrast Security Assess vs Veracode comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 8, 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

Contrast Security Assess
Ranking in Application Security Tools
29th
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
27th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Veracode
Ranking in Application Security Tools
3rd
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
2nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
208
Ranking in other categories
Container Security (8th), Software Composition Analysis (SCA) (3rd), Static Code Analysis (1st), Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST) (1st), Application Security Posture Management (ASPM) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Application Security Tools category, the mindshare of Contrast Security Assess is 1.3%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Veracode is 4.6%, down from 10.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Security Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Veracode4.6%
Contrast Security Assess1.3%
Other94.1%
Application Security Tools
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer1605099 - PeerSpot reviewer
Director of Threat and Vulnerability Management at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees
We're gathering vulnerability data from multiple environments in real time, fundamentally changing how we identify issues in applications
The solution is very accurate in identifying vulnerabilities. In cases where we are performing application assessment using Contrast Assess, and also using legacy application security testing tools, Contrast successfully identifies the same vulnerabilities that the other tools have identified but it also identifies significantly more. In addition, it has visibility into application components that other testing methodologies are unaware of. Assess also provides the option of helping developers incorporate security elements while they're writing code. It depends on whether individual developers decide to utilize the information that's provided to them from the solution, but it definitely gives them visibility into more environments. It gives them an opportunity to remediate vulnerabilities well before production deployments.
reviewer2703864 - PeerSpot reviewer
Head of Security Architecture at a healthcare company with 5,001-10,000 employees
Onboarding developers successfully while improving code security through IDE integration
Regarding room for improvement, we have some problems when onboarding new projects because the build process has to be done in a certain way, as Veracode analyzes the binaries and not the code by itself alone. If the process is not configured correctly, it doesn't work. That's one of the things that we are discussing with Veracode. Something positive that we've been able to do is submit formal feature requests to them, and they are working on them; they've already solved some of them. This encourages us to propose new ideas and improvements. Another improvement that we asked for this use case is to be able to configure how Veracode Fix proposes and fixes because sometimes it makes proposals using libraries that go against our architecture design made by the enterprise architecture team. For example, we want them to propose using another library, and that's something we already asked Veracode, and they are working on it. We want to specify when you see this kind of vulnerability, you can only propose these two options.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I am impressed with the product's identification of alerts and vulnerabilities."
"By far, the thing that was able to provide value was the immediate response while testing ahead of release, in real-time."
"The accuracy of the solution in identifying vulnerabilities is better than any other product we've used, far and away. In our internal comparisons among different tools, Contrast consistently finds more impactful vulnerabilities, and also identifies vulnerabilities that are nearly guaranteed to be there, meaning that the chance of false positives is very low."
"When we access the application, it continuously monitors and detects vulnerabilities."
"It is a stable solution...Contrast Security Assess is one of the first players in this market, so they have experience and customers, especially abroad. Overall, it's a good product."
"In our most critical applications, we have a deep dive in the code evaluation, which was something we usually did with periodic vulnerability assessments, code reviews, etc. Now, we have real time access to it. It's something that has greatly enhanced our code's quality. We have actually embedded a KPI in regards to the improvement of our code shell. For example, Contrast provides a baseline where libraries and the usability of the code are evaluated, and they produce a score. We always aim to improve that score. On a quarterly basis, we have added this to our KPIs."
"The most valuable feature is the continuous monitoring aspect: the fact that we don't have to wait for scans to complete for the tool to identify vulnerabilities. They're automatically identified through developers' business-as-usual processes."
"The solution is very accurate in identifying vulnerabilities. In cases where we are performing application assessment using Contrast Assess, and also using legacy application security testing tools, Contrast successfully identifies the same vulnerabilities that the other tools have identified but it also identifies significantly more. In addition, it has visibility into application components that other testing methodologies are unaware of."
"The dependency graph visualization provides the ability to see nested dependencies within libraries for pinpointing vulnerabilities."
"The most valuable features are that you can do static analysis and dynamic analysis on a scheduled basis and that you can push the findings into JIRA."
"It is easy to use for us developers. It supports so many languages: C#, .NET Core, .NET Framework, and it even scans some of our JavaScript. You just need the extension to upload the files and the reports are generated with so much detail."
"Veracode provides guidance for fixing vulnerabilities. It enables developers to write secure code from the start by pointing them to the problematic line of code, and saying, "This function/method has security vulnerabilities," then suggests alternatives to fix it. Then, we adopt their suggestions of the tool. By implementing it in the right way, we can fix the issue. For example, if the tool has found a method where it copied one piece of memory into another piece of memory in the code. The tool points to problematic methods with the vulnerability and provides ways to code it more securely. By adopting their suggestions, we are fixing this vulnerability."
"I like Veracode's integration with our CI/CD. It automatically scans our code when we do the build. It can also detect any security flaws in our third-party libraries. Veracode is good at pinpointing the sections of code that have vulnerabilities."
"Veracode enables us to build a strong data security layer in our platforms. We can increase customer confidence in data security. Some PCI/HIPAA compliance issues were impossible to resolve without Veracode."
"I like the sandbox, the ability to upload compiled code, and how easy it is."
"It provides security of different Shadow IT activities in our environment, especially around application development and website hosting."
 

Cons

"I think there was activity underway to support the centralized configuration control. There are ways to do it, but I think they were productizing more of that."
"The solution needs to improve flexibility...The scalability of the product is a problem in the solution, especially from a commercial perspective."
"To instrument an agent, it has to be running on a type of application technology that the agent recognizes and understands. It's excellent when it works. If we're using an application that is using an unsupported technology, then we can't instrument it at all. We do use PHP and Contrast presently doesn't support that, although it's on their roadmap. My primary hurdle is that it doesn't support all of the technologies that we use."
"Contrast's ability to support upgrades on the actual agents that get deployed is limited. Our environment is pretty much entirely Java. There are no updates associated with that. You have to actually download a new version of the .jar file and push that out to your servers where your app is hosted. That can be quite cumbersome from a change-management perspective."
"Regarding the solution's OSS feature, the one drawback that we do have is that it does not have client-side support. We'll be missing identification of libraries like jQuery or JavaScript, and such, that are client-side."
"The product's retesting part needs improvement. The tool also needs improvement in the suggestions provided for fixing vulnerabilities. It relies more on documentation rather than on quick fixes."
"Contrast Security Assess covers a wide range of applications like .NET Framework, Java, PSP, Node.js, etc. But there are some like Ubuntu and the .NET Core which are not covered. They have it in their roadmap to have these agents. If they have that, we will have complete coverage."
"The solution should provide more details in the section where it shows that third-party libraries have CVEs or some vulnerabilities."
"We would like the consolidation of all the different modules. This would help, so then we would be able to see analytics and results on one screen, like a single pane of glass."
"There is much to be desired of UI and user experience. The UI is very slow. With every click, it just takes a lot of time for the pages to load. We have seen this consistently since getting this solution. The UI and UX are very disjointed."
"We have encountered occasional issues with scalability."
"It could be improved with support for more programming languages, like SQL."
"The only notable problem we have had is that when new versions of Swift have come out, we have found Veracode tends to be a bit behind in updates to support the new language changes."
"The results of agent-based software composition analysis are not connected to policy scanning. So, for me, the only thing that Veracode can improve in Software Composition Analysis is to connect it with the policy scan because, at present, it is a bit inconvenient for those in our organization who use agent-based Software Composition Analysis. In the end, they need to make a static scan with all those libraries in order to receive that report. If Veracode implemented a connection between agent-based static scan and static scanning itself, it would be great because it would lead to fewer operations in order to prepare release documentation and release reporting from Veracode. We recently had a conversation with Veracode about it."
"Maybe the boards could be made easier to understand or easier to customize."
"Veracode would benefit greatly from more training resources. The videos are great, but I would like more hands-on training writing a script, validating a script with a unit test in a different language, etc. That's something that would be very valuable."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I like the per-application licensing model... We just license the app and we look at different vulnerabilities on that app and we remediate within the app. It's simpler."
"For what it offers, it's a very reasonable cost. The way that it is priced is extremely straightforward. It works on the number of applications that you use, and you license a server. It is something that is extremely fair, because it doesn't take into consideration the number of requests, etc. It is only priced based on the number of onboarded applications. It suits our model as well, because we have huge traffic. Our number of applications is not that large, so the pricing works great for us."
"The good news is that the agent itself comes in two different forms: the unlicensed form and the licensed form. Unlicensed gives use of that software composition analysis for free. Thereafter, if you apply a license to that same agent, that's when the instrumentation takes hold. So one of my suggestions is to do what we're doing: Deploy the agent to as many applications as possible, with just the SCA feature turned on with no license applied, and then you can be more choosy and pick which teams will get the license applied."
"The product's pricing is low. I would rate it a two out of ten."
"The solution is expensive."
"You only get one license for an application. Ours are very big, monolithic applications with millions of lines of code. We were able to apply one license to one monolithic application, which is great. We are happy with the licensing. Pricing-wise, they are industry-standard, which is fine."
"It's a tiered licensing model. The more you buy, as you cross certain quantity thresholds, the pricing changes. If you have a smaller environment, your licensing costs are going to be different than a larger environment... The licensing is primarily per application. An application can be as many agents as you need. If you've got 10 development servers and 20 production servers and 50 QA servers, all of those agents can be reporting as a single application that utilizes one license."
"The licensing is fair, it is time-limited (e.g. one year) but there is a size cap for every app. If your applications are big (due third-party libraries, for example) you should discuss this beforehand and explore suitable agreements."
"I have not examined Veracode's pricing in detail, but from an industry perspective, I see that there is a tendency toward Veracode, which suggests competitive pricing."
"The cost of Veracode is high."
"For our company, the price is reasonable for the benefits that we get."
"There is a fee to scale up the solution which I consider expensive."
"The licensing cost for Veracode is fair."
"Veracode has been fair. We use their SaaS solution and it's just an annual subscription."
"I found Veracode very expensive, though I'm not the person paying for it. I was surprised to find out how much the subscription costs and that the executive board approved it, but it was a no-brainer because now my company has better security scans."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
20%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise6
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business69
Midsize Enterprise45
Large Enterprise114
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
Which gives you more for your money - SonarQube or Veracode?
SonarQube is easy to deploy and configure, and also integrates well with other tools to do quality code analysis. SonarQube has a great community edition, which is open-source and free. Easy to use...
What do you like most about Veracode Static Analysis?
I like its integration with GitHub. I like using it from GitHub. I can use the GitHub URL and find out the vulnerabilities.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Veracode Static Analysis?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Veracode is that it is fairly moderate.
 

Also Known As

Contrast Assess
Crashtest Security , Veracode Detect
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Williams-Sonoma, Autodesk, HUAWEI, Chromeriver, RingCentral, Demandware.
Manhattan Associates, Azalea Health, Sabre, QAD, Floor & Decor, Prophecy International, SchoolCNXT, Keap, Rekner, Cox Automotive, Automation Anywhere, State of Missouri and others.
Find out what your peers are saying about Contrast Security Assess vs. Veracode and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
884,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.