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Coverity Static vs HCL AppScan comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 21, 2025

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

Coverity Static
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
6th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
43
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
HCL AppScan
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
17th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.9
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (20th), Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST) (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category, the mindshare of Coverity Static is 4.2%, down from 7.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HCL AppScan is 2.2%, down from 2.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Static Application Security Testing (SAST) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Coverity Static4.2%
HCL AppScan2.2%
Other93.6%
Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
 

Featured Reviews

KT
Software Engineering Manager at Visteon Corporation
Using tools for compliance is beneficial but cost concerns persist
We have been using Coverity for quite a long period. It has been fine for our needs. I would rate Coverity between eight to nine, though the cost is high. I would rate their support from Coverity as six. That is the main complaint, but we still appreciate having it.
Ravi Khanchandani - PeerSpot reviewer
Founder Director at Techsa Services
Has improved identification of encryption and authentication issues across cloud and on-prem applications
During the learning curve of onboarding HCL AppScan, we learned that HCL has altered the portfolio and now offers HCL AppScan 360, which has a much better look and feel with an improved user interface. However, there is one feature called SCA, which stands for Software Composition Analysis, that could be improved. When I'm doing an application scan, HCL AppScan has the ability to generate information about what components are in use. For example, if I'm scanning a web application, it shows me the various components being used. It tells me whether I have Java libraries, .NET frameworks, or other log management libraries such as Log4j, and what versions of those specific components are present. I would like to see more detailed reports from the tool. Currently, you can find out the components belonging to a specific software, but if detailed reporting became available, you would be in a better position to identify vulnerabilities. For instance, I could identify that I had the Log4j vulnerability and know that I need to fix my application accordingly. If they add the features I'm describing, I would consider giving them a higher rating. However, I've only been experienced with the product for three months.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Considering the analysis part and the benchmarking process involving the product that my company carried out, the solution is good for finding bugs and violations"
"The solution has helped to increase staff productivity and improved our work significantly by approximately 20 percent."
"Coverity provides excellent compliance and other features, which is a very good part."
"The features I find most valuable is that our entire company can publish the analysis results into our central space."
"The most valuable feature of Coverity is the wrapper. We use the wrapper to build the C++ component, then we use the other code analysis to analyze the code to the build object, and then send back the result to the SonarQube server. Additionally, it is a powerful capabilities solution."
"Coverity is easy to use and easy to integrate with CI."
"Coverity gives advisory and deviation features, which are some of the parts I liked."
"It help us identify the latest security vulnerabilities."
"The platform has valuable security features, helping us identify sensitive code issues and the possibility of internal applications' exposure to external threats."
"You can easily find particular features and functions through the UI."
"We leverage it as a quality check against code."
"This solution saves us time due to the low number of false positives detected."
"AppScan's most valuable features include its ability to identify vulnerabilities accurately, provide detailed remediation steps, and the newly introduced AI-powered features that enhance its functionality further."
"We are now deploying less defects to production."
"For me, as a manager, it was the ease of use. Inserting security into the development process is not normally an easy project to do. The ability for the developer to actually use it and get results and focuses, that's what counted."
"AppScan's most valuable features include its ability to identify vulnerabilities accurately, provide detailed remediation steps, and the newly introduced AI-powered features that enhance its functionality further."
 

Cons

"The solution is a bit complex to use in comparison to other products that have many plugins."
"Its price can be improved. Price is always an issue with Synopsys."
"SCM integration is very poor in Coverity."
"The price is a concern, and there are a lot of false positives coming through."
"Coverity is not stable."
"We actually specified several checkers, but we found some checkers had a higher false positive rate. I think this is a problem. Because we have to waste some time is really the issue because the issue is not an issue. I mean, the tool pauses or an issue, but the same issue is the filter now.Some check checkers cannot find some issues, but sometimes they find issues that are not relevant, right, that are not really issues. Some customisation mechanism can be added in the next release so that we can define our Checker. The Modelling feature provided by Coverity helps in finding more information for potential issues but it is not mature enough, it should be mature. The fast testing feature for security testing campaign can be added as well. So if you correctly integrate it with the training team, maybe you can help us to find more potential issues."
"We're currently facing a primary challenge with automation using Coverity. Each developer has a license and can perform manual checks, and we also have a nightly build that analyzes the entire software. The main issue is that the tool can't look behind submodules in our code base, so it doesn't see changes stored there."
"Ideally, it would have a user-based license that does not have a restriction in the number of lines of code."
"Scans become slow on large websites."
"I think being able to search across more containers, especially some of the docker elements. We need a little tighter integration there. That's the only thing I can see at this point."
"The dashboard, for AppScan or the Fortified fast tool, which we use needs to be improved."
"It's a little bit basic when you talk about the Web Services. If AppScan improved its maturity on Web Services testing, that would be good."
"In future releases, I would like to see more aggressive reports. I would also like to see less false positives."
"The penetration testing feature should be included."
"There is not a central management for static and dynamic."
"One thing which I think can be improved is the CI/CD Integration"
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I would rate Coverity's pricing as a nine out of ten. It's already very expensive, and it's a problem for us to get more licenses due to the price. The pricing model has some good aspects - for example, a personal license gives access to all languages without code limitations, which is better than some competitors. However, it's still a lot of money for us to spend."
"The licensing fees are based on the number of lines of code."
"The tool's price is somewhere in the middle. It's neither cheap nor expensive. I would rate the pricing a five out of ten."
"Coverity is quite expensive."
"Offers varying prices for different companies"
"The solution is affordable."
"It is expensive."
"The solution's pricing is comparable to other products."
"I rate the product's price a seven on a scale of one to ten, where one is low, and ten is high. HCL AppScan is an expensive tool."
"AppScan is a little bit expensive. IBM needs to work a little bit on the pricing model, decreasing the license cost."
"The price is very expensive."
"The tool was expensive."
"The solution is moderately priced."
"The product has premium pricing and could be more competitive."
"Pricing was the main reason that we went ahead with this solution as they were the lowest in the market."
"The product is moderately priced, though it's an investment due to extensive code analysis needs."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
32%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Healthcare Company
4%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
11%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise31
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business14
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise31
 

Questions from the Community

How would you decide between Coverity and Sonarqube?
We researched Coverity, but in the end, we chose SonarQube. SonarQube is a tool for reviewing code quality and security. It helps to guide our development teams during code reviews by providing rem...
What do you like most about Coverity?
The solution has improved our code quality and security very well.
What do you like most about HCL AppScan?
The most valuable feature of HCL AppScan is its integration with the SDLC, particularly during the coding phase.
What needs improvement with HCL AppScan?
During the learning curve of onboarding HCL AppScan, we learned that HCL has altered the portfolio and now offers HCL AppScan 360, which has a much better look and feel with an improved user interf...
What is your primary use case for HCL AppScan?
I'm currently working with BigFix and HCL AppScan. At least three people in my company are using HCL AppScan. Since we are a reseller, we run it in both lab environments and live production applica...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Synopsys Static Analysis
IBM Security AppScan, Rational AppScan, AppScan
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

SAP, Mega International, Thales Alenia Space
Essex Technology Group Inc., Cisco, West Virginia University, APIS IT
Find out what your peers are saying about Coverity Static vs. HCL AppScan and other solutions. Updated: February 2026.
881,733 professionals have used our research since 2012.