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Fortify Software Security Center vs SonarQube comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 8, 2026

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

Fortify Software Security C...
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
19th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.6
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SonarQube
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
1st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
134
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (1st), Software Development Analytics (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category, the mindshare of Fortify Software Security Center is 1.3%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SonarQube is 17.7%, down from 25.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Static Application Security Testing (SAST) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
SonarQube17.7%
Fortify Software Security Center1.3%
Other81.0%
Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
 

Featured Reviews

Diego Caicedo Lescano - PeerSpot reviewer
Chief Innovation Officer at SAGGA
Enables centralized analysis and improves governance through seamless tool integration
The main use case for Fortify Software Security Center is exceptional because we have governance and control through that console. You can centralize both static analysis and dynamic analysis, and correlate both analyses in one tool to get better results by combining those independent results from each solution. That is outstanding, and there is no tool I have seen on the market that offers these capabilities. I appreciate the interoperability with other solutions from Fortify Software Security Center. Because we are using Kiuwan, you can run Kiuwan analyses and integrate them with Fortify Software Security Center to get those results in a single console. That is a good console for centralizing things in one point. That is one of the best features of the on-premises Fortify.
KH
Sr Software Engineering Supervisor at Mozarc Medical
Gains control over rule customization and achieves reliable vulnerability assessment
The deployment process took me about 2 or 3 hours to deploy SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube), although I do not remember exactly since it was done about 2 years back. Currently, about 10 of my developers are using SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) in my company. I do not have plans to increase the usage of SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) in the future as there will not be any requirement to increase. I am a senior software engineer and supervisor at Mozark Medical. My corporate email address is karthik.k.a.r.t.h.i.k.h.a.r.p.a.n.h.a.l.l.i@mozarkmedical.com. Overall, I would rate SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) as a 9 out of 10.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The overall rating for this tool is ten out of ten."
"The main use case for Fortify Software Security Center is exceptional because we have governance and control through that console."
"The reporting is very useful because you can always view an entire list of the issues that you have."
"It's very important because they want to scan their source code every day, so we provide CICD integration to our customers so they can auto build and auto test every day, get reports, and fix issues."
"You can easily download the tool's rule packs and update them."
"I like the explanation of issues provided by Fortify Software Security Center."
"Fortify Analytics' AI function helps scan and provides more detailed explanations and recommendations about vulnerabilities."
"This is a stable solution at the end of the day."
"SonarQube is good in terms of code review and to report on basic vulnerabilities in your applications."
"This product helps us to determine the maturity and quality of the coding of our software customers, preventing future crashes in the software."
"We have the software metrics that SonarQube gives us, which is something we did not have before. This helps us work towards aiming coding standards to empower us to move in the direction of better code quality. SonarQube provides targets and metrics for that."
"It automatically scans for code, detects vulnerabilities, and generates daily reports."
"The fact that the solution does security scanning is valuable."
"SonarQube is designed well making it easy to use, simple to identify issues and find solutions to problems."
"The most valuable features of SonarQube Cloud (formerly SonarCloud) include code inspection, addressing technical debt, and identifying security vulnerabilities."
"I like that it covers most programming languages for source code review."
 

Cons

"I am not satisfied with the percentage of false positives, which is around eighteen percent."
"The product's overlap feature is restrictive and requires more customization efforts, which can be expensive."
"Improvements needed for Software Security Center include better aggregation views of datasets."
"We are having issues with false positives that need to be resolved."
"This solution is difficult to implement, and it should be made more comfortable for the end-users."
"Improvements needed for Software Security Center include better aggregation views of datasets."
"Fortify Software Security Center's setup is really painful."
"The support for Fortify on-premises is the same as for the other products. I would say the support is not good and I would rate it a three out of ten."
"SonarCloud can improve the false positives. Sometimes the gates sometimes act a little weird. We then need to manually go and mark the false positive."
"I think the code security can be improved."
"We've been using the Community Edition, which means that we get to use it at our leisure, and they're kind enough to literally give it to us. However, it takes a fair amount of effort to figure out how to get everything up and running. Since we didn't go with the professional paid version, we're not entitled to support. Of course that could be self-correcting if we were to make the step to buy into this and really use it. Then their technical support would be available to us to make strides for using it better."
"Product is good, but the API documentation is poor, when it exists at all."
"SonarQube needs to improve its ease of use, integration with third-party platforms, and scalability."
"If you don't have any experience with the configuration or how to configure the files, it can be complicated."
"An improvement is with false positives. Sometimes the tool can say there is an issue in your code but, really, you have to do things in a certain way due to external dependencies, and I think it's very hard to indicate this is the case."
"The UI can be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is priced fair."
"This is a costly solution that could be cheaper."
"As a Fortify partner company providing technical support, I find the product expensive in our country, where local, inexpensive products are available."
"I was using the Community Edition, which is available free of charge."
"People can try the free licenses and later can seek buying plugins/support, etc. once they started liking it."
"It's an open-source solution, with no additional costs."
"My guess is that we have a yearly subscription. We use it quite extensively, so a monthly license wouldn't make sense. Yearly subscriptions are usually cheaper. In addition to the standard licensing fee, there is just the cost of running the hardware where it is hosted."
"The price point on SonarQube is good."
"We are using the free, unlicensed version."
"Previously, the pricing was 17,000 euros for five million lines analyzed. However, they now charge $15,000 per one million lines, significantly increasing the cost."
"We're using an older version because it is the open-source flavor of it and we can continue using it at no cost. We're not paying any licensing at all, which was another factor in choosing this route so that we can learn and grow with it and not be committed to licenses and other similar things. If we choose to get something else, we have to relearn, but we don't have to relicense. Basically, we're paying no license costs."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
9%
Computer Software Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Computer Software Company
12%
Comms Service Provider
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise3
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business41
Midsize Enterprise24
Large Enterprise79
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Micro Focus Software Security Center?
In my opinion, there are no areas that could be improved with Fortify Software Security Center. I would say it is a good product and a mature product. However, the SAST has many improvement areas. ...
What is your primary use case for Micro Focus Software Security Center?
We have installed Fortify Static Code Analysis, SAST, in Ecuador in two customers. The Fortify ScanCentral includes three components: SAST, Fortify Software Security Center, and the WebInspect.
Is SonarQube the best tool for static analysis?
I am not very familiar with SonarQube and their solutions, so I can not answer. But if you are asking me about which tools that are the best for for Static Code Analysis, I suggest you have a look...
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...
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...
 

Also Known As

Micro Focus Software Security Center, Application Security Center, HPE Application Security Center, WebInspect
Sonar, SonarQube Cloud
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Neosecure, Acxiom, Skandinavisk Data Center A/S, Parkeon
Snowflake, Booking.com, Deutsche Bank, AstraZeneca, and Ford Motor Company.
Find out what your peers are saying about Fortify Software Security Center vs. SonarQube and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
884,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.