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Kiuwan vs Semgrep comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Kiuwan
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
29th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (34th)
Semgrep
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
Supply Chain Management Software (4th), Software Composition Analysis (SCA) (5th), Static Code Analysis (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category, the mindshare of Kiuwan is 1.0%, down from 1.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Semgrep is 2.3%, down from 3.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Static Application Security Testing (SAST) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Semgrep2.3%
Kiuwan1.0%
Other96.7%
Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
 

Featured Reviews

Mustufa Bhavnagarwala - PeerSpot reviewer
CyberRisk Solution Advisor at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees
Though a stable tool, the UI needs improvement
Kiuwan can improve its UI a little more. The user experience can be made better. Kiuwan offers a user interface that is similar to the one offered by Windows 7 or Windows 98, which I saw when I ran the tool and tried to scan the repository to find the security issues. The product's UI has certain shortcomings, where improvements are required.
Manjunath Maneppagol - PeerSpot reviewer
Cloud & Application Security at Sixt SE
Context-aware code analysis has reduced noise and now improves developer experience with actionable security findings
I have consistently observed that their scan time is an issue for mono repos. Sometimes with their AI-based scanning, when you triage that scan, the scan never completes or finishes(, which makes it difficult. Another consistent issue is that whenever you have a new repo to onboard to the platform, the tool ideally should detect the master branch by default. However, sometimes the tool fails to identify it and will never scan it unless manually somebody looks into it and fixes the issue. Although their support team is really good, this issue was present six or eight months ago during the POC and is still present now. If it is affecting multiple customers, it should be prioritized and fixed. I would say that their integration aspects could have been improved. I see a lot of different security solutions that provide flexibility to the security teams based on Jira project, team divisions, Slack, and all those can be very much easily customized. Semgrep needs to work on the enhancement of their notification capabilities. Currently, they are working on identifying business logic vulnerabilities or privilege escalation vulnerabilities by looking at the code, and they should continue to focus on and improve this effort. Regarding stability, whenever you have a mono-repo which is a very large repository, the scan never finishes or the scan never kicks in. At that time, you have to reach out to the support team and ask them to expand the resources in the back end to fix it. This is an issue I keep seeing often on that platform.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I have found the security and QA in the source code to be most valuable."
"I like that it provides a detailed report that lets you know the risk index and the vulnerability."
"Software analytics for a lot of different languages including ABAP."
"In our digital marketing efforts, our app is in continuous integration and having introduced this tool ensures we are always delivering safe code."
"The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that it is quick when processing and giving an output or generating a report."
"From the tool itself, the developer can run an analysis with the same quality, and with this tool, every developer has the opportunity to do an unlimited analysis."
"The solution will measure your development team, give a KPI for the CISO, reduce the time it takes to find and correct coding errors, and more."
"I've tried many open source applications and the remediation or correction actions that were provided by Kiuwan were very good in comparison."
"Compared to other competitors in the market, the AI-backed capability is the biggest strength of Semgrep."
"The best part of Semgrep is its ease of integration with CI/CD pipelines and how it is a developer-friendly tool."
"In my team, we use Semgrep, which is more efficient for coding purposes, time-saving, and quickly detects issues, and I can say that weekly I save about six to seven hours because of this, making it very time-saving and fostering faster development for my team's products and environment."
"Semgrep flourishes with the SAST, secret scanning, and Software Composition Analysis types of scanning."
"Semgrep has positively impacted my organization by significantly reducing the number of vulnerabilities we encounter during development."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to write our custom rules."
"The feature is easy to use, saves a lot of time, and is streamlined in nature."
"Since implementing Semgrep, I have noticed significant outcomes, for example, I can resolve vulnerabilities that previously took four days in under a day, saving both time and money, thus enhancing our return on investment."
 

Cons

"I would like to see better integration with the Visual Studio and Eclipse IDEs."
"Perhaps more languages supported."
"The next release should include more flexibility in the reporting."
"The rate of false positives, where it reports issues that are not really issues, can be improved."
"I would like to see better integration with Azure DevOps in the next release of this solution."
"The pricing and licensing models are poor."
"I would like to see additional languages supported."
"Kiuwan's support has room for improvement. You can only open a ticket is through email, and the support team is outside of our country. They should have a support number or chat."
"I have consistently observed that their scan time is an issue; sometimes with their AI-based scanning, when you triage that scan, the scan never completes or finishes, which makes it difficult."
"Regarding improvements for Semgrep, I have noticed that it occasionally provides false positive results, although it does not happen consistently."
"Semgrep could be improved by offering more granular configuration options for custom rule tuning and reducing memory overhead during large scale repository scans."
"However, as a tool it is really complex to maintain and to use, and it has a huge price tag."
"The features could be enhanced with better documentation and more user-friendly interfaces for beginners."
"I give Semgrep a six out of 10 simply because there are other tools that are better than this out there."
"There should be more information on how to acquire the system, catering to beginners in application security, to make it more user-friendly."
"Semgrep can be improved by making it more user-friendly."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Nothing special. It's a very fair model."
"This solution is cheaper than other tools."
"It follows a subscription model. I think the price is somewhere in the middle."
"Kiuwan is an open-source solution and free to use."
"The price of Kiuwan is lower than that of other tools on the market."
"Check with your account manager."
"I recommend contacting a sales person who will create the best plan payment plan for you, as we did."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
7%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Outsourcing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise6
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise7
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What needs improvement with Semgrep?
The features could be enhanced with better documentation and more user-friendly interfaces for beginners.Semgrep can be improved by further enhancing its reporting features to provide more detailed...
What is your primary use case for Semgrep?
A quick specific example of how I use Semgrep in my pipelines is a recent scenario where it helped me catch a critical vulnerability before it went into production, significantly improving our proc...
What advice do you have for others considering Semgrep?
I would rate Semgrep an eight out of ten overall. I chose a six or seven out of ten when considering specific aspects because while Semgrep is powerful, there are still areas that need improvement,...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Semgrep Code, Semgrep Supply Chain, Semgrep AppSec Platform
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

DHL, BNP Paribas, Zurich, AXA, Ernst & Young, KFC, Santander, Latam, Ferrovial
Policygenius, Tide, Lyft, Thinkific, FloQast, Vanta, and Fareportal
Find out what your peers are saying about Kiuwan vs. Semgrep and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.