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Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs Red Hat Advanced Cluster Security for Kubernetes comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 13, 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

Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Ranking in Container Security
7th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
78
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (7th), Container Management (8th), Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (1st), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (4th), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (4th), Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (5th), Microsoft Security Suite (7th), Compliance Management (5th)
Red Hat Advanced Cluster Se...
Ranking in Container Security
16th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Container Security category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is 6.7%, down from 7.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Red Hat Advanced Cluster Security for Kubernetes is 2.1%, down from 2.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Container Security
 

Featured Reviews

Vibhor Goel - PeerSpot reviewer
A single tool for complete visibility and addressing security gaps
Currently, issues are structured in Microsoft Defender for Cloud at severity levels of high, critical, or warning, but these severity levels are not always right. For example, Microsoft might consider a port being open as critical, but that might not be the case for our company. Similarly, it might suggest closing some management ports, but you might need them to be able to log in, so the severity levels for certain things can be improved. Even though Microsoft Defender for Cloud provides a way to temporarily disable certain alerts or notifications without affecting our security score, it would be better to have more granularized control over these recommendations. Currently, we cannot even disable certain alerts or notifications. There should be an automated mechanism to design Azure policies based on the recommendations, possibly with AI integration. Instead of an engineer having to write a policy to fix security gaps, which is very time-consuming, there should be an inbuilt capability to auto-remediate everything and have proper control in place. Additionally, enabling Defender for Cloud at the resource group level, rather than only at the subscription level, would be beneficial.
Daniel Stevens - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers easy management and container connection with HTTPS, but the support needs to improve
I have experience with the solution's setup in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and our company has assisted in the development of a cluster in a research department, but we didn't start from scratch because we have IT professionals who have installed Kubernetes across 12 nodes of a cluster and a new environment can be created for a new platform. I also had another setup experience of Red Hat Advanced Cluster Security for Kubernetes in Portugal where I had to implement the solution in a cluster of 22 computer servers, which was completed with assistance from the IT department of the company. The initial setup process of the solution can be considered as difficult. The setup process involves using the permissions, subnets and range of IPs, which makes it complex. Deploying Red Hat Advanced Cluster Security for Kubernetes takes around eight to ten hours for new clusters. The solution's deployment can be divided into three parts. The first part involves OpenStack, where the cluster's resources need to be identified. The second part involves virtualizing assets and identifying other physical assets, for which OpenStack, Kubernetes, or OpenShift are used. The third part of the deployment involves dividing the networks into subnetworks and implementing automation to deploy the microservices using Helm. The number of professionals required for the solution's deployment depends upon the presence of automated scripts. Ideally, two or three professionals are required to set up Red Hat Advanced Cluster Security for Kubernetes.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It isn't a highly complex solution. It's something that a lot of analysts can use. Defender gives you a broad overview of what's happening in your environment, and it's a great solution if you're a Microsoft shop."
"It helps you to identify the gaps in your solution and remediate them. It produces a compliance checklist against known standards such as ISO 27001, HIPAA, iTrust, etc."
"Defender for Cloud is a plug-and-play solution that provides continuous posture management once enabled."
"Some of the most valuable features of Microsoft Defender for Cloud include its effectiveness in threat detection through unsupervised machine learning, CTI, and advanced sandboxing."
"Microsoft Defender for Cloud has significantly enhanced our overall security posture by approximately 20 to 25 percent."
"The dashboard is very good. It gives our clients a lot of information and allows them to have a complete overview of the system. Everything is visible in one glance."
"The solution is up-to-date with the latest updates and identified threats."
"Microsoft Defender for Cloud has made our environment more secure."
"The technical support is good."
"It is easy to install and manage."
"Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a nine out of ten."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its monitoring feature."
"I like virtualization and all those tools that come with OpenShift. I also like Advanced Cluster Management and the built-in security."
"Segmentation is the most powerful feature."
"One of the most valuable features I found was the ability of this solution to map the network and show you the communication between your containers and your different nodes."
"I am impressed with the tool's visibility."
 

Cons

"I would suggest building a single product that addresses endpoint server protection, attack surface, and everything else in one solution. That is the main disadvantage with the product. If we are incorporating some features, we end up in a situation where this solution is for the server, and that one is for the client, or this is for identity, and that is for our application. They're not bundling it. Commercially, we can charge for different licenses, but on the implementation side, it's tough to help our end-customer understand which product they're getting."
"The documentation and implementation guides could be improved."
"I would like to have the ability to customize executive reporting."
"It needs to be simplified and made more user-friendly for a non-technical person."
"Customer service and support from Microsoft are very poor. Even for high-severity cases, response or resolution time can extend to three or four weeks."
"Microsoft Defender for Cloud is pricey, especially for Kubernetes clusters. It could be cheaper."
"For Kubernetes, I was using Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS). To see that whatever is getting deployed into AKS goes through the correct checks and balances in terms of affinities and other similar aspects and follows all the policies, we had to use a product called Stackrox. At a granular level, the built-in policies were good for Kubernetes, but to protect our containers from a coding point of view, we had to use a few other products. For example, from a programming point of view, we were using Checkmarx for static code analysis. For CIS compliance, there are no CIS benchmarks for AKS. So, we had to use other plugins to see that the CIS benchmarks are compliant. There are CIS benchmarks for Kubernetes on AWS and GCP, but there are no CIS benchmarks for AKS. So, Azure Security Center fell short from the regulatory compliance point of view, and we had to use one more product. We ended up with two different dashboards. We had Azure Security Center, and we had Stackrox that had its own dashboard. The operations team and the security team had to look at two dashboards, and they couldn't get an integrated piece. That's a drawback of Azure Security Center. Azure Security Center should provide APIs so that we can integrate its dashboard within other enterprise dashboards, such as the PowerBI dashboard. We couldn't get through these aspects, and we ended up giving Reader security permission to too many people, which was okay to some extent, but when we had to administer the users for the Stackrox portal and Azure Security Center, it became painful."
"The user interface of Microsoft Defender for Cloud, like many Microsoft portals, undergoes frequent changes and feature relocation."
"I do see that some features associated with the IAST part are not included in the tool, making it an area where improvements are required."
"The initial setup is pretty complex. There's a learning curve, and its cost varies across different environments. It's difficult."
"The solution's price could be better."
"The testing process could be improved."
"They're trying to convert it to the platform as a source. They are moving in the direction of Cloud Foundry so it can be easier for a developer to deploy it."
"The solution's visibility and vulnerability prevention should be improved."
"The tool's command line and configuration are hard for us to understand and make deployment complex. It should also include zero trust, access control features and database connectivity."
"The documentation about Red Hat Advanced Cluster Security available online is very limited... So it's very limited to the documentation."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Our clients complain about the cost of Microsoft Defender for Cloud."
"Pricing depends on your workload size, but it is very cheap. If you're talking about virtual machines, it is $5 or something for each machine, which is minimal. If you go for some agent-based solution for every virtual machine, then you need to pay the same thing or more than that. For an on-premises solution like this, we were paying around $30 to $50 based on size. With Defender, Microsoft doesn't bother about the size. You pay based on the number of machines. So, if you have 10 virtual machines, and 10 virtual machines are being monitored, you are paying based on that rather than the size of the virtual machine. Thus, you are paying for the number of units rather than paying for the size of your units."
"The product's pricing policy is generally favorable."
"They have a free version, but the license for this one isn't too high. It's free to start with, and you're charged for using it beyond 30 days. Some other pieces of Defender are charged based on usage, so you will be charged more for a high volume of transactions. I believe Defender for Cloud is a daily charge based on Azure's App Service Pricing."
"The cost of the license is based on the subscriptions that you have."
"Pricing is a consideration, but we strive to keep costs low by enabling only necessary services."
"The tool is pretty expensive."
"It is bundled with our enterprise subscription, which makes it easy to go for it. It is available by default, and there is no extra cost for using the standard features."
"The price of Red Hat Advanced Cluster Security for Kubernetes is better than Palo Alto Prisma."
"The pricing model is moderate, meaning it is not very expensive."
"Red Hat offers two pricing options for their solution: a separate price, and a bundled price under the OpenShift Platform Plus."
"It's a costly solution"
"We purchase a yearly basis license for the solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
25%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How is Prisma Cloud vs Azure Security Center for security?
Azure Security Center is very easy to use, integrates well, and gives very good visibility on what is happening across your ecosystem. It also has great remote workforce capabilities and supports a...
What do you like most about Microsoft Defender for Cloud?
The entire Defender Suite is tightly coupled, integrated, and collaborative.
What do you like most about Red Hat Advanced Cluster Security for Kubernetes?
I like virtualization and all those tools that come with OpenShift. I also like Advanced Cluster Management and the built-in security.
What needs improvement with Red Hat Advanced Cluster Security for Kubernetes?
From an improvement perspective, I would like to create new policies in the tool, especially if it is deployed for the prevention part, but currently, we need to do it manually. I hear that Palo Al...
What is your primary use case for Red Hat Advanced Cluster Security for Kubernetes?
I use the solution in my company for vulnerability management, configuration management, compliance, safety handling, and everything else.
 

Also Known As

Microsoft Azure Security Center, Azure Security Center, Microsoft ASC, Azure Defender
StackRox
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Defender for Cloud is trusted by companies such as ASOS, Vatenfall, SWC Technology Partners, and more.
City National Bank, U.S. Department of Homeland Security
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs. Red Hat Advanced Cluster Security for Kubernetes and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.