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OpenText Core Application Security vs Qualys Web Application Scanning comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 19, 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

OpenText Core Application S...
Ranking in Application Security Tools
14th
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
12th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
60
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Qualys Web Application Scan...
Ranking in Application Security Tools
12th
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
8th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
38
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Application Security Tools category, the mindshare of OpenText Core Application Security is 4.3%, down from 5.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Qualys Web Application Scanning is 2.1%, up from 2.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Security Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Jonathan Steyn - PeerSpot reviewer
Source code analyzer, FPR file generation, reduction of false positives and generates compliance reports, for in-depth analysis
Not challenges with the product itself. The product is very reliable. It does have a steep learning curve. But, again, one thing that Fortify or OpenText does very well is training. There are a lot of free resources and training in the community forums, free training as well as commercial training where users can train on how to use the back-end systems and the scanning engines and how to use command-line arguments because some of the procedures or some of the tools do require a bit of a learning curve. That's the only challenge I've really seen for customers because you have to learn how to use the tool effectively. But Fortify has, in fact, improved its user interface and the way users engage the dashboards and the interfaces. It is intuitive. It's easy to understand. But in some regards, the cybersecurity specialist or AppSec would need a bit of training to engage the user interface and to understand how it functions. But from the point of the reliability index and how powerful the tool is, there's no challenge there. But it's just from a learning perspective; users might need a bit more skill to use the tool. The user interface isn't that tedious. It's not that difficult to understand. When I initially learned how to use the interfaces, I was able to master it within a week and was able to use it quite effectively. So training is required. All skills are needed to learn how to use the tool. I would like to see more enhancements in the dashboards. Dashboards are available. They do need some configuration and settings. But I would like to see more business intelligence capabilities within the tool. It's not particularly a cybersecurity function, but, for instance, business impact analysis or other features where you can actually use business intelligence capabilities within your security tool. That would be remarkable because not only do you have a cybersecurity tool, but you also have a tool that can give you business impact analysis and some other measurements. A bit more intelligence in terms of that from a cybersecurity perspective would be remarkable.
Kelvin Oladipo - PeerSpot reviewer
User-friendly scanning provides valuable vulnerability insights, but pricing improvements are needed
Qualys Web Application Scanning ( /products/qualys-web-application-scanning-reviews ) is user-friendly, easy to understand, easy to use, and easy to deploy. Credential scanning is very effective because it goes in-depth into the system, crawling the pages, and reporting on vulnerabilities. The product helps by providing options for remediating vulnerabilities it finds, making it really useful.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"One of the valuable features is the ability to submit your code and have it run in the background. Then, if something comes up that is more specific, you have the security analyst who can jump in and help, if needed."
"Audit workbench: for on-the-fly defect auditing."
"It has saved us a lot of time as we focus primarily on programming rather than tool operational work."
"It is a very easy tool for developers to use in parallel while they're doing the coding. It does auto scanning as we are progressing with the CI/CD pipeline. It has got very simple and efficient API support."
"Fortify helps us to stay updated with the newest languages and versions coming out."
"t's a cloud-based solution, so there was no installation involved."
"The most valuable feature is the capacity to be able to check vulnerabilities during the development process. The development team can check whether the code they are using is vulnerable to some type of attack or there is some type of vulnerability so that they can mitigate it. It helps us in achieving a more secure approach towards internal applications. It is an intuitive solution. It gives all the information that a developer needs to remediate a vulnerability in the coding process. It also gives you some examples of how to remediate a vulnerability in different programming languages. This solution is pretty much what we were searching for."
"The most valuable feature is that it connects with your development platforms, such as Microsoft Information Server and Jira."
"The vulnerability management feature is a strong one. And also the patch management feature."
"The most valuable feature of Qualys Web Application Scanning is the effective scanning that can be done."
"It is a cloud-based solution, so it is easy to scale."
"We can do scanning and submit reports straight to the customers when there are new vulnerabilities, then tell them whether they are affected or not."
"​QualysGuard web-based scanner is very useful for performing external penetration and PCI scans from remote locations.​"
"You can integrate your Burp Suite results and create an integrated report. Also, the way it shows the results - threats and exploit details - makes remediation very easy."
"Licensing is the most valuable. Qualys provides the best licensing for companies. It is the best product for the development purposes of web applications. The product has a lot of integrations."
"It is easy to use."
 

Cons

"Micro Focus Fortify on Demand could improve the user interface by making it more user-friendly."
".NET code scanning is still dependent on building the code base before running any scan. Also, it's dependent on an IDE such as Visual Studio."
"The vulnerability analysis does not always provide guidelines for what the developer should do in order to correct the problem, which means that the code has to be manually inspected and understood."
"Micro Focus Fortify on Demand could improve the reports. They could benefit from being more user-friendly and intuitive."
"There were some regulated compliances, which were not there."
"Not fully integrated with CIT processes."
"New technologies and DevOps could be improved. Fortify on Demand can be slow (slower than other vendors) to support new technologies or new software versions."
"An improvement would be the ability to get vulnerabilities flowing automatically into another system."
"The reporting contains too many false positives."
"Qualys Web Application Scanning is very complex to use, and its graphical interface is not very user-friendly."
"The GUI could be a little less complicated as it opens a lot of new windows for creating search lists, templates, reports, or for scanning purposes."
"There should be better visibility into the application."
"In certain cases, this product does have false positives, which the company should work on."
"Sometimes the response time is low because the handshake fails, and then you have to re-login and start again."
"We procured around 110 licenses for Web Application Scanning, but we have issues running concurrent scans. I don't currently have the option to trigger scans for all 100-plus websites. The default limit is around 10 conference scans. It's not very scalable, to be honest, because of the limitation that they put on concurrent scans."
"We have many websites. We don't force scanning on all of them at once because it's taking some time."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We make an annual purchase of the licenses we need."
"We used the one-time application, Security Scan Dynamic. I believe the original fee was $8,000."
"I'd rate it an eight out of ten in terms of pricing."
"It is not more expensive than other solutions, but the pricing is competitive."
"Buying a license would be feasible for regular use. For intermittent use, the cloud-based option can be used (Fortify on Demand)."
"If I exceed one million lines of code, there might be an extra cost or a change in the pricing bracket."
"The solution is expensive and the price could be reduced."
"I believe the rental license is not too expensive, but it provides a lot of information about the vulnerabilities."
"We are on an annual license for the solution and the pricing could be more affordable."
"Try the free trial of the product to understand the basic working mechanisms.​"
"We normally purchase an annual license."
"Pricing was reasonable and competitive. It was not too far above the other products."
"​It is best to be an institutional buyer and directly contact the sales team, as they can provide over-the-top discounts for bulk orders​."
"Qualys has an IT-based licensing based on a yearly license, which is a good way of handling it. However, in some cases, when we do the PCI scanning, the host will not like the scanning and we lose the IT license. So, this could be improved."
"The product has a very good licensing model."
"I rate the software’s pricing a six out of ten."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
19%
Manufacturing Company
15%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Micro Focus Fortify on Demand?
It helps deploy and track changes easily as per time-to-time market upgrades.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Micro Focus Fortify on Demand?
In comparison with other tools, they're competitive. It is not more expensive than other solutions, but their pricing is competitive. The licenses for Fortify On Demand are generally bought in unit...
What needs improvement with Micro Focus Fortify on Demand?
There are frequent complaints about false positives from Fortify. One day it may pass a scan with no issues, and the next day, without any code changes, it will report vulnerabilities such as passw...
What do you like most about Qualys Web Application Scanning?
The vulnerability management feature is a strong one. And also the patch management feature.
What needs improvement with Qualys Web Application Scanning?
I would like it to be cheaper because it is a bit expensive compared to competitors like Tenable Nessus ( /products/tenable-nessus-reviews ). After using the product for a year, I might have more s...
 

Also Known As

Micro Focus Fortify on Demand
Qualys WAS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

SAP, Aaron's, British Gas, FICO, Cox Automative, Callcredit Information Group, Vital and more.
BskyB, Cartagena, ClearPoint Learning Systems, Connect Group, du, Fortrex Technologies, HBOR, HDI, Highlights for Children, The Lithuanian State Enterprise Centre of Registers, City of Miami Beach, Microsoft, MidlandHR, MSCI Inc., Northern Arizona University, Ofgem, Olympus Europa, PhoneFactor, RTL Nederland, ThousandEyes, VGZ Organisatie B.V.
Find out what your peers are saying about OpenText Core Application Security vs. Qualys Web Application Scanning and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
858,945 professionals have used our research since 2012.