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OWASP Zap vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 20, 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

OWASP Zap
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
11th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
41
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
PortSwigger Burp Suite Prof...
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
6th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
64
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (11th), Fuzz Testing Tools (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category, the mindshare of OWASP Zap is 4.6%, down from 4.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is 2.0%, up from 2.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
 

Featured Reviews

Amit Beniwal - PeerSpot reviewer
Simplifies vulnerability discovery and has high quality support
There are areas for improvement with OWASP Zap, particularly in the alignment of vulnerabilities concerning CVSS scores. Sometimes, a vulnerability initially categorized as high severity may be reduced to medium or low over time after security patches are applied. This alignment with the present severity score and CVSS score could be improved.
Anuradha.Kapoor Kapoor - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers efficient scanning of entire websites but presence of false positive bugs, leading to time-consuming efforts in distinguishing real bugs from false alarms
We have found that so many times, false positive bugs are there, and then we spend a lot of time basically separating them from real bugs. So that's the reason we are looking for some other tool. So we were in discussion with Acunetix. Therefore, the false positive rate is, like, something that we would like to improve. What we are looking for is if this false positive rate goes down because we were OWASP Zap tool users, which was free anyway. But there were a lot of false positives there, and we used to spend a lot of time, like, for security reasons, reproducing those bugs for the development team to fix it. So then we thought, okay, why not we go with the tool? Even if it is not very expensive. But still, every year, we have to renew the license. And we got this tool. Again, we found that in this tool also, even if it is less, there are still a lot of false positive bugs out there. So we again have to spend so much time. So we hired a security tester, who was basically using Acunetix in his previous company for almost three years, and then you said that in that scanning is very slow. The scanning is also slow. Like, sometimes the site scan takes eight hours, six to eight hours. Yeah. And whereas in Acunetix, it took three to four hours. And plus, there are no false positives. I'm not saying none but there's very little. But here, the rate sometimes is very high. These are the two features I think we would like to improve further.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We use the solution for security testing."
"Automatic updates and pull request analysis."
"Fuzzer and Java APIs help a lot with our custom needs."
"​It has improved my organization with faster security tests.​"
"It has evolved over the years and recently in the last year they have added, HUD (Heads Up Display)."
"It scans while you navigate, then you can save the requests performed and work with them later."
"The product discovers more vulnerabilities compared to other tools."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a nine out of ten. I think it's stable enough. I don't see any crashes within the application, so its stability is high."
"In my area of expertise, I feel like it has almost everything I could possibly require at this moment."
"PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional has an intercept tab that helps us to scan our APIs, set the response, and request errors."
"The most valuable feature of PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is the Burp Intruder tool."
"PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is one of the best user-friendly solutions for getting the proxy set up."
"The way they do the research and they keep their profile up to date is great. They identify vulnerabilities and update them immediately."
"It helps in API testing, where manual intervention was previously necessary for each payload."
"The initial setup is simple."
"The extension that it provides with the community version for the skills mapping is excellent."
 

Cons

"There are too many false positives."
"It would be a great improvement if they could include a marketplace to add extra features to the tool."
"It needs more robust reporting tools."
"Sometimes, we get some false positives."
"Reporting format has no output, is cluttered and very long."
"Deployment is somewhat complicated."
"There's very little documentation that comes with OWASP Zap."
"The product reporting could be improved."
"As with most automated security tools, too many false positives."
"Improvement should be done as per the requirements of customers."
"A lot of our interns find it difficult to get used to PortSwigger Burp's environment."
"The solution is not easy to set it up. You need a lot of knowledge."
"PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional could improve the static code review."
"One area that can be improved, when compared to alternative tools, is that they could provide different reporting options and in different formats like PDF or something like that."
"It should provide a better way to integrate with Jenkins so that DAST (dynamic application security testing) can be automated."
"There should be a heads up display like the one available in OWASP Zap."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"OWASP ZAP is a free tool provided by OWASP’s engineers and experts. There is an option to donate."
"The tool is open source."
"This is an open-source solution and can be used free of charge."
"We have used the freeware version. I believe Zap only has freeware."
"The tool is open-source."
"It's free and open, currently under the Apache 2 license. If ZAP does what you need it to do, selling a free solution is a very easy."
"This solution is open source and free."
"As Zap is free and open-source, with tons of features similar to those of commercial solutions, I would definitely recommend trying it out."
"The platform's pricing is reasonable."
"We are using the community version, which is free."
"It's a lower priced tool that we can rely on with good standard mechanisms."
"This solution requires a license. It is expensive but you receive a lot of functionality for the price."
"PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is an expensive solution."
"PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is expensive compared to other tools."
"There are multiple versions available of PortSwigger Burp Suite, such as enterprise, commercial, professional, and beginners."
"There are different licenses available that include a free version."
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Answers from the Community

reviewer1487928 - PeerSpot reviewer
Nov 17, 2021
Nov 17, 2021
OWASP Zap and PortSwigger Burp Suite Pro have many similar features. OWASP Zap has web application scanning available with basic security vulnerabilities while Burp Suite Pro has it available with quality security vulnerabilities. Both are very comparable in terms of intercepting features, fuzzing capabilities, and encoder and decoders. Both OWASP Zap and PortSwigger Burp Suite Pro have a spide...
2 out of 3 answers
AK
Mar 15, 2021
First things first both are having their own merits, however in my personal experience ZAP can replace your burpsuite for sure considering the License. Also as the latest ZAP versions are covering more advanced techniques and spidering patterns with lots of options in it, it is worth considering ZAP. However remember that burpsuite from latest versions with inbuilt chromium and it's emerging plugin support (Installable jars) you can use burp to the fullest and you can keep it as a swiss knife for your web and app pentesting. Couple of extensions in burp pro are interesting especially the race condition one. I always prefer using Burp and at instances I go with ZAP.
reviewer1526550 - PeerSpot reviewer
Mar 17, 2021
Yes OWASP ZAP is a good option as it's an open source so always preferred but Burp Suite Pro  will give you more options, its one of the best tool to have for pentesters so defo worth it.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Government
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Is OWASP Zap better than PortSwigger Burp Suite Pro?
OWASP Zap and PortSwigger Burp Suite Pro have many similar features. OWASP Zap has web application scanning available with basic security vulnerabilities while Burp Suite Pro has it available with ...
What do you like most about OWASP Zap?
The best feature is the Zap HUD (Heads Up Display) because the customers can use the website normally. If we scan websites with automatic scanning, and the website has a web application firewall, i...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for OWASP Zap?
OWASP might be cost-effective, however, people prefer to use the free edition available as open source.
What do you like most about PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional?
The solution helped us discover vulnerabilities in our applications.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional?
I find the price of PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional to be very cost-efficient.
What needs improvement with PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional?
The dashboard of PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional could be made more user-friendly.
 

Also Known As

No data available
Burp
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

1. Google 2. Microsoft 3. IBM 4. Amazon 5. Facebook 6. Twitter 7. LinkedIn 8. Netflix 9. Adobe 10. PayPal 11. Salesforce 12. Cisco 13. Oracle 14. Intel 15. HP 16. Dell 17. VMware 18. Symantec 19. McAfee 20. Citrix 21. Red Hat 22. Juniper Networks 23. SAP 24. Accenture 25. Deloitte 26. Ernst & Young 27. PwC 28. KPMG 29. Capgemini 30. Infosys 31. Wipro 32. TCS
Google, Amazon, NASA, FedEx, P&G, Salesforce
Find out what your peers are saying about OWASP Zap vs. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
860,592 professionals have used our research since 2012.