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OWASP Zap 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

OWASP Zap
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
16th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
41
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SonarQube
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
1st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
137
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (1st), Software Development Analytics (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category, the mindshare of OWASP Zap is 2.7%, down from 5.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SonarQube is 13.3%, down from 23.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Static Application Security Testing (SAST) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
SonarQube13.3%
OWASP Zap2.7%
Other84.0%
Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
 

Featured Reviews

Amit Beniwal - PeerSpot reviewer
Project Manager at Al Hassan LLC
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.
Vitthal Gole - PeerSpot reviewer
Devops Engineer at AIQOD
Automated code checks have improved quality gates and prevent weak code from reaching production
SonarQube could improve by reducing false positives in its static code analysis; while its detection capabilities are strong, some findings require manual verification, increasing developers' workload. More accurate analysis would enhance productivity, and SonarQube would benefit from enhanced AI-powered recommendations for fixing issues. For instance, in our pipeline, if it fails during SonarQube stage, we could check the dashboard for identified issues involving code smells, bugs, or duplicacy. An AI feature should be integrated into SonarQube to resolve issues quickly; optimizing scanning performance for very large repositories and providing faster analysis times would enhance the developer experience, especially in large code bases with frequent commits. For anyone planning to implement SonarQube, I advise starting by defining coding standards first and integrating Quality Gates into the pipeline. You can customize quality profiles to match project requirements; rather than relying entirely on default rules, you can adjust settings for stronger detection and enforcement. Organizations with advanced security, branch analysis, and governance features might consider commercial editions based on their needs.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"OWASP Zap is a good tool, one of my favorites for a long time, and I would recommend it."
"The application scanning feature is the most valuable feature."
"Technical support is excellent."
"The API is exceptional."
"We use OWASP Zap for web application security scanning."
"This solution is providing us with value and as long as it continues to do so, we'll continue to use it."
"Fuzzer and Java APIs help a lot with our custom needs."
"It's great that we can use it with Portswigger Burp."
"Can tweak rules and feed them into our build pipelines."
"The features of SonarQube that I find most valuable for identifying code smells are its comprehensive code analysis capabilities, which cover various aspects of code sustainability."
"I like the by-default policies that are they, as they seem to cover most of what I need."
"This solution has helped with the integration and building of our CICD pipeline."
"The static code analysis of the solution is the most important aspect for us. When it comes to security breaches within the code, we can leverage some rules to allow us to identify the repetition in our code and the possible targets that we may have. It makes it very easy to review our code for security purposes."
"With this, we have delivered a quality product to our stakeholders."
"Apart from the security point of view, I like that it makes it easy to detect code smells and other issues in terms of code quality and standards."
"SonarQube ensures that we release a good quality of code to our customers."
 

Cons

"The technical support team must be proactive."
"Right now, I can't give it off to a team and expect them to give me a report that I'm happy with."
"It would be beneficial to enhance the algorithm to provide better summaries of automatic scanning results."
"It would be nice to have a solid SQL injection engine built into Zap."
"When comparing OWASP Zap and Burp Suite, the main difference besides pricing is that OWASP Zap has limitations with reporting levels and UI, which affects its reporting capabilities, whereas Burp Suite is already advancing with new AI features and scanning capabilities that OWASP Zap seems to be lacking."
"I'd like to see a kind of feature where we can just track what our last vulnerability was and how it has improved or not. More reports that can have some kind of base-lining, I think that would be a good feature too. I'm not sure whether it can be achieved and implement but I think that would really help."
"Deployment is somewhat complicated."
"Zap could improve by providing better reports for security and recommendations for the vulnerabilities."
"The product's pricing could be lower."
"For improvement, this solution could be offered on Docker and the cloud and the support for this solution could be improved. Customizing rules could also be made simpler."
"The interface could be a little better and should be enhanced."
"There is no automation. You need to put the code there and test. You then pull the results and put them back in the development environment. There is no integration with the development environment. We would like it to be integrated with our development environment, which is basically the CI/CD pipeline or the IDE that we have."
"If the product could assist us with fixing issues by giving us more pointers then it would help to resolve more of the warnings without such a commitment in terms of time."
"It would be better if SonarQube provided a good UI for external configuration."
"SonarQube Cloud needs improvements in dynamic code analysis. Static code analysis is good, but the product lacks dynamic code scanning capabilities, an area where Veracode excels."
"Having performance regression would be a helpful add on or ability to be able to do during the scan."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool is open source."
"The tool is open-source."
"OWASP ZAP is a free tool provided by OWASP’s engineers and experts. There is an option to donate."
"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 solution’s pricing is high."
"It is highly recommended as it is an open source tool."
"This app is completely free and open source. So there is no question about any pricing."
"It is open source, and we can scan freely."
"A low cost long-term solution for non-critical situations."
"There are many different packages with different pricing options available. We are able to try what we have and if we need extra features we can upgrade the license."
"The price of SonarCloud could be less expensive. We are using the community version and the price should be more reasonable."
"We have a license with 125,000 lines of code. We did not purchase a lot of lines but it is specific to our code environment."
"For the Community edition, there is no extra cost. It's totally free. The Enterprise edition, Data Center edition, and Developer edition are the paid versions."
"We're using the Community Edition, and we don't pay for anything."
"This product is open source and very convenient."
"We pay €10 per month for this solution, which is good. It provides a good value for money."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise22
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business44
Midsize Enterprise24
Large Enterprise80
 

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 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 needs improvement with OWASP Zap?
The improvement that has to be done for APIs focuses on manual activities where the feature exists, but it is not at the same level as what Burp Suite does with intercepting and tools such as Postm...
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...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Sonar, SonarQube Cloud
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

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
Snowflake, Booking.com, Deutsche Bank, AstraZeneca, and Ford Motor Company.
Find out what your peers are saying about OWASP Zap vs. SonarQube and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
908,834 professionals have used our research since 2012.