Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Qualys VMDR vs Tenable Nessus comparison

Sponsored
 

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

Zafran Security
Sponsored
Ranking in Vulnerability Management
16th
Average Rating
9.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Continuous Threat Exposure Management (CTEM) (1st)
Qualys VMDR
Ranking in Vulnerability Management
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
94
Ranking in other categories
IT Asset Management (6th), Configuration Management Databases (2nd), Container Security (9th), Risk-Based Vulnerability Management (1st)
Tenable Nessus
Ranking in Vulnerability Management
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
85
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Vulnerability Management category, the mindshare of Zafran Security is 0.9%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Qualys VMDR is 7.1%, down from 12.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Tenable Nessus is 8.4%, down from 12.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Vulnerability Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Tenable Nessus8.4%
Qualys VMDR7.1%
Zafran Security0.9%
Other83.6%
Vulnerability Management
 

Featured Reviews

Israel Cavazos Landini - PeerSpot reviewer
Weekly insights and risk analysis facilitate informed security decisions
I appreciate the weekly insights Zafran provides, which include critical topics for networks and IT security, allowing us to evaluate which insights apply to our environment. The organization score feature is valuable to keep the leadership team updated on how our infrastructure fares security-wise. The applicable risk level versus base risk level feature is beneficial because prior to Zafran, we only used the base risk level, but now understand that risk depends on the asset itself. Zafran is an excellent tool.
Ankesh Raj - PeerSpot reviewer
Real-time responses and reporting streamline vulnerability management
Qualys VMDR provides a real-time response and reporting feature, which is excellent. It allows us to see real-time graphs and reports for every asset, server, and more, which is very user-friendly. Our clients have given good feedback, and they are satisfied with the tool. We use it daily to fix vulnerabilities by connecting with infrastructure to remediate. The feedback from the client side is very good.
HarshBhardiya - PeerSpot reviewer
Provided increased visibility across the organization's servers
The user interface of Tenable Nessus feels outdated and could be more user-friendly. Additionally, the documentation is not well-organized, which can be confusing when searching for solutions or specific information related to Tenable Nessus Professional. The reporting feature could be improved by allowing users to create their own templates instead of relying on predefined ones.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We are able to see the real risk of a vulnerability on our environment with our security tools."
"Zafran has become an indispensable tool in our cybersecurity arsenal."
"Overall, we have seen about eighty-seven percent reduction of the number of vulnerabilities that require urgency to remediate, specifically the number of criticals."
"We saw benefits from Zafran Security almost immediately after deploying it."
"Zafran is an excellent tool."
"The Vulnerability Management and Patch Management features are the most valuable features of this solution."
"It is very easy to use and there are lots of options. We can usually easily go through it and all of the things we want to configure, and we can configure everything to our specifications very easily."
"The most valuable feature is the connection of threat intelligence information with identified vulnerabilities, which means you can prioritize vulnerabilities according to actual attacks."
"The most valuable feature is the certificate management."
"The initial setup was good. We didn't have any problems with it."
"The solution is easy to use."
"The most valuable feature is that this solution is very lightweight."
"Monitors workstations and servers for vulnerabilities and creates reports."
"It's scalable."
"The solution is great for scanning servers."
"The most valuable feature of Tenable Nessus is website scanning."
"I have experience with it on my attack stations, and it's pretty good to optimize. Personally, I think Nessus is quite a good product."
"I like this solution because it is complete. It can scan and check many types of vulnerabilities. It can also check for compliance."
"Quick assessments, compliance scores, and results are provided without having to do agents."
"Makes ransomware checking and OS auditing and implementation relatively easy."
"The initial setup is very straightforward."
 

Cons

"Initially, we were somewhat concerned about the scalability of Zafran due to our large asset count and the substantial amount of information we needed to process."
"I think the ability to have some enhanced reporting capabilities is something they can improve on, as they have good reports but we have asked for some specific reporting enhancements."
"The dashboarding and reporting functionality of Zafran Security is an area that definitely could use some improvements."
"They should make it accessible for more operating systems."
"In terms of improvement for the web application console, in the older version, things were more segregated and presented in a brief format."
"It's quite complex on the way it is set up, so it takes a fair bit of time in order to get your head around it in order to deploy it. Once you've deployed it, then you're never confident on the versions of the browsers and the SSL certificates, etc. You have to always go back into Qualys and check."
"Qualys should improve their customer experience. They need to improve the tech support experience and the turnaround time."
"Reports were lacking somewhat on the customization side."
"It is more expensive vs. other products on the market."
"Qualys VM should improve its methodology."
"The reporting and the GUI need improvements."
"Nessus' reporting could be more user-friendly."
"We feel the solution's technical support to be very bad."
"There is room for improvement in finishing the transition to the cloud. We'd like to see them keep on improving the Tenable.io product, so that we can migrate to it entirely, instead of having to keep the Tenable.sc on-prem product."
"It would be nice for the professional module to include some of the reports available in the expert module."
"They have added a new Tenable Nessus Expert. That is their new product, which caters to the cloud and everything else. I am assuming that the new features and product enhancements are based on that tool set, but we haven't reviewed it yet."
"It wasn't very clear how the scripts are running the scans. There's information about the script but it's not straightforward. The script information for each of the plugins should be available, but it doesn't give us straightforward direct information about how it was executed. That needs to be more clear."
"One significant drawback we encounter is the tool's tendency to flag patched packages incorrectly. For instance, if a package is patched by Debian maintainers but not updated to a major or minor version, Nessus may still flag it as vulnerable based on its database. This discrepancy leads to false alarms and requires our developers, system admins, and DevOps teams to address them."
"Sometimes, the categorization for clients was tricky at first, however, they eventually got used to it."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"There is a license for the use of this solution. We pay annually instead of monthly to receive a better discount on the price."
"Qualys VM is reasonably priced."
"The solution is reasonably priced for the value it provides."
"They have recently changed the pricing model, which is now better than it was before."
"The tool's pricing is expensive and I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten."
"Qualys is a pay-as-you-go model, so there's flexibility to the pricing."
"We have an annual contract for Qualys VMDR. I believe it's for either two years or five years."
"It is a high cost product. Compared to the other solutions, it is around 15 to 20% higher in cost."
"One problem with Tenable is its pricing policy. Optimal results can be achieved with Greenbone Solutions which has much more friendly pricing policies."
"Tenable Nessus needs to be licensed. We own a license for the security center and that license is charged by the number of IP addresses that you can scan. You're allowed to have as many scanners as you want and there's no license for the number of scanners. We have a bunch of Nessus scanners out there, and as long as we're comfortable with staying under that IP address limit, that's really all we have to be concerned about."
"Nessus is affordable, but its licensing model could be improved with more flexibility for adding assets."
"It has a fair cost and very good cost-benefit ratio."
"We incurred a single cost for a perpetual license, although I cannot comment on the price as this is above my management level."
"Nessus Manager is not an expensive product. It has its limitations, but the pricing reflects that. We have a yearly subscription."
"Our organization is huge so our license costs $30,000."
"I think the price is fairly affordable. It provides a license that is fair."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Vulnerability Management solutions are best for your needs.
866,088 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
10%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Healthcare Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise69
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business37
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise35
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zafran Security?
Since we stood Zafran Security up in our private cloud, we handle the maintenance on our side. As we opted not to use...
What needs improvement with Zafran Security?
In terms of areas for improvement, Zafran Security is doing a really great job as a new and emerging company. Oftenti...
What is your primary use case for Zafran Security?
My use cases for Zafran Security revolve around two primary areas. One is around vulnerability management and priorit...
What do you like most about Qualys VMDR?
I like that we have many scanners and channels that don't overload. It helps us scan and track easily. Also, the tagg...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Qualys VMDR?
Qualys offers better pricing and is feature-packed compared to other tools.
What needs improvement with Qualys VMDR?
There were some issues later with Qualys VMDR regarding security, specifically with numerous false positive reports.
How would you choose between Rapid7 InsightVM and Tenable Nessus?
You have full visibility across cloud, network, virtual, and containerized infrastructures with Rapid7 Insight VM. Yo...
What's the difference between Tenable Nessus and Tenable.io Vulnerability Management?
Tenable Nessus is a vulnerability assessment solution that is both easy to deploy and easy to manage. The design of ...
What do you like most about Tenable Nessus?
We have around 500 virtual machines. Therefore, we conduct monthly scans and open tickets for our developers to addre...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Qualys VM, QualysGuard VM, Qualys Asset Inventory, Qualys Container Security
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Agrokor Group, American Specialty Health, American State Bank, Arval, Life:), Axway, Bank of the West, Blueport Commerce, BSkyB, Brinks, CaixaBank, Cartagena, Catholic Health System, CEC Bank, Cegedim, CIGNA, Clickability, Colby-Sawyer College, Commercial Bank of Dubai, University of Utah, eBay Inc., ING Singapore, National Theatre, OTP Bank, Sodexo, WebEx
Bitbrains, Tesla, Just Eat, Crosskey Banking Solutions, Covenant Health, Youngstown State University
Find out what your peers are saying about Qualys VMDR vs. Tenable Nessus and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
866,088 professionals have used our research since 2012.