BMC Helix Cloud Security vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud comparison

BMC Helix and Microsoft are both solutions in the Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) category. BMC Helix is ranked #26 with an average rating of 6.0, while Microsoft is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.1. BMC Helix holds a 0.4% mindshare in CWPP, compared to Microsoft’s 15.4% mindshare. Additionally, 80% of BMC Helix users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 94% of Microsoft users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 19, 2025

BMC Helix Cloud Security and Microsoft Defender for Cloud are competing in the cloud security sector. Microsoft Defender for Cloud often has an edge due to its extensive feature set, justifying its higher price for many users.

Features: BMC Helix Cloud Security offers excellent compliance management, automated remediation, and operational flexibility, providing tools for compliance and security across multicloud environments. Microsoft Defender for Cloud delivers advanced threat protection, seamless Azure integration, and holistic security insights, strengthening its position in complex environments.

Room for Improvement: BMC Helix Cloud Security could improve in expanding its threat intelligence capabilities, enhancing user interface for ease of navigation, and providing better documentation. Microsoft Defender for Cloud can enhance multi-cloud support, reduce complexity in policy management, and work on pricing to improve accessibility.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: BMC Helix Cloud Security is noted for straightforward deployment and proactive customer support. Conversely, Microsoft Defender for Cloud, while containing more intricate settings, benefits from thorough documentation, making it manageable for those who invest time in training.

Pricing and ROI: BMC Helix Cloud Security is known for lower initial costs and satisfactory ROI, appealing to budget-conscious organizations. Microsoft Defender for Cloud, despite being more costly, often offers value with its comprehensive security and long-term return, which many find justified.

To learn more, read our detailed BMC Helix Cloud Security vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Report (Updated: September 2025).

Buyer's Guide

BMC Helix Cloud Security vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud

September 2025

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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

SentinelOne Singularity Clo...

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2025, in the Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) category, the mindshare of SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security is 3.6%, up from 1.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of BMC Helix Cloud Security is 0.4%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is 15.4%, up from 15.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Microsoft Defender for Cloud	15.4%
SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security	3.6%
BMC Helix Cloud Security	0.4%
Other	80.6%

Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)

Featured Reviews

Chetan Yelve

Software Engineer at Cateina Technologies

Enhancing workflow with automation and comprehensive security monitoring

Since I have been using it, I have seen many improvements. SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security is an excellent CSSPM tool, but the CSC CWPP features need improvement. There is scope for more application security posture management features and other than that, there are not many ASPM solutions on the market, and existing ones are more costly. I would prefer to see SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security develop into a single pane of glass for ASPM and CSPM, and I would also appreciate runtime protection highlighted immediately if I'm changing anything in my environment. The dashboard needs more widgets added so that customers or users can see everything on the dashboard itself without needing to go too deep.

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GregoireSoukiassian

Consultant at Ministry of Research and Education

Effectively addresses security concerns but could use enhancement in terms of integration

BMC Helix Cloud Security has room for improvement in terms of integrating its various features. It currently consists of separate point solutions that don't flow together as seamlessly as they could. This lack of integration, unlike platforms like ServiceNow, may be due to historical factors. Enhancing this integration would make it a more compelling choice from a business perspective and offer a smoother user experience. In the next release of BMC Helix Cloud Security, I would like to see additional features, particularly AI integration, which has already been announced. AI integration could bring more precision to the platform, making it even more interesting and effective.

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Vibhor Goel

Senior Cloud Platform Engineer at Deutsche Börse

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.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The agentless vulnerability scanning is great."

"The solution saves 40% of my time."

"We noted immediate benefits from using the solution."

"The user interface is well-designed and easy to navigate."

"SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security offers several valuable features, most notably the rapid vulnerability notifications that provide timely alerts regarding our infrastructure."

"With SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security, I appreciate the monitoring features and the report with the compliance score."

"They're responsive to feature requests. If I suggest a feature for Prisma, I will need to wait until the next release on their roadmap. Cloud Native Security will add it right away."

"It saves us time based on savings on manual activities."

More SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security pros

"The most valuable aspects of BMC Helix Cloud Security are its security features and regulatory compliance capabilities."

"The features that I've found most valuable are its container security aspect. I also like its vulnerability management tools."

"It's also multi-cloud. You can look at several cloud providers: AWS, Azure, or GCP."

"The best feature is time to value. With very minimal effort, you are able to have a cohesive view into your security posture on one or multiple cloud accounts, particularly if you are dealing with multicloud. If you have Azure and AWS deployments, you might have multiple subscriptions in Azure and usually multiple accounts in AWS. You may even be doing some GCP work (around Google Cloud Platform). It's very difficult to manage a common set of policies, even less reporting, across multiple subscriptions, accounts, and cloud environments. What BMC Helix Cloud Security does is provide a unified view or single pane of glass as to your baseline. Then, it also facilitates the ability for Level 1 or 2 operations support to take action and report on security vulnerabilities."

"Role-based security is a valuable feature."

"The cool feature of Helix Cloud Security is that you can do all that — understand and remediate issues — in one dashboard, based on the different policies that are available for security, out-of-the-box."

"Threat protection is comprehensive and simple."

"The most valuable feature for me is the variety of APIs available."

"One important security feature is the incident alerts. Now, with all these cyberattacks, there are a lot of incident alerts that get triggered. It is very difficult to keep monitoring everything automatically, instead our organization is utilizing the automated use case that we get from Microsoft. That has helped bring down the manual work for a lot of things."

"I would like to see more connectors and plugins with other platforms."

"The most valuable feature is the regulatory compliance aspect, where we utilize predefined initiatives like NIST. Alert management is another useful feature. Alerts are directly integrated with our email or DevOps board for easy viewing, allowing us to identify problem areas efficiently."

"Microsoft Defender for Cloud helps in improving our overall security posture. We have a nice overview of what is missing where and what can be improved."

"The most valuable features are the security recommendations provided by Defender for Cloud."

"Microsoft Defender for Cloud is a valuable tool that integrates seamlessly with Azure Policy and our Security SIEM, simplifying implementation and enhancing security posture."

More Microsoft Defender for Cloud pros

Cons

"From my personal experience, the alerting system needs to be faster. If something happens in our infrastructure, the alert appears on the dashboard, but I have to log in to the dashboard and refresh it."

"Their search feature could be better."

"When you find a vulnerability and resolve it, the same issue will not occur again. I want SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security to block the same vulnerability from appearing again. I want something like a playbook where the steps that we take to resolve an issue are repeated when that issue happens again."

"We can customize security policies but lack auditing capabilities."

"I have noticed that the dashboard occasionally gets stuck, potentially due to internet issues. It could benefit from enhancements to be more robust and smoother."

"While SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security offers robust protection, its cost could be a barrier for some users."

"One potential drawback is the cost of SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security, which may be prohibitive for smaller businesses or startups, particularly those in regions with lower average incomes, such as India."

"There is no break-glass account feature. They should implement this as soon as possible because we can't implement SSO without a break-glass feature."

More SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security cons

"Every organization out there doesn't rely on just one control body. They use FISMA control. They may use HIPAA, CIS, PCI, or SOX, then blend them. One of the things that is now in big demand for BMC Helix Cloud Security is content. That's the next journey in its lifespan, making it easier for the community to share and collaborate on content for security controls that can be measured and remediated."

"BMC Helix Cloud Security has room for improvement in terms of integrating its various features."

"The UI could be more user-friendly."

"I want the role-based security feature to be improved."

"We've had some with issues connectors. The connectors have seemed to have caused a little bit of trouble, perhaps with the APIs trying to scan the environment. The only time I've had to reach out to tech support was for that. It seems it may not have been scanning correctly or I wasn't seeing data within a specific time. But we've set up a couple of connectors in the past couple of weeks and they actually scanned the AWS environment and we had data within about 10 minutes. It's working a lot faster and I think they're making improvements as they go."

"Microsoft can improve the pricing by offering a plan that is more cost-effective for small and medium organizations."

"Features like code scanning and pipeline scanning are not included in the solution."

"Customizing some of the compliance requirements based on individual needs seems like the biggest area of improvement. There should be an option to turn specific controls on and off based on how your solution is configured."

"Microsoft Defender for Cloud is not compatible with Linux machines."

"As an analyst, there is no way to configure or create a playbook to automate the process of flagging suspicious domains."

"They could always work to make the pricing a bit lower."

"The most significant areas for improvement are in the security of our identity and endpoints and the posture of the cloud environment. Better protection for our cloud users and cloud apps is always welcome."

"The pricing could be improved, as it is somewhat high for smaller companies."

More Microsoft Defender for Cloud cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is fair. It is not inexpensive, and it is also not expensive. When managing a large organization, it is going to be costly, but it meets the business needs. In terms of what is out there on the market, it is fair and comparable to what I have seen, so I do not have any complaints about the cost"

"PingSafe is not very expensive compared to Prisma Cloud, but it's also not that cheap. However, because of its features, it makes sense to us as a company. It's fairly priced."

"While SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security offers robust protection, its high cost may be prohibitive for small and medium-sized businesses."

"It's not expensive. The product is in its initial growth stages and appears more competitive compared to others. It comes in different variants, and I believe the enterprise version costs around $55 per user per year. I would rate it a five, somewhere fairly moderate."

"I wasn't sure what to expect from the pricing, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was a little less than I thought."

"SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security is costly."

"I understand that SentinelOne is a market leader, but the bill we received was astronomical."

"Its pricing was a little less than other providers."

More SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security pricing and cost advice

"The pricing is based on an annual subscription, upfront, and it's based on cloud assets. Whether your assets are in Azure and AWS combined, the tool tells you how many assets are being scanned and that's the number used for pricing."

"It is a subscription model with term licensing that is usually yearly. This includes, not only the product, but support and maintenance. It is based on cloud assets. Therefore, if you have 100 cloud assets, those cloud assets are measured based on evaluation or transactions. For example, if I'm evaluating that cloud asset for CIS compliance, PCI compliance, and AWS best practices, that asset gets evaluated three times, as those are three transactions. However, the license model is based on peak asset usage. So, over a year, if you deploy 100, 1000, 500, and then 2000 assets, you will be charged for the 2000 peak of assets managed by Helix Cloud Security."

"It has global licensing. It comes with multiple licenses since there are around 50,000 people (in our organization) who look at it."

"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."

"I am not involved much with the pricing but the bundle offering is good."

"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."

"I'm not privy to that information, but I know it's probably close to a million dollars a year."

"The cost of the license is based on the subscriptions that you have."

"We only use the free tier, so we haven't faced any pricing, setup costs, or licensing challenges."

"Microsoft Defender for Cloud is pricey, especially for Kubernetes clusters."

More Microsoft Defender for Cloud pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

16%

Financial Services Firm

14%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Government

No data available

Financial Services Firm

13%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	46
Midsize Enterprise	20
Large Enterprise	53

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	26
Midsize Enterprise	7
Large Enterprise	45

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about PingSafe?

The dashboard gives me an overview of all the things happening in the product, making it one of the tool's best featu...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for PingSafe?

I think the pricing of SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security is a bit high.

See all answers

What needs improvement with PingSafe?

One area that could be improved in SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security is their policies; the way they have config...

See all answers

What do you like most about BMC Helix Cloud Security?

The most valuable aspects of BMC Helix Cloud Security are its security features and regulatory compliance capabilities.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for BMC Helix Cloud Security?

I would rate the price of BMC Helix Cloud Security as a seven in terms of costliness. It is not the cheapest option a...

See all answers

What needs improvement with BMC Helix Cloud Security?

BMC Helix Cloud Security has room for improvement in terms of integrating its various features. It currently consists...

See all answers

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 acros...

See all answers

What do you like most about Microsoft Defender for Cloud?

The entire Defender Suite is tightly coupled, integrated, and collaborative.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Defender for Cloud?

The pricing is pretty standard.

See all answers

Comparisons

Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks vs SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security

Compared 11% of the time

Wiz vs SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security

Compared 11% of the time

AWS GuardDuty vs SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security

Compared 8% of the time

Orca Security vs SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security

Compared 4% of the time

Aqua Cloud Security Platform vs SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security

Compared 4% of the time

More SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security Competitors

CloudBolt vs BMC Helix Cloud Security

Compared 21% of the time

Snyk vs BMC Helix Cloud Security

Compared 18% of the time

BMC Cloud Lifecycle Management vs BMC Helix Cloud Security

Compared 12% of the time

Cisco Secure Workload vs BMC Helix Cloud Security

Compared 12% of the time

OpenNebula vs BMC Helix Cloud Security

Compared 12% of the time

More BMC Helix Cloud Security Competitors

AWS GuardDuty vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Compared 32% of the time

Wiz vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Compared 11% of the time

Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Compared 6% of the time

Microsoft Defender XDR vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Compared 4% of the time

CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Compared 1% of the time

More Microsoft Defender for Cloud Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security

October 2025

SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security report

Download SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security product report

Buyer's Guide

BMC Helix Cloud Security

November 2025

Download BMC Helix Cloud Security product report

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Defender for Cloud

October 2025

Download Microsoft Defender for Cloud product report

Also Known As

PingSafe

TrueSight Cloud Security, SecOps Policy Service

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

Interactive Demo

Demo not available

SentinelOne

Demo not available

BMC Helix

Microsoft

Overview

SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security offers a streamlined approach to cloud security with intuitive operation and strong integration capabilities for heightened threat detection and remediation efficiency.

Singularity Cloud Security stands out for its real-time detection and response, effectively minimizing detection and remediation timelines. Its automated remediation integrates smoothly with third-party tools enhancing operational efficiency. The comprehensive console ensures visibility and support for forensic investigations. Seamless platform integration and robust support for innovation are notable advantages. Areas for development include improved search functionality, affordability, better firewall capabilities for remote users, stable agents, comprehensive reporting, and efficient third-party integrations. Clarity in the interface, responsive support, and real-time alerting need enhancement, with a call for more automation and customization. Better scalability and cost-effective integration without compromising capabilities are desired.

What are SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security's standout features?

Ease of Use: Intuitive operation simplifies navigation across platforms.
Real-Time Detection: Quick identification and response to threats.
Automated Remediation: Streamlines recovery processes with integration capabilities.
Forensic Visibility: Aids in thorough threat analysis and prevention strategies.
Comprehensive Console: Offers full visibility and historical data tracking.
Platform Integration: Supports seamless operation across cloud and hybrid environments.

What benefits should users expect from SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security?

Enhanced Efficiency: Automation and third-party integration improve threat response.
Improved Detection: Reduces mean time to detect and respond to threats.
Operational Support: Comprehensive visibility and forensic tools aid operational decisions.
Cost Efficiency: Affordable integration with scaling capabilities without high overhead.

SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security is deployed in industries needing robust cloud security posture management, endpoint protection, and threat hunting. Utilized frequently across AWS and Azure, it assists in monitoring, threat detection, and maintaining compliance in diverse environments while providing real-time alerts and recommendations for proactive threat management.

SentinelOne

BMC Helix Cloud Security is a SaaS tool designed to help organizations reduce compliance and security lapses resulting from next-gen container and cloud technologies. The solution offers a fully transparent, user-friendly view of all compliance data gathered throughout container resources, cloud, and data centers. BMC Helix Cloud Security can be used to insert compliance inquiries precisely in DevOps workflows for immediate assessment in relation to critical “go, no-go” conclusions throughout the entire workflow.

BMC Helix Cloud Security offers enterprise organizations a unique compliance solution with robust functionalities to concentrate on numerous use processes that may interfere with digital transfigurations, such as:

Discovering resources, accounts, and configurations that are non-compliant with standard regulations or the organization's own policies and protocols.
Multi-source cloud compliance for PaaS service infrastructures, networks, storage, and containers.
DevOps workflows with melded security and compliance for WebApp application blueprints and weaknesses, and all application libraries.
Out-of-box capabilities for immediate compliance integration for DevOps workflows.

BMC Helix Cloud Security is SaaS, which makes it a very flexible solution. It is able to integrate seamlessly with many of today’s enterprises’ demands. BMC Helix Cloud Security can easily perform as a policy-as-code (YAML) based protocol language, open RESTful APIs, or by seamlessly compiling extensible data connectors.

Many of today's enterprise organizations must comply with numerous policies and regulations to maintain effective operations. BMC Helix Cloud Security ensures an enterprise organization is able to satisfy regulatory standards such as Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) Act, Defense Information System Agency (DISA), or any other stringent government or internal organizational compliance standards. The solution has a comprehensive compliance policy that utilizes mode-two capabilities and will ensure that an enterprise organization will greatly minimize or even negate the threat of ransomware and data breaches throughout its network.

BMC Helix Cloud Security will also see that container and container hosts are configured correctly and will then regularly audit to ensure compliance at the three important levels of compliance - images, daemon configuration, and host configuration.

BMC Helix Cloud Security is designed to identify vulnerabilities by dissecting and thoroughly investigating compliance data for container and cloud resources and delivering the outcomes through a friendly, easy-to-understand dashboard. The solution can also provide support for unique or custom sources, provided that data is in a JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) format.

BMC Helix Cloud security is also able to help discover and minimize vulnerabilities created by new services, objects, and resources instituted by containers and public clouds. These can sometimes be forgotten, creating a tremendous risk to an organization. BMC Helix Cloud Security will ensure these new services will be carefully and continually monitored to ensure industry and government standards and regulations are not being compromised. The solution is continually dissecting data and then will deliver outcomes in a dynamic, easy-to-understand dashboard.

BMC Helix Cloud Security offers a user-friendly, robust, complete compliance strategy to ensure organizations maintain the highest levels of productivity and profitability while negating the risk of any type of compliance vulnerabilities.

BMC Helix

Microsoft Defender for Cloud is a comprehensive security solution that provides advanced threat protection for cloud workloads. It offers real-time visibility into the security posture of cloud environments, enabling organizations to quickly identify and respond to potential threats. With its advanced machine learning capabilities, Microsoft Defender for Cloud can detect and block sophisticated attacks, including zero-day exploits and fileless malware.

The solution also provides automated remediation capabilities, allowing security teams to quickly and easily respond to security incidents. With Microsoft Defender for Cloud, organizations can ensure the security and compliance of their cloud workloads, while reducing the burden on their security teams.

Microsoft

Sample Customers

Information Not Available

NHS, Vodafone, Kansas City Life, SKY Italia, Cybera

Microsoft Defender for Cloud is trusted by companies such as ASOS, Vatenfall, SWC Technology Partners, and more.

Buyer's Guide

BMC Helix Cloud Security vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud

September 2025

Free Report: BMC Helix Cloud Security vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Find out what your peers are saying about BMC Helix Cloud Security vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.

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