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Aqua Cloud Security Platform vs Sysdig Secure comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 16, 2024

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

Qualys TotalCloud
Sponsored
Ranking in Container Security
11th
Ranking in Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP)
7th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (11th), Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (8th), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (8th), SaaS Security Posture Management (SSPM) (2nd)
Aqua Cloud Security Platform
Ranking in Container Security
14th
Ranking in Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP)
13th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
Cloud and Data Center Security (10th), Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (14th), Software Supply Chain Security (7th), DevSecOps (9th)
Sysdig Secure
Ranking in Container Security
20th
Ranking in Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP)
18th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (27th), Cloud Detection and Response (CDR) (9th), AI Observability (28th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) category, the mindshare of Qualys TotalCloud is 2.3%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Aqua Cloud Security Platform is 3.1%, down from 3.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Sysdig Secure is 2.9%, down from 3.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Qualys TotalCloud2.3%
Aqua Cloud Security Platform3.1%
Sysdig Secure2.9%
Other91.7%
Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP)
 

Featured Reviews

RO
IT Security Expert at Alior Bank S.A.
Unified risk scoring has improved our cloud visibility and simplifies remediation priorities
Qualys TotalCloud provides unified vulnerability and threat assessment across both IAS and SaaS. This solution provides a single prioritized view of risk, which helps reduce the work I would have to do. We are no longer based on CVSS; we are based on Qualys risk scoring, which is based on CVSS plus internal findings made by Qualys, and then assigns its own score. The TruRisk insight feature has found a small number of assets with high vulnerability scores, though I am cautious since some information is classified. Qualys TotalCloud has positively impacted our bank's performance, and we have definitely seen benefits after implementing this solution.
Samir Paul - PeerSpot reviewer
Security Practitioner at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Secures cloud workloads from build to runtime and has needed simpler setup and alert tuning
Regarding how Aqua Cloud Security Platform can be improved, the first area is the complex initial setup. Deployment and configuration can be complex, especially in large environments that require skilled resources. For Kubernetes environments, initial onboarding and policy setup takes time. Compared to Wiz onboarding, it is not very straightforward, as I have also worked with Wiz. The UI is powerful but not very simple for new users, as navigation and dashboard can be overwhelming. Alert noise and tuning are required because Aqua generates a large number of initial alerts that need tuning to reduce false positives. Additionally, pricing can be high depending on workload scale, especially for large Kubernetes and multi-cloud environments. For improvements to Aqua Cloud Security Platform, I think better integration with SOAR and XDR platforms, more AI-driven prioritization, and providing simpler out-of-the-box policies would be beneficial.
MM
DevSecOps Engineer at a outsourcing company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Runtime threat detection has improved and security teams prioritize real Kubernetes risks
The best feature Sysdig Secure offers is threat detection. The threat detection feature on Sysdig Secure stands out compared to other solutions I have seen or used because Sysdig sees the actual behavior inside the container or kernel and correlates it with Kubernetes infrastructure, which makes detection both earlier and more precise in a cloud-native environment. Sysdig Secure has positively impacted our organization by improving visibility into our Kubernetes environment and focusing on real risk, which has reduced alert noise, improved threat detection at runtime, and made vulnerability management more efficient by prioritizing issues that actually affect running workloads.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Qualys TotalCloud's most valuable features are its security capabilities that help identify and mitigate risk factors."
"Qualys TotalCloud's most valuable feature is its agent versatility."
"TotalCloud's best feature is the integration of cloud accounts. It helps with the risk and security posture management of our cloud infrastructure."
"One of the features I appreciate is the ability to generate daily reports without relying on anyone else."
"If someone were to ask me to review Qualys TotalCloud, I would summarize it as an end-to-end solution for cloud security with visibility and governance-grade controls without needing to manage multiple disconnected tools."
"The most valuable feature is the consolidated information that it provides from various platforms."
"The scalability is good as well. I would rate it ten out of ten."
"Qualys TotalCloud's most valuable feature is its ability to link clusters of assets, providing a clear model of deployments, vulnerabilities, and statuses."
"The most helpful feature of Aqua Security is Drift Prevention, which is a feature that allows images to be immutable. In addition, one of the main reasons we went with Aqua Security is because it provides strong protection when it comes to runtime security."
"The container scanning is very helpful."
"The most valuable feature of Aqua Security is the scanner."
"The CSPM product is great at securing our cloud accounts and I really like the runtime protection for containers and functions too."
"Their sandboxing service is also really good."
"Aqua Cloud Security Platform positively impacted my organization by allowing deployment from code to cloud in the entire CI/CD pipeline, with excellent capabilities and recent AI application security that is useful in the DevSecOps platform."
"From what I understand, the initial setup is simple."
"The most valuable feature is the security."
"The log monitor is the most valuable feature."
"I have not seen any stability issues so far."
"From a container-based standpoint, it offers excellent scalability to its users...I would tell those planning to use the solution that, from a container standpoint, it's excellent."
"In terms of measurable outcomes, I have seen a reduction in vulnerabilities, as Sysdig Secure can tell us how many vulnerabilities are present on a day-to-day report basis, which has improved our efficiency by more than 50% and helps us stay compliant with necessary regulations."
"Sysdig Secure has positively impacted our organization by improving visibility into our Kubernetes environment and focusing on real risk, which has reduced alert noise, improved threat detection at runtime, and made vulnerability management more efficient by prioritizing issues that actually affect running workloads."
"We appreciate this feature, especially when combined with CD monitoring. The implementation of requested features has been remarkable, such as scanning for compliance in CRM processes for the US government. We heavily rely on this feature to assess compliance with federal requirements."
"Sysdig Secure has many strong foundational features like compliance and benchmark, security, network access management, and vulnerability management."
"The proactiveness of the support has been fantastic. Every time we mention something in a meeting that we're trying to do, he proactively takes that as an investigation topic and looks into it. He'll provide the solution even though we might not have asked him to investigate it."
 

Cons

"In TotalCloud, I would suggest improvements in policy checks to cater to various inventory types like VPCs, subnets, S3 buckets, or IAMs. There is a lack of data segregation according to criticality or inventory."
"The patching process with Qualys Patch Management, which is part of TotalCloud, does not cover installing certain prerequisites on the servers or workstations. This shortcoming means we must rely on SCCM when any service stack updates or additional prerequisites are needed."
"I sometimes have difficulty detecting or uninstalling certain versions of applications, which I have to do manually."
"From a downside perspective, the UI is not user-friendly and feels dated compared to other tools like Prisma Cloud."
"In terms of improvement, remediation still belongs to the cloud team, which is one of the issues we faced with Qualys TotalCloud."
"There is a lack of data segregation according to criticality or inventory."
"An area for improvement would be to focus on risks related to AI, such as large language models and potential data leakage."
"We would like to see Windows-based sensors available in Qualys, as this would make the platform more versatile and support a broader range of environments."
"I would like Aqua Security to look into is the development of a web security portal."
"Aqua Cloud Security Platform could improve by streamlining the onboarding process and initial policy tuning to reduce the feeling of exhaustion or fatigue."
"Aqua Security could improve the forwarding of logging into Splunk and into other tools, it should be easier."
"It's a bit hard to use the user roles. That was a bit confusing."
"Customer support is acceptable. Sometimes we receive a complaint from our L3 or L2 engineers that they are not getting proper on-time support, but overall, it is acceptable."
"Aqua is a bit expensive so you have to really justify going for it or not."
"What I dislike about Aqua Cloud Security Platform is that we did not find an option to turn off logging or split logs to avoid putting Aqua Cloud Security Platform logs into a logging system because there was a lot of information about logs."
"The user interface could be improved, especially in terms of organization and clarity."
"Perhaps, it could support more custom implementations, as our company utilizes custom implementations rather than standard ones. Configuring it requires a deep understanding and adjustment to our specific needs, which took some time. Other than that, I'm unsure about potential improvements. We were considering the possibility of compartmentalizing their tools. Currently, in Sysdig Secure, they bundle multiple features, and we are unable to use them individually. For instance, if we only need compliance scanning, we have to deploy the entire secure package. This is because of the way their agent functions, but I can't delve into more details."
"Reporting can definitely be better. Live dashboards should be configurable for a longer period of time rather than 30 days. Being able to go back in time to compare six months ago to today would be valuable."
"The solution needs to improve overall from a CSPM standpoint since they can't compete with Wiz or Orca."
"Sysdig Secure needs to scale more for complete cloud-native coverage."
"The dashboard could be more simple and show the more important issues that are detected first. We'd like to be able to set it up so more important issues show up more prominently in the dashboard."
"Sysdig's biggest weakness is dashboarding and reporting. You have access to the data and can get everything you need, but we need the ability to summarize the information quickly in a format that senior leaders can understand. We report to the executive level and global board. I need to roll all that in-depth information into a quick summary, and their maturity level isn't there. I'm seeing that on the future road map, but it isn't there now."
"I give it an eight because of the bugs, specifically the fix version bug where sometimes there is no fix version shown, and I wish Sysdig Secure would create a customizable UI that orders features by importance to enhance user experience."
"There was a security concern related to a specific feature. While the feature itself was promising, it posed a challenge. The situation revolved around code scanning. If your source code is hosted within your own premises, say on Bitbucket, you naturally wouldn't want your code to be accessible to external parties beyond your company. Keeping your code base private is a standard practice. However, in the case of code scanning using Sysdig Secure, they copy your code to their SaaS platform. This posed an issue for us. When we inquired about this, their response acknowledged the concern. In an upcoming release, they plan to enable code scanning within your on-premises environment through the assistance of an agent. This change is already in progress. While this tool stands out compared to existing solutions in the market, it's important to note that there are still some limitations to consider. Another drawback we encountered relates to our expertise with Kubernetes. The tool can monitor Kubernetes audit logs, triggering alerts and notifications. However, it falls short in terms of taking direct action based on these alerts. There are different methods of event capture, including through system labels and system calls, as well as via Kubernetes audit events. Notably, at the system level, Sysdig Secure can both detect and respond to events, allowing actions like blocking and warning. This proactive approach is effective at the system call level. However, when it comes to monitoring Kubernetes audit events, Sysdig Secure can only notify without being able to execute any further actions. It can't block access or containers. The vendor likened their role to that of a monitoring camera, observing events and sending notifications without the capacity to intervene. This limitation applies to Kubernetes audit events. Given that everything operates within our system, there is a workaround available: configuring system-level policies to block containers as necessary."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"TotalCloud's price is about right where I would expect it to be."
"It isn't cheap, but it's reasonable. It helps us to manage things with very few resources."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers cost-effective licensing flexibility."
"The pricing is comparable. It is built into our other product, so I cannot piecemeal it. It is a part of our subscription."
"The pricing for TotalCloud is attractive and competitive in the market. Given the features, especially the dashboard, I have no concerns regarding pricing."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers good pricing that is affordable and competitive with the market. Our partnership also provides us with additional benefits."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers competitive pricing given its comprehensive suite of features, including integration, assessment, remediation, and detection capabilities, all within a single platform."
"Although Qualys TotalCloud is relatively expensive due to its unique automation features, its cost-effectiveness is rated an eight out of ten, with ten being the most costly."
"They were reasonable with their pricing. They were pretty down-to-earth about the way they pitched their product and the way they tried to close the deal. They were one of the rare companies that approached the whole valuation in a way that made sense for our company, for our needs, and for their own requirements as well... They will accommodate your needs if they are able to understand them and they're stated clearly."
"The pricing of this solution could be improved."
"Aqua Security is not cheap, and it's not very expensive, such as Splunk, they are in the middle."
"Dealing with licensing costs isn't my responsibility, but I know that the licenses don't depend on the number of users, but instead are priced according to your workload."
"It comes at a reasonable cost."
"I am always going to say that it could be a little bit cheaper. I do feel that it is a little bit on the expensive side."
"It is quite costly compared to other tools."
"In comparison to other cloud solutions, it's reasonably priced. However, when compared to in-house built open-source projects, it might be considered somewhat costly. The cost depends on whether someone sees the support provided by Sysdig as an advantage or if it's deemed unnecessary. Personally, I find the support to be excellent and consider it a good value."
"Sysdig is competitive. The quality matches the pricing. Obviously, everyone wants things to be cheaper, but if you're realistic, you acknowledge that quality service comes with a price. Sysdig is the gold standard for Kubernetes, and I wouldn't choose anything else. We live in Kubernetes. Everything is containerized, so that means a lot to us, and we're willing to make an investment."
"The solution's pricing depends on the agents...In short, the price depends on the environment of its user."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
16%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Outsourcing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Financial Services Firm
18%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise32
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise15
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise5
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Qualys TotalCloud?
In terms of improvement, remediation still belongs to the cloud team, which is one of the issues we faced with Qualys...
What is your primary use case for Qualys TotalCloud?
My main use case for Qualys TotalCloud is regarding the cloud visibility that we were not having previously. Previous...
What do you think of Aqua Security vs Prisma Cloud?
Aqua Security is easy to use and very manageable. Its main focus is on Kubernetes and Docker. Security is a very valu...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Aqua Security?
Compared to other vendors, Aqua Cloud Security Platform's pricing is good or lesser. The pricing part is acceptable, ...
What needs improvement with Aqua Security?
Aqua Cloud Security Platform could be improved as the UI can feel rough to navigate, and sometimes finding the data I...
What needs improvement with Sysdig Secure?
Sysdig Secure works well for us, but there are a few areas for improvement, such as the alerting and notification sys...
What is your primary use case for Sysdig Secure?
Our primary use case for Sysdig Secure is runtime threat detection and vulnerability management.
What advice do you have for others considering Sysdig Secure?
My advice for others looking into using Sysdig Secure is to clearly define your primary use case before getting start...
 

Also Known As

Qualys TotalCloud with FlexScan
Aqua Security Platform, CloudSploit, Argon
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
HPE Salesforce Telstra Ellie Mae Cathay Pacific HomeAway
SAP Concur, Goldman Sachs, Worldpay, Experian, BigCommerce, Arkose Labs, Calendly, Noteable, Bloomreach. More here: https://sysdig.com/customers/
Find out what your peers are saying about Aqua Cloud Security Platform vs. Sysdig Secure and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
912,517 professionals have used our research since 2012.