AWS Security Hub vs CRITICALSTART comparison

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Critical Start are both solutions in the Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) category. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is ranked #7 with an average rating of 7.7, while Critical Start is ranked #26. Amazon Web Services (AWS) holds a 5.8% mindshare in SOAR, compared to Critical Start’s 1.2% mindshare. Additionally, 89% of Amazon Web Services (AWS) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Critical Start users who would recommend it.

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 5, 2024

AWS Security Hub and CRITICALSTART are competitors in the cybersecurity market. AWS Security Hub holds an edge in integration within the AWS ecosystem, while CRITICALSTART excels in advanced threat detection and response.

Features: AWS Security Hub integrates seamlessly with AWS services, offers a centralized security view, and maintains compliance checks. It acts as a one-stop dashboard for security alerts. CRITICALSTART provides real-time threat intelligence, managed detection and response services, and strong human intervention capabilities, utilizing a Zero-Trust model for security enhancements.

Room for Improvement:AWS Security Hub could improve its UI intuitiveness and support for hybrid environments and reduce complexity in dashboard usage. CRITICALSTART could enhance response times, lower the complexity of UI navigation, and refine feature tuning for better alert management.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: AWS Security Hub is easily deployed for AWS environments with comprehensive documentation and automation features, promoting self-reliance. CRITICALSTART offers a more hands-on deployment with personalized support, beneficial for organizations needing extensive setup assistance.

Pricing and ROI: AWS Security Hub offers cost-effective scalability, suiting organizations deeply embedded in AWS. CRITICALSTART, though potentially higher in initial costs, provides tailored security solutions and expert management that justify its pricing for businesses prioritizing security.

To learn more, read our detailed AWS Security Hub vs. CRITICALSTART Report (Updated: June 2026).

Buyer's Guide

AWS Security Hub vs. CRITICALSTART

June 2026

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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

Torq

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2026, in the Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) category, the mindshare of Torq is 3.8%, down from 5.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of AWS Security Hub is 5.8%, down from 8.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of CRITICALSTART is 1.2%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Torq	3.8%
AWS Security Hub	5.8%
CRITICALSTART	1.2%
Other	89.2%

Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR)

Featured Reviews

AdityaDesai

Solutions Architect at ProArch

Automation has streamlined multi-tenant SOC workflows and improves alert handling efficiency

Although the reporting within Torq is not that great, we did ask for many features regarding reporting in Torq, but due to some platform constraints, they could not make the whole dataset available for us to be used in reporting. Except for that, we used some basic reporting. When I used Torq, it was indeed in the early stages of AI capabilities. Only a few customers were allowed to use it, and we were among them. It functioned well as long as we summarized the data properly. If you input garbage, you would get garbage out. Thus, we had to do significant fine-tuning regarding what data context we provided to the AI orchestrator to get meaningful results. In terms of Torq's unified platform approach to AI SOC automation and case management compared to managing multiple point solutions across my security stack, I find it case-centric. The unified view in case management is good since it provides clarity, although there are limitations regarding how many items in case management can be modified at once. Bulk operations are very limited, potentially due to their back-end database or data retrieval processes that can be improved. Regarding improvements for Torq, when we were onboarded, there were aspects we were uncertain about, such as the number of cases that could be generated, what data we could bring in, how many clients we could onboard, and similar concerns. Initially, we also lacked clarity about the number of playbooks or workflows we could build. Different triggers like system triggers, case-based triggers, and others can be employed without restrictions, but when it comes to on-demand and scheduled jobs, there is a limitation based on the subscription and pricing tier that notably caps the number of workflows we can create. No bulk editing across cases was one issue, along with limited filtering related to single grouping constraints. Additionally, the out-of-the-box case templates provided require substantial modifications before they become usable. There is also a feature in the cases for notes that cannot be searched. They are only visible through the UI, which is another area for improvement. The workflow and execution-based charges seem misleading as this was not discussed initially. I am not sure if new customers are made aware of this. It seems that workflows revolving around cases hinder functionality outside of case management, as we have many use cases needing on-demand triggers and schedules for functions like reporting or polling devices. Creating additional workflows to achieve basic functionalities raises costs significantly, which disadvantages customers. While they facilitate optimization and scaling, the support received tends to be very basic. Improvements can be made in that area as well.

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Karthik Ekambaram

Director at Scybers

Has helped identify misconfigurations and prioritize risks but lacks multi-cloud support and deeper integration features

AWS Security Hub cannot scale up to multiple different cloud environments; it only works for AWS. There are other products in the market for CSPM that can give you multi-cloud environment misconfigurations, even Microsoft for that matter. Regarding the integration of AWS Security Hub with third-party tools, I am not certain whether we can integrate them, but there is no need to do so. However, AWS Security Hub cannot integrate with other cloud providers, so it only supports the AWS environment. The compliance checks within AWS Security Hub are good, but we don't use them much. We utilize compliance frameworks such as CIS compliance frameworks and ISO 27017 framework, which are beneficial, but it can improve in other areas too, such as including NIST and other frameworks beyond just ISO and CIS. Improvements can be applicable for scalability, particularly on integration with multi-cloud environments, and compliance frameworks can be added for more variety as well. The unified dashboard in AWS Security Hub is adequate; I cannot say it is exceptional, but the content available in the dashboards is satisfactory for now.

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Justin Hadley

Sr. Manager, Security Engineering at a financial services firm with 501-1,000 employees

The transparency of data in the platform is perfect: You see everything as they are seeing it

Their Zero Trust Analytics Platform (ZTAP) engine, which is kind of their correlation engine, is by far and away one of the best in the business. We can filter and utilize different lists to build out different alerts, such as, what to alert on and when not to alert. This engine helps reduce our number of alerts and false positives. The service's Trusted Behavior Registry helps the provider solve every alert. The way that they have it built out is very intelligent. The way every alert comes in, it gets triaged one direction or another. If it is already a false positive, then it is still getting addressed and reviewed on a regular cadence. Also, true positive alerts get escalated to the appropriate personnel. Its mobile app is great. The ability just to be able to quick reference and see what's coming in when you're on the move or go. You don't always need to have your computer or laptop handy, because you can operate it just from the mobile app. It can communicate with analysts, which is great. The mobile app is great at affecting the efficiency of our security operations. Those guys are using it throughout the day, whether that be at the office, home, or off hours. Typically, they triage from the mobile app. Then, if an escalation needs to be done on a computer, they will pull out a computer. We were on the original UI for a few years, so the updated UI has been a refreshing change. It has significantly more ability to filter and translate data, then load that data. It is rather intuitive to click through for some of our junior analysts or interns, especially as we are starting to onboard and teach them different aspects of the security operations team.

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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

"Torq's unified platform approach to AI, SOAR, automation, and case management is superior compared to my experience managing multiple point solutions."

"We have seen fewer failures of automations from the time Torq came into the picture, we've had a more streamlined process of handling incidents, and at the same time, we've learned to embed the AI into our incident types, and that is how it has helped us in the automation."

"What I appreciate most about Torq is that it is an essential part of our system."

"Any request that comes in, regardless of how complex it is, I can accomplish it with Torq."

"If I review about 100 vendors that I might work with, Torq is definitely in the top five that gave me personally investment back, just because every bit of effort I put into Torq eventually became a workflow that gave it back to me."

"According to positive outcomes, Torq reduced manual work and made incident response more efficient."

"As an analyst, it has demonstrated potential to reduce workforce requirements and time needed for related activities."

"Using that one piece of AI, we auto-closed 511 cases in quarter four alone."

More Torq pros

"I find all of the features to be highly valuable."

"The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that it is easy to manage...It is a scalable solution."

"I like that AWS Security Hub currently has several good features, around four or five. The technical support for AWS Security Hub is also responsive."

"Within AWS Security Hub, there is a feature for aggregating and prioritizing security findings which allows for better risk prioritization based on misconfiguration, as they know AWS thoroughly."

"I really like the seamless integration with the AWS account structure. It can even be made mandatory as part of the landing zone. These are great features. And there's a single pane of glass for the entire account."

"Easily integrates with third-party tools"

"The best feature of AWS Security Hub is that you can get compliance or your cloud's current security posture."

"This solution is for security posture management for the cloud, showing the security posture of your cloud infrastructure and giving you good insight into whether your infrastructure is secure or not."

More AWS Security Hub pros

"There are two parts of CRITICALSTART's services that are most valuable to us. The MDR solution where they monitor our computers, laptops, and users across the board; and their knowledge of Palo Alto firewalls."

"My impression of the transparency of the data is that it has good detail. It allows you to see how many events have come in, how many of those events have made it down to their analysts to review, and then however many from their analysts to be able to close out, have been able to been escalated to us. It's a good metric that we can share with my management. They see the value of what the SOC is bringing on top of what my team is already doing."

"From where we were prior to going into them, the service has increased our analysts’ efficiency to the point that they can focus on other areas of the business. It gives me the ability to allow analysts to do Level 3 and 4 work and stay out of the weeds of the alerts, where you tend to get alert fatigue. The service takes care of much of the Tier 1 and Tier 2 triage. It is more effective than what we had been used to, because it allows the filtering of Level 1 and Level 2 type alerts to be taken care of. This leaves less for us to handle, which is a good thing."

"From where we were prior to going into them, the service has increased our analysts’ efficiency to the point that they can focus on other areas of the business."

"The main difference between the other options and this one is the quality of the personnel within the SOC. It's their knowledge and depth and the way they handle customers."

"The most valuable feature of their service is their tuning... If we were getting 1,000 alerts a day without them, they tune it until they know what to do for 999 of them, and one will make it through to us per day. That tuning is the most valuable part of their solution."

"Out of all the service providers I've had to work with over the years—I've been here six years—CRITICALSTART is my favorite to work with."

"When I start thinking about if I were to try to light up a SOC, which I've done before and I have no interest in doing, it could be a million dollars a year or more to do that, and for what I am paying them for the managed fees, it's a steal."

More CRITICALSTART pros

Cons

"I wish Torq's AI assistant for building templated workflows from scratch worked better; when you start with a blank slate, asking AI to help you build or template the workflow out does not go well."

"We have MCP that we are working with our cloud security platform, and we wanted to connect this MCP to the case management."

"The initial deployment of Torq was not easy."

"It was able to capture data but was unable to differentiate between the agent hostname we are using and the hostname that resides on the back end of the Internet."

"Regarding the pricing of Torq, I would say it is expensive."

"The workflow and execution-based charges seem misleading as this was not discussed initially, and creating additional workflows to achieve basic functionalities raises costs significantly, which disadvantages customers."

"Additionally, the documentation for Torq is not very clear. Most of the information is presented in videos, which are not ideal for reading; there are mostly paragraphs and other text-based content."

"Torq can probably use more ML and look at what can be closed and what cannot be closed in terms of data classification."

More Torq cons

"Security needs to be measured based on their own criteria. We can't add custom criteria specific to our organization. For example, having an S3 bucket publicly available might be flagged as a critical alert, but it might not be critical in a sandbox environment. So, it gets flagged as critical, which becomes a false positive. So, customization options and creating custom dashboards would be areas for improvement."

"From an improvement perspective, there is a need to add more compliance since, right now, AWS Security Hub only provides four to five compliances to control the tool."

"Adding SIEM features would be beneficial because of the limited customization of AWS Security Hub."

"However, the sheer number of services can be overwhelming when implementing something new."

"AWS Security Hub's configuration and integration are areas where it lacks and needs to improve."

"Shortening the response time for support tickets, particularly in production issues, could make the service more efficient."

"Right now, there are some difficulties we're facing with AWS Security Hub, and we need our central team to mitigate the issues."

"AWS Security Hub cannot scale up to multiple different cloud environments; it only works for AWS."

More AWS Security Hub cons

"The only thing I can think of that I would like to see, and I'm sure they could work this into a service pretty easily, is not only alerts on issues that are affecting my company, but some threat intelligence of a general nature on what's out there in the environment. That might be a nice add-in."

"They just did a user interface overhaul to the website portal that you use for troubleshooting tickets. The old one was fine. The new one is not intuitive and I hate it."

"During the six-month integration and rollout, there were some bumpy roads along the way. There were communication breakdowns between the project manager, CRITICALSTART leadership, and us (as the customer). I expressed my displeasure during the integration in their inability to effectively communicate when there were holdups or issues. They were going through some growing pains at that time, but they have been right there for us ever since."

"The updated UI is actually pretty bad. Regarding the intuitiveness, it is fairly easy to use, but the responsiveness, on a scale of one to 10, is a one. It's really poor performance."

"There is room for improvement with the new UI, and that's about it. I would like to see a more intuitive design."

"The UI has become slower but it's not something I would call them out on."

"The biggest room for improvement is not necessarily in their service or offering, but in the products that they support. I would like them to further their knowledge and ability to integrate with those tools. They have base integrations with everything, and we haven't come across anything. They should just continue to build on that API interface between their applications and other third-party consoles."

"They could dig a little bit deeper into the Splunk alerts when they feel like they need to be escalated to us."

More CRITICALSTART cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available

"The price of AWS Security Hub is average compared to other solutions."

"AWS Security Hub's pricing is pretty reasonable."

"Security Hub is not an expensive solution."

"There are multiple subscription models, like yearly, monthly, and packaged."

"The pricing is fine. It is not an expensive tool."

"The price of the solution is not very competitive but it is reasonable."

"AWS Security Hub is not an expensive tool. I would consider it to be a cheap solution. AWS Security Hub follows the PAYG pricing model, meaning you will have to pay for whatever you use."

"The cost is based on the number of compliances, core checks, and services required, and for more than 10,000 recommendations, the charge is just one dollar."

"I've told CRITICALSTART that I think the managed service they provide is cheaper than it should be. It's a really good deal."

"As far as the expense goes, it's very competitive pricing and the services you get are almost like you have a person on your team."

"There are contractual penalties if their SLAs are not met. This commitment was very important in our decision to go with this service, because not having downtime is extremely important to us. The providers has not missed an SLA in the 18 months that I have worked with them."

"Overall, for what I'm paying for it, and the benefit I'm getting out of it, it is right where it needs to be, if not a little bit in my favor. For what it costs me to actually have this service, I could afford one internal person to do that job, but now I have a team of 10 or more who are doing that job, and they don't sleep because they work shifts."

"The pricing of other services was so insane that they weren't even an option."

"It costs a lot for what we felt comfortable to spend."

"The pricing has always been competitive. They have always been good to us. They will make it a fight. They don't try to hide anything; it's always been fully transparent and well-worth what we pay for it."

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Comparison Review

it_user186927

Director of Operations at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees

Feb 16, 2015

Cybereason vs. Interset vs. SQRRL

Capture DB - they all use NoSQL db and hence solve the ad hoc query and 'go back in time' problem with current best of breed SIEM and DLP solutions that rely on real time analysis of incoming logs (and don't store them). This means deeper and quicker iterative threat analysis and assessment…

Read full review

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

13%

Construction Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Computer Software Company

Comms Service Provider

Construction Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	4
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	6

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	14

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	4
Midsize Enterprise	3
Large Enterprise	4

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Torq?

I do not dislike anything about Torq because it has satisfied all of our use cases and requirements. We contacted sup...

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What is your primary use case for Torq?

Initially, we were using Slack for small automations, such as creating pipelines or shutting down servers. For exampl...

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What advice do you have for others considering Torq?

I have been working for five years with experience in the IT field. Torq is very good. It manages everything. I would...

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Which is better - Azure Sentinel or AWS Security Hub?

We like that Azure Sentinel does not require as much maintenance as legacy SIEMs that are on-premises. Azure Sentinel...

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What needs improvement with AWS Security Hub?

I do not see any areas for improvement in AWS Security Hub itself, but the cost factor is something that is the main ...

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What is your primary use case for AWS Security Hub?

AWS Security Hub is something I have used daily as it is a part of my job for cloud security purposes. If you are dea...

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Comparisons

Tines vs Torq

Compared 25% of the time

Splunk SOAR vs Torq

Compared 14% of the time

Blink Ops vs Torq

Compared 11% of the time

Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR vs Torq

Compared 10% of the time

Swimlane vs Torq

Compared 8% of the time

More Torq Competitors

Microsoft Sentinel vs AWS Security Hub

Compared 32% of the time

Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks vs AWS Security Hub

Compared 6% of the time

Wiz vs AWS Security Hub

Compared 4% of the time

Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs AWS Security Hub

Compared 4% of the time

Check Point CloudGuard CNAPP vs AWS Security Hub

Compared 4% of the time

More AWS Security Hub Competitors

ServiceNow Security Operations vs CRITICALSTART

Compared 12% of the time

Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR vs CRITICALSTART

Compared 9% of the time

SentinelOne Wayfinder Threat Detection and Response vs CRITICALSTART

Compared 8% of the time

Binary Defense MDR vs CRITICALSTART

Compared 8% of the time

Expel vs CRITICALSTART

Compared 6% of the time

More CRITICALSTART Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Torq

June 2026

Download Torq product report

Buyer's Guide

AWS Security Hub

June 2026

Download AWS Security Hub product report

Buyer's Guide

CRITICALSTART

June 2026

Download CRITICALSTART product report

Also Known As

No data available

SQRRL

Critical Start, CriticalStart

Overview

Torq is the enterprise AI SOC solution that effectively combines adaptive insights and automation to handle critical threats efficiently. It manages threat lifecycles, swiftly moving from triage to response, ensuring effective risk management.

Torq is designed to streamline security operations by aggregating telemetry across your security stack. It investigates significant risks and manages threats from triage to containment and remediation. This AI-driven tool enhances the capabilities of your SecOps team, allowing them to achieve more impactful results without introducing complicated processes.

What are the key features of Torq?

Adaptive Agentic Insights: Provides real-time threat intelligence tailored to specific security challenges.
Automation: Automates responses to security incidents, minimizing manual intervention requirements.
Threat Lifecycle Management: Comprehensive handling of threats from detection to remediation.
Telemetry Aggregation: Integrates data across platforms for a unified security overview.

Why consider Torq based on reviews?

Efficiency: Users notice significant reductions in time spent managing threats.
Risk Reduction: Enhanced ability to identify and address critical threats promptly.
Resource Optimization: Allows teams to allocate effort to other critical tasks by reducing manual security operations.
Scalability: Adaptable to meet the demands of growing or changing infrastructures.

In industries like finance and healthcare, Torq shows effectiveness by adapting to specific risk scenarios often encountered in these fields. Its integration with existing infrastructures makes it a valuable asset for maintaining stringent security standards, essential for protecting critical data and operations in diverse high-stakes environments.

Torq

AWS Security Hub provides multi-account management and compliance checks alongside integrations with AWS services and third-party tools. It centralizes vulnerability tracking and risk prioritization, delivering real-time alerts for proactive security management.

AWS Security Hub enhances cloud security management through a centralized dashboard that monitors infrastructure resources and compliance scores, ensuring adherence to AWS standards. With integrations for vulnerability detection and security posture management, users can streamline security operations. While the platform offers notable benefits, areas for improvement include customization options for findings suppression and integration with multi-cloud environments.

What are the key features of AWS Security Hub?

Multi-Account Management: Seamlessly manage security across numerous accounts.
Compliance Checks: Stay aligned with standards such as PCI through automated reviews.
AWS Integrations: Connect effortlessly with AWS and third-party services to enhance security posture.
Real-Time Alerts: Quickly respond to potential threats with immediate notifications.
Risk Prioritization: Focus on critical vulnerabilities to enhance resource allocation.

What benefits should users expect from using AWS Security Hub?

Proactive Security: Early threat detection enables quicker mitigation strategies.
Cloud-Native Functionality: Utilize tools tailored for cloud environments.
Compliance Insights: Simplified compliance management provides transparency.
Ease of Use: Streamlined interface facilitates efficient security management.

Industries implementing AWS Security Hub leverage its capabilities for comprehensive security across multiple accounts and regions. Health, finance, and retail sectors benefit by automating compliance checks and monitoring security infrastructures. This service aids in identifying misconfigurations, tracking alerts, and ensuring infrastructure integrity during cyber incidents.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

CRITICALSTART enhances cybersecurity through advanced alert management, expert guidance, and a user-friendly interface. It promotes efficient monitoring and response to alerts, utilizing a Zero Trust model for heightened security.

CRITICALSTART is designed for organizations seeking to manage security alerts and streamline monitoring processes. Known for its quick response times and efficient alert filtering, it integrates tools like Cylance and Carbon Black to offer managed detection and response services. Users experience enhanced security by focusing on critical threats while the platform's easy navigation aids in efficiently responding to alerts. Improvement areas include better alert prioritization, enhanced compliance disclosure, and smoother integration with third-party communication tools.

What are the key features of CRITICALSTART?

Alert Management: Efficient handling and filtering of alerts to minimize noise.
Expert Guidance: Insights for integrating SIEM and optimizing response strategies.
Mobile Access: Easy access through a mobile app to manage alerts on the go.
Zero Trust Model: Enhances security by minimizing unnecessary access and noise.
User-Friendly Interface: Seamless navigation enhances user interaction and response times.

What advantages and ROI should users consider?

Improved Security Confidence: Advanced alert handling promotes a secure environment.
Increased Efficiency: Streamlined monitoring allows focus on critical threats.
Expert Insight: Professional guidance enhances security strategies and operations.
Quick Response Times: Rapid handling of threats reduces potential impacts.

In industry applications, organizations use CRITICALSTART to bolster cybersecurity measures across finance, healthcare, and technology sectors. Managed detection services and third-party integration make it suitable for enterprises looking to optimize security operations and minimize alert fatigue while ensuring 24/7 monitoring and protection.

Critical Start

Sample Customers

Information Not Available

Edmunds, Frame.io, GoDaddy, Realtor.com

Information Not Available

Buyer's Guide

AWS Security Hub vs. CRITICALSTART

June 2026

Free Report: AWS Security Hub vs. CRITICALSTART

Find out what your peers are saying about AWS Security Hub vs. CRITICALSTART and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.

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