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BMC Helix Cloud Security vs FortiCNAPP comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 22, 2026

Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

Qualys TotalCloud
Sponsored
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
7th
Ranking in Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
6th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
54
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (5th), Container Security (8th), SaaS Security Posture Management (SSPM) (2nd), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (6th)
BMC Helix Cloud Security
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
24th
Ranking in Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
35th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
FortiCNAPP
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
13th
Ranking in Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
13th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
17
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (27th), Container Security (17th), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (13th), Compliance Management (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) category, the mindshare of Qualys TotalCloud is 1.9%, up from 1.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of BMC Helix Cloud Security is 1.7%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of FortiCNAPP is 4.3%, up from 2.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Qualys TotalCloud1.9%
FortiCNAPP4.3%
BMC Helix Cloud Security1.7%
Other92.1%
Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2859021 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr Security Engineer at a tech vendor with 5,001-10,000 employees
Risk-based triage has transformed container security and now prioritizes high-impact threats
The best features Qualys TotalCloud offers currently include managing cloud infrastructure and container security while facing major challenges such as alert fatigue. Traditional vulnerability scanners flag hundreds of CVEs on short-lived Kubernetes containers, some of which have no internet exposure or are gone before we can even triage them. I leverage Qualys TotalCloud to move beyond static CVSS. I use it to implement runtime exposure, correlation risk reprioritization, and shift-left integration. This notifies developers to fix a base image upstream rather than patching live ephemeral instances. In my work with cloud and container security, the biggest operational hurdle was alert fatigue. I use Qualys to shift left from static CVSS severity to context-aware risk prioritization. I correlated raw vulnerability data with real-time risk factors such as public network exposure, active runtime execution, or overly permissive IAM roles. This allows us to immediately drop the priority of isolated containers and escalate lower-severity CVEs that sit on an exposed, high-risk path. We can map these findings directly back to our CI/CD pipelines so developers can patch the root base images upstream. We have drastically cut down the signal-to-noise ratio, saved a lot of manual hours doing triage work, and ensured engineering effort goes directly towards high-impact risk reduction.
GregoireSoukiassian - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
Charl Pinches - PeerSpot reviewer
Solutions Sales Specialist at a outsourcing company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Cloud risk has become visible and security teams prioritize and act on threats efficiently
FortiCNAPP can be improved because the platform can feel complex at the start, especially for teams new to CNAP tooling. Some users mention that they found the interface and data models less intuitive than expected, and I have had situations where reporting and alert configurations might require time. Regarding other improvements needed for FortiCNAPP, the majority of the time is that reporting and alert configuration might require time to tune properly. This is the significant issue, combined with the fact that some users find the interface and data model less intuitive than expected. Regarding FortiCNAPP's AI capabilities, I think there might be a bit of improvement needed. However, since Fortinet is a security vendor overall, keeping the data safe is not a problem. I know they have invested a lot in getting it to a place where it is a trusted platform.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Its excellent graphical interface makes the scanning process simple."
"TotalCloud offers a comprehensive suite of features, including EDR, XDR, and TrueRisk, providing a centralized platform for managing vulnerabilities and security risks."
"With TotalCloud, we can scan through the API. If we are not able to deploy cloud agents on the machine, we can use the API."
"The platform's unified view of the organization proves particularly valuable for leadership team meetings."
"Qualys TotalCloud has saved our time by giving us better asset visibility and risk-based prioritization, as it has reduced the time spent manually reviewing CVEs and deciding what to address first."
"The biggest strengths of Qualys TotalCloud are that it is pretty good at cloud visibility, has easy integration, and also has multi-cloud compatibility."
"TruRisk Insights is the most important innovation they've released this year."
"Qualys TotalCloud fulfills all these needs."
"Role-based security is a valuable feature."
"It is a good tool to make sure that your containers are safe and sound."
"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."
"Using this solution is an eye-opener; having that holistic view is the biggest eye-opener because you understand, from any of your connected cloud accounts, what your vulnerabilities are with it."
"The most valuable aspects of BMC Helix Cloud Security are its security features and regulatory compliance capabilities."
"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."
"The features that I've found most valuable are its container security aspect. I also like its vulnerability management tools."
"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."
"The compliance reports are definitely most valuable because they save time and are accurate. So, instead of relying on a human going through and checking or providing me with a report, I could just log into Lacework and see for myself."
"Lacework is helping a lot in reducing the noise of the alerts. Usually, whenever you have a tool in place, you have a lot of noise in terms of alerts, but the time for an engineer to look into those alerts is limited. Lacework is helping us to consolidate the information that we are getting from the agents and other sources. We are able to focus only on the things that matter, which is the most valuable thing for us. It saves time, and for investigations, we have the right context to take action."
"FortiCNAPP definitely brings time-saving benefits, and security is the main concern for the company."
"What I personally appreciate about FortiCNAPP is that I think it is a good product and a good firewall because it usually offers many options for the company."
"FortiCNAPP is a competitive and robust solution, the only one in the IT sphere that addresses all quadrants in the Gartner Quadrants."
"The most valuable feature, from a compliance perspective, is the ability to use Lacework as a platform for multiple compliance standards. We have to meet multiple standards like PCI, SOC 2, CIS, and whatever else is out there. The ability to have reports generated, per security standard, is one of the best features for me."
"If you want to turn your cloud findings into actionable security work, FortiCNAPP is the way to go."
"The machine learning capability in Lacework FortiCNAPP is used for threat detection, and automated policy recommendation helps to improve my security measures in general."
 

Cons

"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."
"Regarding improvements to Qualys TotalCloud, I suggest that user navigation can be enhanced because initially, many users found it complicated and had trouble understanding the platform due to information being spread across multiple tabs."
"I would like the ability to disable certain default built-in policies as they can be misleading when creating dashboards. That is the top one."
"Customer support with Qualys TotalCloud needs a little improvement with the response times."
"Their support could be improved."
"Regarding technical support from Qualys, they respond, but the response time can be too long. Sometimes we need to wait weeks for solutions to simple questions."
"It is already perfect, but they can bring some newer dashboards and customization options for the dashboard. It would be great to be able to include on-prem assets on the dashboard."
"The improvement needed in Qualys TotalCloud is mainly in the artificial intelligence automation agents, where we can customize and create what meets our needs, not necessarily having to use those provided in the tool."
"I want the role-based security feature to be improved."
"The biggest challenge now, which is a good problem to have, with BMC Helix is content."
"I think its TOA interfaces are still not that comfortable. The UI could be more user-friendly, easier to use."
"We've had some issues with connectors; the connectors have seemed to cause a little bit of trouble, perhaps with the APIs trying to scan the environment."
"BMC Helix Cloud Security has room for improvement in terms of integrating its various features."
"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."
"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."
"The UI could be more user-friendly."
"Its integrations with third-party SIEMs can be better. That is one of the things that we discussed with them."
"However, the solution could be more user-friendly and intuitive."
"Lacework has not reduced the number of alerts we get. We've actually had to add resources as a result of using it because the application requires a lot of people to understand it to get the value out of it properly."
"Lacework lacks remediation features, but I believe they're working on that. They're focused on the reporting aspect, but other features need to improve. They're also adding some compliance features, so it's not worth saying they need to get better at it."
"The solution lacks a cohesive data model, making extracting the necessary data from the platform challenging. It uses its own LQL query language, and each database across different layers and modules is structured differently, complicating correlation efforts. Consequently, I had to create extensive custom reports outside Lacework because their default dashboards didn't communicate risk metrics. They're addressing these issues by redesigning their tools, including introducing the dashboard, which is a step closer to actionable insights but still needs refinement."
"Visibility is lacking, and both compliance-related metrics and IAM security control could be improved."
"When considering improvements for FortiCNAPP, I think there could be enhancements regarding the license, possibly adding more options to it."
"I would like to see a remote access assistance feature. And the threat-hunting platform could be better."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"TotalCloud's price is about right where I would expect it to be."
"The cost is high, but it meets our organizational needs."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers cost-effective licensing flexibility."
"Qualys TotalCloud is cost-efficient and was selected for its value compared to other products."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers good pricing that is affordable and competitive with the market. Our partnership also provides us with additional benefits."
"As a middle management member, I do not have direct pricing knowledge, but based on the knowledge from our meetings, its pricing is competitive."
"While Qualys TotalCloud's pricing is currently acceptable, it is becoming increasingly expensive and may soon be considered overpriced."
"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."
"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."
"The pricing has gotten better. That scenario was somewhat unstable. They have a rather interesting licensing structure. I believe you get 200 resources per "Lacework unit." It was difficult, in the beginning, to figure out exactly what a "resource" was... That was a problem until about a year or so ago. They have improved it and it has stabilized quite a bit."
"My smaller deployments cost around 200,000 a year, which is probably not as expensive as Wiz."
"The licensing fee was approximately $80,000 USD, per year."
"It is slightly expensive. It depends on how big your environment is, but it is expensive. Right now, we are spending a lot of money. We have covered all of the cloud providers and most of our colocation facilities as well, so we cannot complain, but it is slightly expensive. It is not super expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
18%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Construction Company
18%
Comms Service Provider
14%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Construction Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise38
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise8
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Qualys TotalCloud?
We purchased Qualys TotalCloud for GCP and Azure as well. It is comparatively better than others regarding pricing. T...
What needs improvement with Qualys TotalCloud?
I am unsure about how Qualys TotalCloud can be improved. I do not have anything else to add about the needed improvem...
What is your primary use case for Qualys TotalCloud?
My main use case for Qualys TotalCloud is telemetry, although I am unsure about the specifics. A quick specific examp...
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Lacework?
We purchased the Fortinet firewall and services from a vendor, not through any other marketplaces.
What needs improvement with Lacework?
FortiCNAPP can be improved because the platform can feel complex at the start, especially for teams new to CNAP tooli...
What is your primary use case for Lacework?
My main use case for FortiCNAPP, from my previous experience distributing it or now as a reseller, is for anyone who'...
 

Also Known As

Qualys TotalCloud with FlexScan
TrueSight Cloud Security, SecOps Policy Service
Polygraph, FortiCNP, Lacework
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
NHS, Vodafone, Kansas City Life, SKY Italia, Cybera
J.Crew, AdRoll, Snowflake, VMWare, Iterable, Pure Storage, TrueCar, NerdWallet, and more.
Find out what your peers are saying about BMC Helix Cloud Security vs. FortiCNAPP and other solutions. Updated: October 2026.
920,939 professionals have used our research since 2012.