CAST Application Intelligence Platform vs SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) comparison

CAST and Sonar are both solutions in the Software Development Analytics category. CAST is ranked #3 with an average rating of 7.0, while Sonar is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.1. CAST holds a 10.8% mindshare in SDA, compared to Sonar’s 45.8% mindshare. Additionally, 83% of CAST users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 81% of Sonar users who would recommend it.

CAST Application Intelligen...

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83% willing to recommend

SonarQube Server (formerly ...

Read 114 SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) reviews

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3,104 Comparison Views

81% willing to recommend

CAST Application Intelligen...

SonarQube Server (formerly ...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 9, 2025

SonarQube Server and CAST Application Intelligence Platform are key products in the software development tool market, focusing on code quality and software intelligence. SonarQube Server is preferred for its ease of use and integration, while CAST offers superior analytical features with detailed insights.

Features: SonarQube Server's strengths include robust support for continuous integration workflows, effective code quality visualization, and immediate feedback for developers. CAST Application Intelligence Platform provides advanced deep-dive application analysis, extensive portfolio management features, and comprehensive software intelligence, ideal for enterprises requiring detailed insights.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: SonarQube Server supports a simple deployment process with community-driven support, making it easy to integrate into existing CI/CD pipelines. CAST Application Intelligence Platform requires a more involved setup, needing dedicated IT resources but offers professional support, essential for large-scale enterprise environments.

Pricing and ROI: SonarQube Server presents an affordable entry with open-source options, offering a strong ROI for small to medium enterprises on a budget. CAST Application Intelligence Platform demands higher initial investment, justified by its features and long-term benefits, delivering a higher ROI for enterprises utilizing its advanced capabilities.

To learn more, read our detailed CAST Application Intelligence Platform vs. SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

CAST Application Intelligence Platform vs. SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube)

April 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

CAST Application Intelligen...

Ranking in Software Development Analytics

3rd

Average Rating

7.0

Reviews Sentiment

8.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

SonarQube Server (formerly ...

Ranking in Software Development Analytics

1st

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

114

Ranking in other categories

Application Security Tools (1st), Static Application Security Testing (SAST) (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Software Development Analytics category, the mindshare of CAST Application Intelligence Platform is 10.8%, up from 6.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) is 45.8%, down from 48.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Software Development Analytics

Q&A Highlights

Joe Baker

Senior Program Manager at Oasis TE

May 23, 2023

What are the differences between SonarQube and CAST AIP?

Hi Joe - SonarQube is essentially a static code quality tool and has multiple versions (community is free and then we have developer, enterprise, and data center versions which are paid). As per the latest branding from CAST, they don't market AIP as a separate product and are bundled with CAST Imaging. CAST AIP is used to onboard the code base and perform analysis and the actual products are Imaging for architecture analysis and health, engineering, and security dashboards. The dashboards in CAST are richer and have more security features compared to SonarQube. Also, CAST does not have any free community version available. Both of them do static code analysis and do not look at run time code.

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Featured Reviews

Jayanti Rode

Technical Associate Manager at Accenture

Application Intelligence Platform that offers useful insights into violations and improvements

There are different products of the CAST solution that we use for different reasons. For quality improvement, we use CAST AIP which is an Application Intelligence Platform. We have a health dashboard where we can view improvements and violations that have been fixed. Our clients use CAST Highlight…

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Wang Dayong

Senior Software Engineering Manager at Hill

Easy to integrate and has a plug-in that supports both C and C++ languages

The product provides false reports sometimes. It also fails to understand the context of the code. It reports that a line of code has issues without considering its relation with the previous line. The product should improve the report quality. While it asks us to improve the code quality, it would be good if it also suggests how to improve the quality.

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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 most valuable feature of the CAST Application Intelligence Platform is its security dashboard which is a dedicated dashboard that's pretty helpful because it gives compliance checks based on some of the leading frameworks in the industry, such as ISO 5055, OWASP, CWE Top 25, and NIST security guidelines. I find the security dashboard of the solution and the information it provides pretty useful. The security dashboard of the CAST Application Intelligence Platform is a feature that stands out."

"Our clients use CAST Highlight for cloud migration. This allows them to remove or remediate the blockers which are highlighted. This part of the solution shows improvement in quality and captures feedback for our clients."

"Used for controlling the technical debt and code quality."

"CAST's risk and security flow detection capabilities are highly effective, particularly in identifying security vulnerabilities. It is one of the most important and valuable features of the platform."

"It supports most programming languages."

"The reporting and the results are quick. It gets integrated within the pipeline well."

"The static code analysis is very good."

"Offers multi-programming language support"

"It's a great product. If you are in a hurry and just want to focus on the functional requirements of any kind of project, SonarQube is highly helpful. It enables the developers to code securely. SonarQube has a Community edition, which is open source and free. There are also three proprietary or paid versions: Enterprise edition, Data Center edition, and Developer edition."

"The solution's user interface is very user-friendly."

"SonarQube's unit test coverage and exhaustive information at the module, project, and overall code repo levels are quite good."

"The customizable dashboard and ability to include results and coverage from unit test and other static analysis code tools."

"SonarQube: Recording of issues over a period of time, with an indication of the addition in the new issues or the reduction of existing issues (which were fixed)."

More SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) pros

Cons

"The integration of this solution could be improved."

"The overall coverage of rules could be improved in the CAST Application Intelligence Platform because it does not cater to or cover all. For example, 2022 CWE coverage is still not available in the CAST Application Intelligence Platform. The solution also covers some NIST rules, but it does not cater to all rules. An additional feature I'd like to see in the next update of the CAST Application Intelligence Platform is for it to provide source code developer and contributor details, especially information on which areas of code were touched. This would be a good insight as the CAST Application Intelligence Platform looks into the source code."

"Areas for improvement in CAST AIP include enhancing support for implementation in complex environments and improving technical support to address organizational challenges alongside engineering issues."

"It has very few plugins to access different code repositories, so source code has to be fed."

"Implementation could be made more simpler as it is complex."

"The software testing tool capability could improve. It does not always integrate well. You have to use a specific plugin and the plugin does not always go in Apple's applications."

"The pricing could be reduced a bit. It's a little expensive."

"The product needs to integrate other security tools for security scanning."

"SonarQube's detail in the security could be improved. It may be helpful to have additional details, with regards to Oracle PL/SQL. For example, it's neither as built nor as thorough as Java. For now, this is the only additional feature I would like to see."

"The learning curve can be fairly steep at first, but then, it's not an entry-level type of application. It's not like an introduction to C programming. You should know not just C programming and how to make projects but also how to apply its findings to the bigger picture. I've had users who said that they wish it was easier to understand how to configure, but I don't know if that's doable because what it's doing is a very complicated thing. I don't know if it is possible to make a complicated thing trivially simple."

"We also use Fortify, which is another tool to find security errors. Fortify is a better security tool. It is better than SonarQube in finding errors. Sometimes, SonarQube doesn't find some of the errors that Fortify is able to find. Fortify also has a community, which SonarQube doesn't have. Its installation is a little bit complex. We need to install a database, install the product, and specify the version of the database and the product. They can simplify the installation and make it easier. We use docker for the installation because it is easier to use. Its dashboard needs to be improved. It is not intuitive. It is hard to understand the interface, and it can be improved to provide a better user experience."

"Lacks sufficient visibility and documentation."

"If you don't have any experience with the configuration or how to configure the files, it can be complicated."

More SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I do know how the CAST Application Intelligence Platform is licensed, but I'm not able to give the cost because the price is not listed. My company works with individual vendors, so pricing is on a case-to-case basis, but the vendors give specialized pricing because of the enterprise deployment, though my team is aware of product pricing based on lines of code, based on the number of applications, etc., I'm unable to give the exact licensing costs of the CAST Application Intelligence Platform. My company doesn't have to pay extra for some features or services because all are included as part of the enterprise license. On a scale of one to five, with five being very cheap and one being very expensive, I would rate the CAST Application Intelligence Platform as three out of five."

"We are using the open-source version, which is available free of cost."

"We are using the community version of the solution and we plan on purchasing licenses for the upgraded version soon. There is a limitation on how many lines of code can be scanned and this is why we are going to purchase a license for an increased amount."

"I think comparing the product to competitors it should be less expensive."

"A low cost long-term solution for non-critical situations."

"Get the paid version which allows the customized dashboard and provides technical support."

"We pay €10 per month for this solution, which is good. It provides a good value for money."

"We use the tool's community edition."

"The free version of SonarQube does everything that we need it to."

More SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

30%

Computer Software Company

14%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Insurance Company

Financial Services Firm

17%

Computer Software Company

15%

Manufacturing Company

13%

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about CAST Application Intelligence Platform?

CAST's risk and security flow detection capabilities are highly effective, particularly in identifying security vulnerabilities. It is one of the most important and valuable features of the platfor...

See all answers

What needs improvement with CAST Application Intelligence Platform?

Areas for improvement in CAST AIP include enhancing support for implementation in complex environments and improving technical support to address organizational challenges alongside engineering iss...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for CAST Application Intelligence Platform?

CAST AIP is a valuable solution for quality metrics and application security. It is beneficial for software architecture detection.

See all answers

Is SonarQube the best tool for static analysis?

I am not very familiar with SonarQube and their solutions, so I can not answer. But if you are asking me about which tools that are the best for for Static Code Analysis, I suggest you have a look...

See all answers

Which gives you more for your money - SonarQube or Veracode?

SonarQube is easy to deploy and configure, and also integrates well with other tools to do quality code analysis. SonarQube has a great community edition, which is open-source and free. Easy to use...

See all answers

How would you decide between Coverity and Sonarqube?

We researched Coverity, but in the end, we chose SonarQube. SonarQube is a tool for reviewing code quality and security. It helps to guide our development teams during code reviews by providing rem...

See all answers

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Compared 11% of the time

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Compared 8% of the time

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Compared 7% of the time

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Product Reports

No data available

Buyer's Guide

SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube)

April 2025

SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) report

Download SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) product report

Also Known As

CAST AIP

Sonar

Interactive Demo

Demo not available

CAST

Sonar

Overview

CAST Application Intelligence Platform (AIP), a result of over $130M in R&D investment over two decades, is an enterprise-grade software measurement and quality analysis solution designed to analyze multi-tiered, multi-technology applications for technical vulnerabilities and adherence to architectural and coding standards and then provide business relevant information to the IT organization through various dashboards and products built with end users in mind.

Application Analytics Dashboard (CAST AAD): Provides IT executives with accurate business relevant analytics to drive their organization
Application Engineering Dashboard (CAST AED): Provides engineering and QA teams with powerful code and system level structural flaw insight and remediation guidance
Enlighten: Delivers to developers a powerful deep understanding of their application’s structure
Architecture Checker: Gives architects a reliable, automated solution to enforce architectures that deliver stability and performance of their critical applications

CAST’s underlying system-level analysis technology assesses both the health of an application, as measured through numerous health factors, as well as specific structural and system-level defects that drive performance and stability issues providing true system level analysis.

CAST

SonarQube Server enhances code quality and security via static code analysis. It detects vulnerabilities, improves standards, and reduces technical debt, integrating into CI/CD pipelines.

SonarQube Server is a comprehensive tool for enhancing code quality and security. It offers static code analysis to identify vulnerabilities, improve coding standards, and reduce technical debt. By integrating into CI/CD pipelines, it provides automated checks for adherence to best practices. Organizations use it for code inspection, security testing, and compliance, ensuring development environments with better maintainability and fewer issues.

What are the key features of SonarQube Server?

Support for 20+ languages: Extensive programming language support suitable for diverse coding environments.
Custom coding rules: Allows for tailored rule sets to match specific coding standards.
Flexible quality gates: Define criteria for code acceptance at various intervals.
CI/CD integration: Seamless integration with Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment tools.
Rich interface: User-friendly dashboard with detailed visual insights.

What benefits should users expect from SonarQube Server?

Improved code quality: Enhanced analysis contributes to fewer bugs and improved coding practices.
Security enhancements: Identifies and mitigates security vulnerabilities pre-emptively.
Maintainability: Reduces technical debt, yielding long-term development efficiency.
Customizable: Flexibility in configuration aligns with specific project needs.

Many industries implement SonarQube Server to uphold coding standards, maintain security protocols, and streamline their software development lifecycle. In sectors like finance and healthcare, adhering to regulations and ensuring reliable software is critical, making SonarQube Server invaluable. It is often integrated into CI/CD pipelines, ensuring that code changes meet set standards before deployment. This approach enhances productivity and maintains compliance with industry-specific requirements.

Sonar

Sample Customers

Steria, T-Systems MMS, Atos Origin, Accenture, Capgemini

Information Not Available

Buyer's Guide

CAST Application Intelligence Platform vs. SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube)

April 2025

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