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Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis vs FOSSA comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 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

Checkmarx Software Composit...
Ranking in Software Composition Analysis (SCA)
10th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
FOSSA
Ranking in Software Composition Analysis (SCA)
9th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.9
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Software Composition Analysis (SCA) category, the mindshare of Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis is 3.0%, up from 2.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of FOSSA is 2.6%, down from 3.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Software Composition Analysis (SCA) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
FOSSA2.6%
Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis3.0%
Other94.4%
Software Composition Analysis (SCA)
 

Featured Reviews

Tharindu Malwenna - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Application Security Engineer at a newspaper with 5,001-10,000 employees
Efficient library identification and upgrade suggestions improve application security
We have many third-party libraries in our organization. I used Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis to identify all the libraries we use and determine whether they are used or unused within the application Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis provides identification of libraries and…
reviewer2588340 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Software Engineer at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
Dependency management enhanced with update suggestions but lacks precise vulnerability tracking
FOSSA does not show the exact line of code with vulnerabilities, which adds time to the process as we have to locate these manually. Some other tools like Check Point or SonarQube provide exact line numbers for bugs. Also, the process in FOSSA can be quite contradicting and not very straightforward for new users.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"What's most valuable in Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis is that it provides security from the start. In the traditional approach, an enterprise or company validates the solution before launching to a production environment, but in the modern approach, security must be checked and provided from the beginning and from the design, and this is where Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis comes in. The solution helps you make sure that every open-source application that you use is secure, and that there's no vulnerability inside that open-source application."
"What's most valuable in Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis is that it provides security from the start, helping you make sure that every open-source application that you use is secure and that there's no vulnerability inside that open-source application."
"The most valuable feature of Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis is the comprehensive security scan."
"Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis is one of the most important products in the IT security market."
"It is very easy and user friendly. It never requires any kind of technical support. You can do everything on your own."
"What I found most valuable in Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis is its ability to identify vulnerabilities in components, especially if some critical issues exist."
"We were able to reduce the number of vulnerable libraries by 50%, leading to significant operational improvement."
"What's most valuable in Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis is its ability to identify vulnerabilities in open-source components, especially if some critical issues exist."
"FOSSA is easy to use and set up, provides relatively accurate results, and doesn't require armies of people to get value from its use."
"It improves productivity, saving a lot of time for our software developers."
"The most valuable feature is its ability to identify all of the components in a build, and then surface the licenses that are associated with it, allowing us to make a decision as to whether or not we allow a team to use the components. That eliminates the risk that comes with running consumer software that contains open source components."
"One of the things that I really like about FOSSA is that it allows you to go very granular. For example, if there's a package that's been flagged because it's subject to a license that may be conflicts with or raises a concern with one of the policies that I've set, then FOSSA enables you to go really granular into that package to see which aspects of the package are subject to which licenses. We can ultimately determine with our engineering teams if we really need this part of the package or not. If it's raising this flag, we can make really actionable decisions at a very micro level to enable the build to keep pushing forward."
"Having it as a resource to very quickly triage incredibly high volumes of open-source coming into the company through agile development programs was invaluable."
"FOSSA provided us with contextualized, easily actionable intelligence that alerted us to compliance issues. I could tell FOSSA exactly what I cared about and they would tell me when something was out of policy. I don't want to hear from the compliance tool unless I have an issue that I need to deal with. That was what was great about FOSSA is that it was basically "Here's my policy and only send me an alert if there's something without a policy." I thought that it was really good at doing that."
"FOSSA is at the heart of the license compliance part of our open-source management program."
"The support team has just been amazing, and it helps us to have a great support team from FOSSA. They are there to triage and answer all our questions which come up by using their product."
 

Cons

"In terms of time and quality of support, Checkmarx SCA needs improvement."
"Its pricing can be improved. It is a little bit high priced."
"An area for improvement in Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis is for the updates to be fast."
"Parts of the implementation process could improve by making it more user-friendly."
"It can have better licensing models."
"API security is an area with shortcomings that needs improvement."
"I would rate the scalability a seven out of ten."
"The performance of Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis also needs improvement because sometimes, it's slow, and in particular, scanning could take several hours."
"I want the product to include binary scanning which is missing at the moment. Binary scanning includes code and component matching through dependency management. It also includes the actual scanning and reverse engineering of the boundaries and finding out what is inside."
"I wish there was a way that you could have a more global rollout of it, instead of having to do it in each repository individually."
"FOSSA does not show the exact line of code with vulnerabilities, which adds time to the process as we have to locate these manually."
"We have seen some inaccuracies or incompleteness with the distribution acknowledgments for an application, so there's certainly some room for improvement there. Another big feature that's missing that should be introduced is snippet matching, meaning, not just matching an entire component, but matching a snippet of code that had been for another project and put in different files that one of our developers may have created."
"Security scanning is an area for improvement. At this point, our experience is that we're only scanning for license information in components, and we're not scanning for security vulnerability information."
"I would like the FOSSA API to be broader. I would like not to have to interact with the GUI at all, to do the work that I want to do. I would like them to do API-first development, rather than a focus on the GUI."
"On the legal and policy sides, there is some room for improvement. I know that our legal team has raised complaints about having to approve the same dependency multiple times, as opposed to having them it across the entire organization."
"If you have thousands of applications, organizing them all into teams or tags is challenging."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The license model is somewhat perplexing as it comprises multiple aspects that can be confusing for customers. The model is determined by the number of registered users and the number of projects being scanned, along with a third component that adds to the complexity."
"It is a little bit high priced. It would be better if it was a little less expensive."
"Pricing for Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis needs to be competitive."
"My customers need to pay for the licensing part, and they need to opt for an annual subscription."
"We don't have a license. The usage is limited to one, two, three, five, or ten people. It is currently used for all projects, and there are plans to increase its usage."
"The solution's cost is a five out of ten."
"Its price is reasonable as compared to the market. It is competitively priced in comparison to other similar solutions on the market. It is also quite affordable in terms of the value that it delivers as compared to its alternative of hiring a team."
"FOSSA is a fairly priced product. It is not either cheaper or expensive. The pricing lies somewhere in the middle. The solution is worth the money that we are spending to use it."
"FOSSA is not cheap, but their offering is top-notch. It is very much a "you get what you pay for" scenario. Regardless of the price, I highly recommend FOSSA."
"The solution's pricing is good and reasonable because you can literally use a lot of it for free."
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893,438 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
23%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Insurance Company
6%
Construction Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Educational Organization
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise8
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis?
Pricing is complex and high for small organizations but offers great benefits for larger organizations. It is notably different compared to competitors like GitHub Advanced Security.
What needs improvement with Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis?
The solution could improve by determining the success factor of an upgrade, which is currently lacking.
What is your primary use case for Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis?
We have many third-party libraries in our organization. I used Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis to identify all the libraries we use and determine whether they are used or unused within the ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for FOSSA?
The solution's pricing is good and reasonable because you can literally use a lot of it for free. You have to pay for the features you need, which I think is fair. If you want to get value for free...
What needs improvement with FOSSA?
FOSSA does not show the exact line of code with vulnerabilities, which adds time to the process as we have to locate these manually. Some other tools like Check Point or SonarQube provide exact lin...
What is your primary use case for FOSSA?
I have worked with FOSSA primarily to manage the dependencies in our projects. For example, if I take a Spring Boot application, FOSSA helps in identifying mismatches or unsupported dependencies th...
 

Also Known As

CxSCA
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

AXA, Liveperson, Aaron's, Playtech, Morningstar
AppDyanmic, Uber, Twitter, Zendesk, Confluent
Find out what your peers are saying about Checkmarx Software Composition Analysis vs. FOSSA and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
893,438 professionals have used our research since 2012.