CloudPassage vs Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks comparison

Why PeerSpot?

CloudPassage and Palo Alto Networks are both solutions in the Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) category. CloudPassage is ranked #41, while Palo Alto Networks is ranked #2 with an average rating of 9.0. CloudPassage holds a 0.8% mindshare in CSPM, compared to Palo Alto Networks’s 7.6% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of CloudPassage users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 98% of Palo Alto Networks users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 1, 2026

CloudPassage and Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks compete in cloud security solutions. Users favor Prisma Cloud for its comprehensive feature set, even though CloudPassage is commended for cost-effectiveness and support.

Features: CloudPassage provides scalability, automated security checks, and compliance readiness, making it ideal for agile and rapid deployment scenarios. Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks offers a wide range of integrated security features, including deep visibility, compliance, and risk assessment capabilities, providing extensive security coverage.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: CloudPassage is known for its easy setup and responsive customer service, aiding quick adoption and problem resolution. Prisma Cloud supports a robust deployment model with extensive integration, though it may require more initial configuration. Both products offer commendable customer service, but CloudPassage's deployment ease and support are especially noted.

Pricing and ROI: CloudPassage is recognized for lower setup costs and strong ROI, appealing to budget-conscious organizations. Prisma Cloud may be more expensive initially but justifies its cost through comprehensive security. It is considered the superior choice for those prioritizing advanced security measures despite higher costs.

To learn more, read our detailed CloudPassage vs. Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks Report (Updated: September 2026).

Buyer's Guide

CloudPassage vs. Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks

September 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

Qualys TotalCloud

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) category, the mindshare of Qualys TotalCloud is 2.0%, up from 1.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of CloudPassage is 0.8%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks is 7.6%, down from 11.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks	7.6%
Qualys TotalCloud	2.0%
CloudPassage	0.8%
Other	89.6%

Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)

Featured Reviews

reviewer2859021

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.

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it_user854058

Lead Information Security Engineer

It helped us be more aware of what our security posture is, but not all of the features work in my environment

I would say CloudPassage is very useful for certain things. If you just want a few modules then focus on what you need and negotiate the price based on the individual module, rather than looking at the whole thing, because I didn't find all the modules very useful. Also, use Splunk in combination with it if you want reporting. I would give CloudPassage at least a seven out of 10. I rate it on the high-end because of the customer support - I've never seen any support that is comparable to that, it's very good, excellent. The support staff actually care, they actually follow up; it's very nice. And CloudPassage really listens to its customers. The product itself is very nice if you're only looking to check off your compliance requirements, but if you're looking for more of dashboarding and things like that, CloudPassage is improving but it's not quite there.

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reviewer2776578

Cyber Security Architect at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees

Image scanning has supported consistent security practices during cloud deployment

On a scale of ten, we would say people are happy with Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks for the part we use. People are okay with it. We probably would give an eight. We don't give ten because if we don't use the other parts of Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks, it's because it was difficult to implement from an operational point of view. We could have deployed the runtime monitoring with Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks, but within our organization at our company, it was very difficult to find who would be the owner for the alerts. People have other tools and in the end, we don't use the full capabilities of a product that we pay for. It's partially related to the difficulty to integrate Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks runtime in our company's support process. We don't use the real-time monitoring part of Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks. We don't know about the automated remediation feature of Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks.

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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

"Qualys TotalCloud is overall the best tool available in the market for scanning purposes."

"TotalCloud provides the easiest and the best approach for cloud infrastructure management."

"Qualys TotalCloud provides unified vulnerability and threat assessment for IaaS and SaaS and a single prioritized view of risk, which helps reduce my workload by not having to combine multiple sources."

"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."

"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."

"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."

"I found the initial setup user-friendly."

"By integrating TotalCloud, we have significantly reduced vulnerabilities in our deployment pipeline."

More Qualys TotalCloud pros

"Key features are the Software Vulnerability Assessment and the CSM, which is the configuration check."

"Our scores let us know when to trigger workflow to go out in a patch, it has reduced the amount of time we had to take to manually verify software and check our updates, and it helped us be more aware of what our security posture is."

"Policies are very easy to manage on a day-to-day basis."

"CloudPassage allowed us to implement changes that affected hundred of servers within our environments in seconds."

"Prisma has massively reduced our alert investigation times; it is 50 times quicker, turning an issue investigation from two hours into two minutes compared to a cloud-native solution."

"We have standardized vendor process management, so we want to reduce multiple vendors. Prisma Cloud is part of Palo Alto. We use Palo Alto firewalls and other solutions. Prisma has many features that intelligently cover cloud security. One solution can cover runtime for EC2 systems, containers, and Fargate. We also have EKS/Kubernetes integration. So, whatever the cloud-native solution in Pfizer, we can use one solution to secure that."

"I was looking for a vulnerability scanner and I was looking for one place in which I could find everything. This tool not only does vulnerability scanning, but it also gives me an asset management tool."

"The client wasn't using all of the features, but the one that stood out was infrastructure-as-code (IaC). I built IaC use cases and was trying to get them to use it. I also liked cloud workload protection. I worked with the vulnerability management team to develop a process. It's a manual process, so it can be challenging to remediate many image or container issues. It was nice that we could build out a reporting process and download the reports. The reports are solid."

"The runtime mechanism on the solution is very useful, and it has very good network mapping between containers, so if you have more than one container, you can create a content data link between them."

"If you can configure it well, Twistlock is a lot better in providing you real-time statistics than Aqua Security."

"Prisma Cloud is quite simple to use. The web GUI is powerful. Prisma Cloud scans the overall architecture of the AWS network to identify open ports and other vulnerabilities, then highlights them."

"Prisma was extremely comprehensive. It's easy to drill down to gather more information and keep going. It seemed like you could drill down forever to see what the vulnerability was linked to."

More Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks pros

Cons

"The onboarding process is a bit difficult. In the initial phase, it is very difficult to understand the features, what the dashboard contains, and what criteria they are using."

"To improve the user experience, reporting could be simplified for better comprehension by end users and project managers, facilitating issue resolution."

"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."

"The cloud licensing unit system is unclear, especially since "units" aren't well-defined."

"There is room for improvement in the support."

"Two areas for improvement in Qualys TotalCloud are the speed of the public cloud platform and vulnerability detection."

"TotalCloud could improve the classification of vulnerabilities. Specifically, it could enhance the categorization of what aspects fall under patches resolved by OS or software updates and what pertains to configuration adjustments."

"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."

More Qualys TotalCloud cons

"The reports and graphs are unintuitive."

"Anything outside of the software vulnerability management and the CSM, things like the GhostPort, need some improvement. The dashboard is in beta. It looks really good, I wish it would come out of beta."

"Of all the advertised functions, I only find two things that really work in my environment, even though I wanted to use all of them. They're not flexible enough to be used."

"In the CSM module the policies are really hard to work with it. It is not very flexible at all. I would suggest that they change that. Right now, the scan is based on the group that the server is in. What happens if the server is in multiple groups?"

"I don't think their SaaS offering is adoptable by large enterprises like ours, in every case."

"The access controls for our bank roles were not granular enough. We needed specific people to do particular actions, and we often had to give some people way too much access for them to be able to do what they needed in Prisma. They couldn't do their jobs if they didn't have that level of access, so other people had to do that part for them. It would help to have more granular role-based access controls."

"We'd like to have more native integration with clouds and additional security checks in the future."

"Some of the usability within the Compute functionality needs improvement. I think when Palo Alto added on the Twistlock functionality, they added a Compute tab on the left side of the navigation. Some of the navigation is just a little dense. There is a lot of navigation where there is a tab and dropdowns. So, just improving some of the navigation where there is just a very dense amount of buttons and drop-down menus, that is probably the only thing, which comes from having a lot of features. Because there are a lot of buttons, just navigating around the platform can be a little challenging for new users."

"Prisma is the result of multiple Palo Alto acquisitions, like CWPP, Twistlock, and Aporeto. Though they are part of a single pane of glass, there is no correlation between the solutions."

"There I saw one feature called dummy payloads, in which we trigger the dummy payload, so it exactly gives the exploitable resources. That might be a feature that would be helpful if Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks also had some kind of that feature."

"They can improve the integrations into the SDLC lifecycle."

"The feedback that we have given to the Palo Alto team is that the UI can be improved. When you press the "back" button on your browser from the Investigate tab, the query that you're working on just disappears. It won't keep the query on the "back" button."

More Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Qualys TotalCloud offers good pricing that is affordable and competitive with the market. Our partnership also provides us with additional benefits."

"It isn't cheap, but it's reasonable. It helps us to manage things with very few resources."

"Qualys TotalCloud is expensive."

"Qualys TotalCloud offers competitive pricing given its comprehensive suite of features, including integration, assessment, remediation, and detection capabilities, all within a single platform."

"While Qualys TotalCloud's pricing is currently acceptable, it is becoming increasingly expensive and may soon be considered overpriced."

"Its price seems higher compared to other tools, but it is worth it. If they could adjust the pricing and make it comparable with other tools, that would be great."

"The cost is high, but it meets our organizational needs."

"The pricing is comparable. It is built into our other product, so I cannot piecemeal it. It is a part of our subscription."

More Qualys TotalCloud pricing and cost advice

"CloudPassage is a little bit on the expensive side. So my suggestion is that the company lower its price point a wee bit or sell modules, separate them in modules, because I only find two things that are useful to me, yet I pay for four or five modules. It didn't seem like it was a fair deal."

"We also evaluated VMware NSX, but the pricing and features available in a CloudPassage implementation were decisive in deciding to go with CP."

"The pricing is good. They gave us some good discounts right at the end of the year based on the value that it brings, visibility, and the ability to build in cloud, compliance, and security within one dashboard."

"The pricing of the solution is fair."

"If a competitor came along and said, "We'll give you half the price," that doesn't necessarily mean that's the right answer, at all. We wouldn't necessarily entertain it that way. Does it do what we need it to do? Does it work with the things that we want it to work with? That is the important part for us. Pricing wasn't the big consideration it might be in some organizations. We spend millions on public cloud. In that context, it would not make sense to worry about the small price differences that you get between the products."

"We are encountering some resistance in the African market regarding the cost of Prisma Cloud."

"Our licensing fees are $18,000 USD per year."

"Prisma Cloud is cost-efficient, but the credits are on the higher end."

"Prisma Cloud is more expensive than some other solutions, but when we consider all of its use cases, the cost averages out."

"Prisma Cloud is more expensive than Check Point CloudGuard."

More Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Comms Service Provider

16%

Outsourcing Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Comms Service Provider

14%

Manufacturing Company

13%

Construction Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

13%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

Outsourcing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	14
Midsize Enterprise	6
Large Enterprise	35

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	37
Midsize Enterprise	21
Large Enterprise	58

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Qualys TotalCloud?

The price is very expensive, actually.

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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...

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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...

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What is your primary use case for Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks?

Prisma Cloud helps support DevSecOps methodologies, making those responsibilities easier to manage.

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What Cloud-Native Application Protection Platform do you recommend?

We like Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks, since it offers us incredible visibility into our entire cloud system. We...

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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...

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Compared 18% of the time

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Compared 14% of the time

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Compared 11% of the time

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Compared 11% of the time

Symantec Cloud Workload Protection vs CloudPassage

Compared 2% of the time

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Wiz vs Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 13% of the time

Check Point Cloud Firewall (formerly CloudGuard Network Security) vs Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 7% of the time

SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security vs Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 3% of the time

TrendAI Vision One – Cloud Security vs Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 3% of the time

Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 3% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Qualys TotalCloud

September 2026

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Buyer's Guide

Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)

September 2026

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Buyer's Guide

Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks

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Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks report

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Also Known As

Qualys TotalCloud with FlexScan

CloudPassage Halo

Prisma Public Cloud, RedLock Cloud 360, RedLock, Twistlock, Aporeto

Overview

Qualys TotalCloud enhances security posture across cloud environments with continuous monitoring, vulnerability management, and risk visualization, ensuring efficient threat assessment and automated remediation for improved cyber risk reduction.

Qualys TotalCloud offers a robust suite of security tools essential for organizations managing multi-cloud infrastructures. By integrating cloud accounts and automating workflows, it supports AWS, Azure, and GCP, offering comprehensive vulnerability management and zero-day detection. The platform's user-friendly design, combined with its extensive risk management and unified threat assessment capabilities, enables organizations to prioritize and remediate vulnerabilities effectively. TruRisk Insights provides clear insights on cyber risks, while the automation options streamline patch management and scanning processes. API integration across IaaS and SaaS environments further enhances resource allocation efficiency and saves time, addressing misconfigurations across cloud environments.

What are the most important features of Qualys TotalCloud?

Accurate Vulnerability Reports: Delivers precise and actionable insights for risk mitigation.
Zero-Day Detection: Identifies and addresses zero-day vulnerabilities proactively.
Unified Threat Assessment: Offers comprehensive evaluation of threats across the environment.
Extensive Risk Management: Manages risks effectively with advanced insights and prioritization.
Continuous Monitoring: Provides non-stop surveillance for vulnerabilities and threats.
Cloud-Native Automation: Streamlines processes and reduces manual efforts using automation.
FlexScan for Internet-Facing VMs: Scans external VMs efficiently to detect vulnerabilities.
Dashboard Risk Visualization: Clear visualization helps prioritize vulnerabilities.

What benefits and ROI should users look for?

Improved Security Posture: Enhances threat detection and response across clouds.
Time Savings: Automation reduces time spent on manual vulnerability management.
Resource Efficiency: Better allocation of resources through streamlined workflows.
Enhanced Risk Prioritization: Focus on critical vulnerabilities for effective mitigation.
Integrated Cloud Accounts: Facilitates seamless cloud management and security.

Qualys TotalCloud is deployed in sectors needing rigorous vulnerability management, such as finance and healthcare. Companies utilize it to secure multi-cloud environments like AWS, Azure, and GCP, focus on compliance, and integrate security into CI/CD pipelines to detect and remedy threats pre-deployment.

Qualys

CloudPassage offers cloud security solutions ensuring data protection and compliance. Its comprehensive platform provides security monitoring, vulnerability management, and incident response for dynamic cloud environments.

CloudPassage specializes in securing cloud-based infrastructures, facilitating visibility and control across complex environments. Its key functionalities include real-time vulnerability management and automated security monitoring, helping maintain compliance with industry standards. The adaptable solution is designed to seamlessly integrate with existing systems, providing users with effective security measures needed to safeguard cloud resources. CloudPassage delivers significant protection against evolving threats, empowering organizations to confidently deploy applications in the cloud.

What are the most valuable features of CloudPassage?

Automated Security Monitoring: Offers continuous oversight of cloud environments to identify potential threats.
Vulnerability Management: Detects vulnerabilities to help prioritize remediation efforts efficiently.
Compliance Management: Ensures adherence to regulatory standards and automates compliance checks.
Incident Response: Provides real-time alerts and comprehensive incident management tools.

What benefits and ROI should users consider?

Improved Security Posture: Helps enhance overall security, reducing risk exposure.
Cost Efficiency: Minimizes potential security breaches, reducing associated financial impacts.
Time Savings: Streamlines security processes, allowing teams to focus on critical tasks.
Scalability: Supports growing workloads, adapting to changing requirements effectively.

CloudPassage is implemented across industries such as finance, healthcare, and retail where securing sensitive data is crucial. Its versatile capabilities support compliance with sector-specific regulations, ensuring secure cloud infrastructure deployment regardless of industry-specific challenges.

CloudPassage

Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks provides comprehensive cloud-native security solutions. It covers dynamic workload identity, automated forensics, and multi-cloud protection, ensuring robust security across diverse cloud platforms.

Prisma Cloud delivers advanced capabilities for managing cloud security across AWS, Azure, and GCP platforms. It offers dynamic workload identity creation, real-time monitoring, and seamless integration into CI/CD pipelines. With automation, centralized dashboards, and enhanced visibility, users effectively manage security misconfigurations and vulnerabilities. While optimizing cloud environments through runtime protection and compliance, Prisma Cloud faces challenges with its navigation, pricing, and limited automation capabilities. Users seek improvements in API security, role-based access controls, and documentation quality, emphasizing the need for enhanced customization and reporting features.

What are the important features of Prisma Cloud?

Dynamic Workload Identity: Enables unique workload identities for security purposes.
Automated Forensics: Offers detailed insights into threats and incidents automatically.
Runtime Protection: Provides ongoing detection and blocking of suspicious activities.
Multi-Cloud Security: Protects environments on AWS, Azure, and GCP simultaneously.
Compliance Management: Assists in meeting regulatory standards across cloud platforms.

What benefits or ROI should users consider in reviews?

Enhanced Security Posture: Strengthens cloud defense lines with proactive monitoring.
Centralized Dashboard: Offers unified oversight of multiple cloud environments.
Efficient Misconfiguration Handling: Quickly identifies and addresses security lapses.
Seamless CI/CD Integration: Integrates security within development workflows.
Improved Visibility: Provides transparent insights into security operations and alerts.

Industries like finance and telecom rely on Prisma Cloud for managing cloud security posture and container security. Teams utilize its capabilities across hybrid and multi-cloud settings to ensure compliance and robust threat protection. Features like misconfiguration detection and runtime monitoring are critical in promoting security objectives in these sectors.

Palo Alto Networks

Sample Customers

Information Not Available

Citrix

Amgen, Genpact, Western Asset, Zipongo, Proofpoint, NerdWallet, Axfood, 21st Century Fox, Veeva Systems, Reinsurance Group of America

Buyer's Guide

CloudPassage vs. Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks

September 2026

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Find out what your peers are saying about CloudPassage vs. Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.

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