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Contrast Security Assess vs SonarQube Cloud (formerly SonarCloud) comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 9, 2025

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

Contrast Security Assess
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
22nd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (25th)
SonarQube Cloud (formerly S...
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
10th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category, the mindshare of Contrast Security Assess is 0.5%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SonarQube Cloud (formerly SonarCloud) is 5.8%, down from 6.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
 

Featured Reviews

ToddMcAlister - PeerSpot reviewer
It has an excellent API interface to pull APIs.
Assess has brought our development time down because it helps create code the first time. Instead of going through the Jenkins process to build an application, they can see right off the bat that if there are errors in the code and fix them before it even goes to build.
Archana Verma - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides valuable insights on code vulnerabilities and integrates seamlessly with CI/CD pipelines
I find SonarQube Cloud to be very user-friendly with an easy-to-use interface. It provides detailed code smell reports and insights on hotspots, which can later represent security vulnerabilities. It gives precise reports compared to Coverity and has a slightly lower number of false positives. It is integrated easily with the CI/CD pipeline, saving time and cost. It provides information on upcoming vulnerability details and loopholes that might turn into vulnerabilities.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"By far, the thing that was able to provide value was the immediate response while testing ahead of release, in real-time."
"The accuracy of the solution in identifying vulnerabilities is better than any other product we've used, far and away. In our internal comparisons among different tools, Contrast consistently finds more impactful vulnerabilities, and also identifies vulnerabilities that are nearly guaranteed to be there, meaning that the chance of false positives is very low."
"We use the Contrast OSS feature that allows us to look at third-party, open-source software libraries, because it has a cool interface where you can look at all the different libraries. It has some really cool additional features where it gives us how many instances in which something has been used... It tells us it has been used 10 times out of 20 workloads, for example. Then we know for sure that OSS is being used."
"This has changed the way that developers are looking at usage of third-party libraries, upfront. It's changing our model of development and our culture of development to ensure that there is more thought being put into the usage of third-party libraries."
"Assess has an excellent API interface to pull APIs."
"The most valuable feature is the continuous monitoring aspect: the fact that we don't have to wait for scans to complete for the tool to identify vulnerabilities. They're automatically identified through developers' business-as-usual processes."
"In our most critical applications, we have a deep dive in the code evaluation, which was something we usually did with periodic vulnerability assessments, code reviews, etc. Now, we have real time access to it. It's something that has greatly enhanced our code's quality. We have actually embedded a KPI in regards to the improvement of our code shell. For example, Contrast provides a baseline where libraries and the usability of the code are evaluated, and they produce a score. We always aim to improve that score. On a quarterly basis, we have added this to our KPIs."
"I am impressed with the product's identification of alerts and vulnerabilities."
"I find SonarQube Cloud to be very user-friendly with an easy-to-use interface."
"I find SonarQube Cloud very easy to use and simple to integrate initially."
"The most valuable features of SonarQube Cloud (formerly SonarCloud) include code inspection, addressing technical debt, and identifying security vulnerabilities."
"Its dashboard provides a unified view of various code quality metrics, including code duplication, unit test coverage, and security hotspots."
"The most valuable feature of SonarCloud is its overall performance."
"For what it is meant to do, it works pretty well."
"The reports from SonarCloud are very good."
"I find SonarQube Cloud to be very user-friendly with an easy-to-use interface."
 

Cons

"Contrast's ability to support upgrades on the actual agents that get deployed is limited. Our environment is pretty much entirely Java. There are no updates associated with that. You have to actually download a new version of the .jar file and push that out to your servers where your app is hosted. That can be quite cumbersome from a change-management perspective."
"The product's retesting part needs improvement. The tool also needs improvement in the suggestions provided for fixing vulnerabilities. It relies more on documentation rather than on quick fixes."
"The solution should provide more details in the section where it shows that third-party libraries have CVEs or some vulnerabilities."
"I think there was activity underway to support the centralized configuration control. There are ways to do it, but I think they were productizing more of that."
"The setup of the solution is different for each application. That's the one thing that has been a challenge for us. The deployment itself is simple, but it's tough to automate because each application is different, so each installation process for Contrast is different."
"Personalization of the board and how to make it appealing to an organization is something that could be done on their end. The reports could be adaptable to the customer's preferences."
"Contrast Security Assess covers a wide range of applications like .NET Framework, Java, PSP, Node.js, etc. But there are some like Ubuntu and the .NET Core which are not covered. They have it in their roadmap to have these agents. If they have that, we will have complete coverage."
"The out-of-the-box reporting could be improved. We need to write our own APIs to make the reporting more robust."
"I've been told by the developers that the solution is too limited. It's not testing enough within the containers."
"CI/CD pipeline is part of a whole chain of design, development, and production, and it's becoming increasingly crucial to optimize the various tools across different stages. However, it's still a silo approach because the full integration is missing. This isn't just an issue with SonarCloud. It's a general problem with tooling."
"There's room for improvement in the configuration process, particularly during the initial setup phase."
"The reports could improve by providing more information. We are not able to use the reports in our operation until they are improved. Additionally, if the vendor provided more customization capabilities it would be a benefit."
"The UI can be improved. Additionally, in future updates, I would like to see SonarQube Cloud provide more detailed solutions for fixing code issues, especially solutions related to CVEs."
"Reporting features are missing in SonarCloud."
"It would be helpful if notifications could go out to an extra person."
"I need a solution that can bring together three key areas: vulnerabilities, static scanning, and misarchitecture. Currently, to achieve our expectations, we have to use more than one product, as some products excel at scanning for vulnerabilities but are poor at checking code quality."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is expensive."
"For what it offers, it's a very reasonable cost. The way that it is priced is extremely straightforward. It works on the number of applications that you use, and you license a server. It is something that is extremely fair, because it doesn't take into consideration the number of requests, etc. It is only priced based on the number of onboarded applications. It suits our model as well, because we have huge traffic. Our number of applications is not that large, so the pricing works great for us."
"I like the per-application licensing model... We just license the app and we look at different vulnerabilities on that app and we remediate within the app. It's simpler."
"The product's pricing is low. I would rate it a two out of ten."
"You only get one license for an application. Ours are very big, monolithic applications with millions of lines of code. We were able to apply one license to one monolithic application, which is great. We are happy with the licensing. Pricing-wise, they are industry-standard, which is fine."
"It's a tiered licensing model. The more you buy, as you cross certain quantity thresholds, the pricing changes. If you have a smaller environment, your licensing costs are going to be different than a larger environment... The licensing is primarily per application. An application can be as many agents as you need. If you've got 10 development servers and 20 production servers and 50 QA servers, all of those agents can be reporting as a single application that utilizes one license."
"The good news is that the agent itself comes in two different forms: the unlicensed form and the licensed form. Unlicensed gives use of that software composition analysis for free. Thereafter, if you apply a license to that same agent, that's when the instrumentation takes hold. So one of my suggestions is to do what we're doing: Deploy the agent to as many applications as possible, with just the SCA feature turned on with no license applied, and then you can be more choosy and pick which teams will get the license applied."
"While not extremely cheap, it aligns well with market standards and offers good value."
"Previously, the pricing was 17,000 euros for five million lines analyzed. However, they now charge $15,000 per one million lines, significantly increasing the cost."
"The current pricing is quite cheap."
"I am using the free version of the solution."
"The price of SonarCloud could be less expensive. We are using the community version and the price should be more reasonable."
"The price of SonarCloud is not expensive, it goes by the lines of code. 1 million lines per code are approximately 4,000 USD per year. If you need 2 million lines of code you would double the annual cost."
"I rate the pricing a five out of ten."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
24%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Computer Software Company
9%
Insurance Company
7%
Computer Software Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Insurance Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Contrast Security Assess?
When we access the application, it continuously monitors and detects vulnerabilities.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Contrast Security Assess?
The product's pricing is low. I would rate it a two out of ten.
What needs improvement with Contrast Security Assess?
Technical support for the solution should be faster. We have to further analyze what kind of CVEs are in the reported libraries and what part of the code is affected. That analysis can be added to ...
What do you like most about SonarCloud?
Recently, they introduced support for mono reports and microservices, which is a noteworthy development as it provides a more detailed view of each service.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SonarCloud?
From my experience, SonarQube Cloud (formerly SonarCloud) is very expensive for small companies. It would be a great improvement if the price for smaller companies were reduced, as I do not have th...
What needs improvement with SonarCloud?
I need a solution that can bring together three key areas: vulnerabilities, static scanning, and misarchitecture. Currently, to achieve our expectations, we have to use more than one product, as so...
 

Also Known As

Contrast Assess
No data available
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Williams-Sonoma, Autodesk, HUAWEI, Chromeriver, RingCentral, Demandware.
Information Not Available
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850,671 professionals have used our research since 2012.