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Contrast Security Assess vs Veracode comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 8, 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

Contrast Security Assess
Ranking in Application Security Tools
30th
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
28th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Veracode
Ranking in Application Security Tools
2nd
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
201
Ranking in other categories
Container Security (8th), Software Composition Analysis (SCA) (3rd), Static Code Analysis (1st), Application Security Posture Management (ASPM) (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Application Security Tools category, the mindshare of Contrast Security Assess is 0.7%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Veracode is 9.0%, down from 10.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Security Tools
 

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.
Sajal Sharma - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers shift-left security strategy and helps us with the latest security configurations, OWASP standards, and SAST standards
It's robustness is the main benefit to the organization. As it gets upgraded with time, it also improves the coverage – security configuration coverages and vulnerability coverages. It also updates itself with the latest known vulnerabilities that are uploaded to the NVD, OWASP, or other databases. So it gets upgraded itself with that. And so with each upgrade, it gets better and better. The solution offers the ability to prevent vulnerable code from going into production. It provides us with a report containing multiple remediations and mitigations for each vulnerability. For example, if it finds a cross-site scripting vulnerability, it will also include references like CWE and CVE records, instructions on how to fix it, and the specific line of code or module where the vulnerability is present. This helps us fix the issues accordingly. I'm a penetration tester and DevSecOps engineer. I evaluate the findings, mark false positives, and manually exploit vulnerabilities if they exist. If we need further clarification, we raise a ticket with the Veracode team and get consultancy from them. We are a software development team. If we find a vulnerability, I exploit it and come back with the best possible mitigation, and the dev team fixes it. If we use Veracode Fix, it might use third-party implementations or make changes we aren't aware of. We need to be very aware of what our application is using internally. It should be known to us. As per my experience, the solution's policy reporting ensures compliance with industry standards. It comes with multiple features. I get the most out of it, and it's good. The solution provides visibility into application status at every phase of development. Like static analysis, dynamic analysis, software composition, and manual penetration tests - throughout the SDLC We have a pipeline that I maintain. I use the Veracode API account and have integrated it with AWS and our Jenkins pipeline. We use Snyk for SCA and Veracode for SAST scanning. At the earliest stage of the build, the SAST scan runs along with the JS and PHP files. It provides us with reports, which are then handed over to the other tools we depend on. If I validate the report or check the Veracode dashboard and find vulnerabilities, I mark them as false positives or existing issues. We work on multiple projects, but the one I'm handling these days only uses Veracode for SAST. It's been about one and a half years since I've been working with Veracode and this project. It is quite impressive. There are some things Veracode cannot find, like code obfuscations inside the code and some insecure randoms. Sometimes, it misses those flaws. But overall, if I compare it with other tools, it is better. I will definitely recommend others to use this tool. We run the scan before each deployment. If the dev team builds a new module or something, we scan it along with all the files. If we find anything, we get it fixed. That's how it works. Veracode is quite important to the organization's shift-left security strategy because we make a scan for each deployment. Sometimes, if I think we need to perform a shift-left, I just make a scan before deployment and check for any misconfiguration or vulnerability in the code.

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."
"It is a stable solution...Contrast Security Assess is one of the first players in this market, so they have experience and customers, especially abroad. Overall, it's a good product."
"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."
"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."
"No other tool does the runtime scanning like Contrast does. Other static analysis tools do static scanning, but Contrast is runtime analysis, when the routes are exercised. That's when the scan happens. This is a tool that has a very unique capability compared to other tools. That's what I like most about Contrast, that it's runtime."
"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."
"Assess has an excellent API interface to pull APIs."
"The reporting being highly accurate is pretty cool. I use another product and I was always looking for answers as to what line, which part of the code, was wrong, and what to do about it. Veracode seems to have a solid database to look things up and a website to look things up."
"For our rapid, secure DevOps cycle, we have integration of the Vericode API into our build tool, and Greenlight into our IDE."
"The solution is a specialist in SAST that you can rely on. Code scanning is fast with current, updated algorithms​."
"Veracode's technical support is great. They assigned us a TAM and once a week, we have a brief engagement with the TAM to verify that everything's going well. If we have any outstanding issues, they get serviced and addressed."
"I like the sandbox, the ability to upload compiled code, and how easy it is."
"Provides consistent evaluation and results without huge fluctuations in false positives or negatives."
"It's hard to say that any single feature is the most essential. There are many errors and vulnerabilities in software today in the standard libraries for different vendors because. We don't need to reinvent the wheel every time because we're using standard libraries, and it's important to know that your security isn't compromised because you are using libraries with vulnerabilities."
"The SAST and DAST modules are great."
 

Cons

"I would like to see them come up with more scanning rules."
"The solution needs to improve flexibility...The scalability of the product is a problem in the solution, especially from a commercial perspective."
"Regarding the solution's OSS feature, the one drawback that we do have is that it does not have client-side support. We'll be missing identification of libraries like jQuery or JavaScript, and such, that are client-side."
"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."
"The out-of-the-box reporting could be improved. We need to write our own APIs to make the reporting more robust."
"To instrument an agent, it has to be running on a type of application technology that the agent recognizes and understands. It's excellent when it works. If we're using an application that is using an unsupported technology, then we can't instrument it at all. We do use PHP and Contrast presently doesn't support that, although it's on their roadmap. My primary hurdle is that it doesn't support all of the technologies that we use."
"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."
"The one thing I'd like to be able to do is schedule dynamic scans. Today we're kicking those off manually, but I believe that it's something have on their roadmap."
"I would like to see more technical support for some of the connectors, some more detailed diagrams or run-books on how to install some of stuff; more hand-holding in the sense of understanding our environment."
"The sandbox could use some improvement; when creating a sandbox, it requires us to put the application name in twice, which seems unnecessary."
"From the usability perspective, it is not up to date with the latest trends. It looks very old. Tools such as Datadog, New Relic, or infrastructure security tools, such as AWS Cloud, seem very user-friendly. They are completely web-based, and you can navigate through them pretty quickly, whereas Veracode is very rigid. It is like an old-school enterprise application. It does the job, but they need to invest a little more on the usability front."
"In the next release, I would like a proper way of packaging files for scanning and the packing of IOS apps and API Dynamic scan methodology."
"It's problematic if you want to integrate it with your pipelines because the documentation is not so well written and it's full of typos. It is not presented in a structured way. It does not say, "If you want to achieve this particular thing, you have to do steps 1, 2, and 3." Instead, it contains bits of information in different parts, and you have to read everything and then understand the big picture."
"Improving sorting through findings reports to filter by only what is critically relevant will help developers focus on issues."
"We are testing Veracode's software composition analysis, but we're having trouble integrating it with SVN. It works out of the box when you use Git but doesn't work as well with other tools like SVN. It's more geared toward Git"
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is expensive."
"The product's pricing is low. I would rate it a two out of ten."
"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."
"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."
"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."
"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."
"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."
"For our company, the price is reasonable for the benefits that we get."
"I think the pricing is in line with the rest of the tools. I think you get what you pay for. It is certainly not inexpensive, but the value proposition is there. There are certainly cheaper tools, but I don't think we'd be getting the support that we get with those, and that is what separates this product from the others."
"We use this product per project rather than per developer... Your development model will really determine what the best fit is for you in terms of licensing, because of the project-based licensing. If you do a few projects, that's more attractive. If you have a large number of developers, that would also make the product a little more attractive."
"It's worth the value"
"Costs are reasonable. No special infrastructure is required and the license model is good."
"As compared to others, it is a costly solution. It is overpriced, and many organizations with a limited budget cannot afford it. That is why they are going for other tools, but those tools are not that effective. Veracode is better in terms of quality. If you want good service, you have to pay for it."
"I found Veracode very expensive, though I'm not the person paying for it. I was surprised to find out how much the subscription costs and that the executive board approved it, but it was a no-brainer because now my company has better security scans."
"Pricing/licensing is complicated."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
21%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Computer Software Company
10%
Insurance Company
7%
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Insurance Company
7%
 

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 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 advice do you have for others considering Contrast Security Assess?
Contrast Security Assess is deployed on-cloud in our organization. I would recommend Contrast Security Assess to other users. It's a really good tool. It provides lots of details on web-based vulne...
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...
What do you like most about Veracode?
The SAST and DAST modules are great.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Veracode?
The product’s price is a bit higher compared to other solutions. However, the tool provides good vulnerability and database features. It is worth the money.
 

Also Known As

Contrast Assess
Crashtest Security , Veracode Detect
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Williams-Sonoma, Autodesk, HUAWEI, Chromeriver, RingCentral, Demandware.
Manhattan Associates, Azalea Health, Sabre, QAD, Floor & Decor, Prophecy International, SchoolCNXT, Keap, Rekner, Cox Automotive, Automation Anywhere, State of Missouri and others.
Find out what your peers are saying about Contrast Security Assess vs. Veracode and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
861,481 professionals have used our research since 2012.