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Contrast Security Protect vs HCL AppScan comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 2026

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 Protect
Ranking in Application Security Tools
36th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
5.8
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
HCL AppScan
Ranking in Application Security Tools
24th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.9
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Static Application Security Testing (SAST) (20th), Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST) (7th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Application Security Tools category, the mindshare of Contrast Security Protect is 1.1%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HCL AppScan is 2.4%, up from 2.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Security Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
HCL AppScan2.4%
Contrast Security Protect1.1%
Other96.5%
Application Security Tools
 

Featured Reviews

ToddMcAlister - PeerSpot reviewer
Lead Application and Data Security Engineer at a insurance company with 5,001-10,000 employees
It provides us with more in-depth visibility into ongoing attacks.
I rate Contrast Security Protect eight out of 10. Overall, it's a solid product, but I deduct a couple of points because of the interface and some shortcomings in the reporting. If you have a large enterprise where you're dealing with a lot of servers, then it makes sense not to use the internal MySQL database. You should use something like Oracle or Microsoft SQL, but if you don't have many transactions, the embedded MySQL database works great.
Ravi Khanchandani - PeerSpot reviewer
Founder Director at Techsa Services
Has improved identification of encryption and authentication issues across cloud and on-prem applications
During the learning curve of onboarding HCL AppScan, we learned that HCL has altered the portfolio and now offers HCL AppScan 360, which has a much better look and feel with an improved user interface. However, there is one feature called SCA, which stands for Software Composition Analysis, that could be improved. When I'm doing an application scan, HCL AppScan has the ability to generate information about what components are in use. For example, if I'm scanning a web application, it shows me the various components being used. It tells me whether I have Java libraries, .NET frameworks, or other log management libraries such as Log4j, and what versions of those specific components are present. I would like to see more detailed reports from the tool. Currently, you can find out the components belonging to a specific software, but if detailed reporting became available, you would be in a better position to identify vulnerabilities. For instance, I could identify that I had the Log4j vulnerability and know that I need to fix my application accordingly. If they add the features I'm describing, I would consider giving them a higher rating. However, I've only been experienced with the product for three months.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The Protect solution allows applications to continue to run, even with known vulnerabilities, but will report or block attempts to exploit the vulnerabilities."
"Protect provides us with more in-depth visibility into ongoing attacks."
"The solution has excellent real-time capabilities."
"The product gives a few false positives. We get 99 percent true positives."
"Contrast Security's support is great. They're willing to spend a lot of time on your problem."
"This is a stable solution."
"This solution saves us time due to the low number of false positives detected."
"Technical support is helpful."
"It identifies all the URLs and domains on its own and then performs tests and provides the results."
"HCL AppScan has helped us improve our security posture, as we've been able to identify quite a few issues."
"I mainly use AppScan for vulnerability scanning and database bridging."
"You can easily find particular features and functions through the UI."
"Compared to other tools only AppScan supports special language."
 

Cons

"There's room for improvement in the initial setup."
"Protect's reporting GUI is very basic. To get all statuses from the APIs, we needed to write our own KPI dashboard to provide reports."
"Contrast Security Protect needs to improve integration."
"We're not using it much anymore because we had some performance issues."
"We would like to integrate with some of the other reporting tools that we're planning to use in the future."
"They have to improve support."
"One thing which I think can be improved is the CI/CD Integration"
"There is not a central management for static and dynamic."
"HCL AppScan needs to improve security."
"The databases for HCL are small and have room for improvement."
"They should have a better UI for dashboards."
"Visibility is an issue for us. Our partners were not even aware that we had an integration with AppSense."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"The price is very expensive."
"I rate the product's price a seven on a scale of one to ten, where one is low, and ten is high. HCL AppScan is an expensive tool."
"The tool was expensive."
"Pricing was the main reason that we went ahead with this solution as they were the lowest in the market."
"The price of HCL AppScan is okay, in my opinion. You just buy HCL AppScan and don't pay anything anymore, meaning it is just a one-time purchase."
"With the features, that they offer, and the support, they offer, AppScan pricing is on a higher level."
"The product is moderately priced, though it's an investment due to extensive code analysis needs."
"The solution is moderately priced."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Construction Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Construction Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business14
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise31
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What needs improvement with HCL AppScan?
During the learning curve of onboarding HCL AppScan, we learned that HCL has altered the portfolio and now offers HCL AppScan 360, which has a much better look and feel with an improved user interf...
What is your primary use case for HCL AppScan?
I'm currently working with BigFix and HCL AppScan. At least three people in my company are using HCL AppScan. Since we are a reseller, we run it in both lab environments and live production app...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HCL AppScan?
AppScan is considered more cost-effective than Veracode, although I have not updated the exact pricing details. Companies often choose based on budget constraints, with Veracode being on the higher...
 

Also Known As

Contrast Protect
IBM Security AppScan, Rational AppScan, AppScan
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Williams-Sonoma, Autodesk, HUAWEI, Chromeriver, RingCentral, Demandware.
Essex Technology Group Inc., Cisco, West Virginia University, APIS IT
Find out what your peers are saying about Contrast Security Protect vs. HCL AppScan and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
921,714 professionals have used our research since 2012.