Corelight vs Vectra AI comparison

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Corelight

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 6, 2024

Vectra AI and Corelight are contenders in the network security solutions space. Vectra AI seems to have the upper hand due to its advanced AI-driven alert management capabilities.

Features: Vectra AI offers capabilities like advanced alert management that consolidates alerts into manageable incidents, captures network metadata at scale for enhanced context, and provides functionalities like Cognito Recall and Cognito Detect for improved visibility. Corelight integrates with Zeek for robust open-source traffic analysis, facilitates easy deployment, and enables detailed traffic insights.

Room for Improvement: Vectra AI needs improvements in integrating with external solutions and enhancing its user interface for better engagement. Users seek better logging and visibility on host-driven attacks. Corelight, despite its open-source strengths, requires additional feature development and ease of use improvements. Its complexity can overwhelm and complicate pricing.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Vectra AI is mainly deployed on-premises with hybrid options, boasting strong technical support that enhances customer satisfaction. Corelight, also primarily on-premises, benefits from excellent technical support due to its smaller size, although its scalability might face challenges as demand grows.

Pricing and ROI: Vectra AI's high pricing reflects its comprehensive offerings, delivering a good ROI by reducing attack response time. However, it is less accessible for smaller budgets. In contrast, Corelight's pricing is more affordable and open-source, appealing to technically adept users, though additional investments may be required to maximize its value.

To learn more, read our detailed Corelight vs. Vectra AI Report (Updated: December 2025).

Corelight vs. Vectra AI

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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

Corelight

Ranking in Network Detection and Response (NDR)

13th

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (7th)

Vectra AI

Ranking in Network Detection and Response (NDR)

2nd

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) (5th), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (16th), Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR) (11th), AI-Powered Cybersecurity Platforms (6th)

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2025, in the Network Detection and Response (NDR) category, the mindshare of Corelight is 4.3%, down from 5.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Vectra AI is 14.1%, down from 17.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Network Detection and Response (NDR) Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Vectra AI	14.1%
Corelight	4.3%
Other	81.6%

Network Detection and Response (NDR)

Q&A Highlights

Mazin Al-Shuaili

Head Of Retail Operations at a financial services firm with 201-500 employees

Jun 09, 2020

What is the biggest difference between Corelight and Vectra AI?

Corelight is a Zeek based solution for network behavior analysis and Vectra AI is a User Behavior based solution. If you are comparing these 2 systems you are comparing apples to oranges. You shouldn't be evaluating these products against each other as they address different use cases for your network. My guess is you are either looking for better network visibility and possibly network detection or you need to understand insider threats (User Behavior). If you need both then you need both tools.

An expensive solution to monitor internet traffic with multiple dashboards

Featured Reviews

HamadaElewa

Technical Sales Manager at Spire Solutions

The huge library especially the open source link, makes it the main engine for Corelight with some enhancements in the commercial version. It has a very powerful level, such as signature-based attacks or behavioral attacks, with enhancements in the design. It is very flexible for intelligent implementations like IPs, especially between big companies and banks. Corelight is easy to understand and monitor what is going on behind the team. The solution is already integrated with other systems like Suricata, Elastic, and Microsoft tools. It's very easy to integrate signature-based or behavior-based engines. You can use Elastic for the dashboards to get it from Corelight, along with all the benefits and expandability.

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RahulReddy

Consultant at a retailer with 5,001-10,000 employees

Threat detection has improved and malicious emails are now identified quickly

Vectra AI offers artificial intelligence capabilities with visibility that can be integrated into our day-to-day operations and other tools, including malware detection tools and cyber threat tools. Vectra AI has positively impacted my organization. Last year while using it, we received many malicious email threats and virus incidents, including a trojan virus that had reportedly been deployed by someone. Our company used Vectra AI to detect the malicious threats and viruses before they could cause more damage, and we successfully stopped the threats. Using Vectra AI, I notice that server downtime has decreased significantly. We now experience only two to three hours of downtime, whereas without Vectra AI and other tools, our downtime would exceed 48 to 72 hours.

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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

"It is easy to deploy and easy to handle."

"It's an easy way for us to get visibility in a client's environment."

"Corelight is easy to use."

"The most valuable feature is the embedded IDS from Suricata."

"It's easy to create additional dashboards specific to supporting specific tasks."

"The core product provides excellent visibility, but my favorite feature is Vectra Recall."

"One of the key advantages for us is we define a 24/7 service around it. We use far more of Vectra alerts than we do with our SIEM product because we understand that when we get an alert from Vectra we actually need to do something about it."

"The most valuable feature for Cognito Detect, the main solution, is that external IDS's create a lot of alerts. When I say a lot of alerts I really mean a lot of alerts. Vectra, on the other hand, contextualizes everything, reducing the number of alerts and pinpointing only the things of interest. This is a key feature for me. Because of this, a non-trained analyst can use it almost right away."

"Our company used Vectra AI to detect the malicious threats and viruses before they could cause more damage, and we successfully stopped the threats."

"It has helped us to organize our security. We get a better overview on what is happening on the network, which has helped us get quicker responses to users. If we see malicious activity, then we can quickly take action on it. Previously, we weren't getting an overview as fast as we are now, so we can now provide a quicker response."

"It is doing some artificial intelligence. If it sees a server doing a lot of things, then it will assume that is normal. So, it is looking for anomalous behavior, things that are out of context which helps us reduce time. Therefore, we don't have to look in all the logs. We just wait for Vectra to say, "This one is behaving strange," then we can investigate that part."

"Vectra AI offers artificial intelligence capabilities with visibility that can be integrated into our day-to-day operations and other tools, including malware detection tools and cyber threat tools."

"Vectra AI has positively impacted my organization; last year while using it, we received many malicious email threats and virus incidents, including a trojan virus that had reportedly been deployed by someone, and our company used Vectra AI to detect the malicious threats and viruses before they could cause more damage, and we successfully stopped the threats."

More Vectra AI pros

Cons

"Corelight hasn’t added features in a long time."

"In the next release, building a graphical user interface would be helpful."

"Machine learning could be a good improvement, but it's very costly."

"The solution’s architecture is complex and difficult to understand. There are multiple machines and VMs."

"They can enhance the interface of the product. They can make it more interactive and also easier to use for feature access."

"I would like to see a bit more strategic metrics instead of technical data. Information that I could show to my executive management team or board would be valuable."

"There is room for improvement in the documentation. We would like to have more details on how it detects what we see."

"We have a lot of system solutions and integrations with system solutions. Vectra is a type of black box. It implements AI-informed detection mechanisms, but we cannot create system detections. I understand that the product is designed this way, but it would be great if we could create our own detections as well."

"We have had a few issues with the integration of Vectra AI with EDR. Some filters have not been working. We've also had issues with the brain not being powerful enough."

"Integration with other security components needs improvement. It should have true integration as opposed to just being a separate pane of glass."

"The false positives and the tuning side of it is something that could use improvement. But that could be from our side."

"Some of the customization could be improved. Everything is provided for you as an easy solution to use, but working with it and doing specific development could be worked on a bit more in the scope of an incident response team."

"Pricing could be improved, as many customers have complained about the pricing model and pricing complexity."

More Vectra AI cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's a yearly fee and depends on what you are looking for."

"Its cost is too much. It's an investment that we can afford. It's a lot, but it's worth it."

"The licensing is on an annual basis."

"It's relatively on the pricier side, but when compared to other solutions. It's not the most budget-friendly option, but it can be considered somewhat more cost-effective in comparison to other alternatives."

"Vectra AI is not a cheap solution."

"Vectra's pricing is too high. All schools will not be able to afford it. Vectra will only end up targeting higher education and higher value independence purely because of the price. A lot of schools would love to have a product like Vectra AI, but they simply can't because they struggle to even pay the high E5 licensing from Microsoft. When you're up against that, Vectra AI is never going to be within the sector's price range."

"Vectra is a bit on the higher side in terms of price, but they have always been transparent. The reason that they are this good is that they invest, so they need to charge accordingly."

"The pricing and licensing are quite straightforward because they're based on the IP licenses. As a result, they are easy to count."

"From a licensing perspective, the Vectra detect platform is pretty doable. Also, the hardware prices are nothing that we're not used to. The stream part is a little overpriced compared to the detect part. The reason is that you need to stream data to detect events anyway, so the data is in there. The only thing that's not available is the UI to be able to look at the stream data, which is also on the appliances but is just not activated. That's mainly the thing that we want to improve on."

More Vectra AI pricing and cost advice

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Answers from the Community

Mazin Al-Shuaili

Head Of Retail Operations at a financial services firm with 201-500 employees

Jun 9, 2020

What is the biggest difference between Corelight and Vectra AI?

2 out of 5 answers

JJennifer Geisler

Chief Marketing Officer at a tech vendor with 201-500 employees

Feb 13, 2020

The two platforms take a fundamentally different approach to NDR. Corelight is limited to use cases that require the eventual forwarding of events and parsed data logs to a security team’s SIEM or data lake. You then rely on an open-source community for things like detections. Vectra not only does that – but also enriches the underlying data. It is also delivered as an investigative workbench that includes out-of-box detections that highlight and prioritize attacker behaviors and campaigns. Perhaps just as importantly, Corelight has few integrations whereas Vectra natively integrates with parts of infrastructure like EDR, orchestration and network security products.

Read full answer

OseremeOsobase

Director at Baverianvine

Feb 13, 2020

I would recommend you look at Darktrace instead. Extrahop and the new kid on the block, Awake security are also recommended.

Read full answer

See all 5 answers

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

14%

Government

12%

Computer Software Company

Real Estate/Law Firm

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	10
Large Enterprise	29

Questions from the Community

What is the biggest difference between Corelight and Vectra AI?

What do you like most about Corelight?

It's easy to create additional dashboards specific to supporting specific tasks.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Corelight?

The solution is too expensive compared to others. If you have the technical knowledge, it's good. Corelight is a very big gap between you and others if you’re new.

What do you like most about Vectra AI?

The solution is currently used as a central threat detection and response system.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Vectra AI?

It is very acceptable when you compare it with Darktrace, for example.

What needs improvement with Vectra AI?

Vectra AI could be improved by focusing on all threat types, not only malicious threats or virus threats. All threats, including hacking attempts, should be comprehensively addressed. The user inte...

ExtraHop Reveal(x) vs Corelight

Comparisons

Darktrace vs Corelight

Compared 24% of the time

Compared 20% of the time

Cisco Secure Network Analytics vs Corelight

Compared 7% of the time

NetWitness NDR vs Corelight

Compared 7% of the time

ExtraHop Reveal(x) 360 vs Corelight

Compared 6% of the time

More Corelight Competitors

Darktrace vs Vectra AI

Compared 23% of the time

ExtraHop Reveal(x) vs Vectra AI

Compared 8% of the time

Cisco Secure Network Analytics vs Vectra AI

Compared 4% of the time

Fortinet FortiNDR vs Vectra AI

Compared 4% of the time

Arista NDR vs Vectra AI

Compared 4% of the time

More Vectra AI Competitors

Product Reports

Network Detection and Response (NDR)

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Also Known As

No data available

Vectra Networks, Vectra AI NDR

Overview

Corelight is the most powerful network visibility solution for information security professionals. We provide real-time data that organizations use to understand, detect, and prevent cyber attacks. Our solution is built on Zeek, the powerful and widely-used open source monitoring framework.

Corelight

Vectra AI enhances security operations by pinpointing attack locations, correlating alerts, and providing in-depth visibility across attack lifecycles, ultimately prioritizing threats and improving incident responses.

Vectra AI integrates AI and machine learning to detect anomalies early and supports proactive threat response. Its features like risk scoring, alert correlation, and streamlined SOC efficiency are supplemented by integration with tools like Office 365. Users highlight integration, reporting, and customization challenges, alongside limitations in syslog data and false positive management. They seek enhancements in visualization, UI, TCP replay, endpoint visibility, and tool orchestration, with requests for improved documentation, licensing, and cloud processing innovation.

What are the key features of Vectra AI?

Attack Location Identification: Pinpoints specific locations of security breaches.
Alert Correlation: Combines multiple alerts into a single incident for efficiency.
Visibility Across Attack Lifecycle: Offers detailed insight through different attack stages.
Risk Scoring: Aggregates risk scores to prioritize imminent threats.
AI and Machine Learning: Detects anomalies early to aid in proactive threat response.
Integration with Office 365: Seamlessly consolidates data for enriched investigations.

What benefits should users look for?

Enhanced SOC Efficiency: Reduces alert fatigue and improves operational efficiency.
Threat Prioritization: Focuses on the most critical threats with risk scoring.
Proactive Threat Response: Early anomaly detection aids in swift response.
Operational Overhead Reduction: Seamless integration minimizes extra workload.
Compliance and Policy Support: Assists in adhering to policies and regulations.

In industries like finance, healthcare, and critical infrastructure, Vectra AI is crucial for threat detection and network monitoring. Entities use it for identifying anomalous behaviors and enhancing cybersecurity by responding to network activities and analyzing traffic for potential breaches. It operates on-premises and in hybrid cloud settings, enabling threat detection without endpoint agents and supporting compliance and policy enforcement.

Sample Customers

Education First

Tribune Media Group, Barry University, Aruba Networks, Good Technology, Riverbed, Santa Clara University, Securities Exchange, Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association

Corelight vs. Vectra AI