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Coverity vs Fortify Application Defender comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Coverity
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
43
Ranking in other categories
Static Application Security Testing (SAST) (5th)
Fortify Application Defender
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (28th)
 

Mindshare comparison

Coverity and Fortify Application Defender aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Coverity is designed for Static Application Security Testing (SAST) and holds a mindshare of 7.2%, up 6.7% compared to last year.
Fortify Application Defender, on the other hand, focuses on Application Security Tools, holds 0.7% mindshare, up 0.7% since last year.
Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
Application Security Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Jaile Sebes - PeerSpot reviewer
Resolving critical software issues demands faster implementation and better integration
We use Coverity primarily to find issues such as software bugs and memory leaks, especially in C++ and C# projects. It helps us identify deadlocks, synchronization issues, and product crashes Coverity has been instrumental in resolving product crashes by detecting various issues like deadlocks.…
Saroj-Patnaik - PeerSpot reviewer
Reliable solution with excellent machine learning algorithms but expensive and lacking support
I primarily use Fortify Application Defender to assess whether our products can defend against applications Fortify Application Defender's most valuable features are machine learning algorithms, real-time remediation, and automatic vulnerability notifications. Fortify Application Defender gives…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"One of the most valuable features is Contributing Events. That particular feature helps the developer understand the root cause of a defect. So you can locate the starting point of the defect and figure out exactly how it is being exploited."
"It has the lowest false positives."
"The product has deeper scanning capabilities."
"Coverity is easy to set up and has a less lengthy process to find vulnerabilities."
"Coverity integrates with issue-tracking systems like Jira and provides email notifications, alerts, and other features."
"The solution has helped to increase staff productivity and improved our work significantly by approximately 20 percent."
"The most valuable feature is that there were not a whole lot of false positives, at least on the codebases that I looked at."
"Coverity is scalable."
"The information from Fortify Application Defender on how to fix and solve issues is very good compared to other solutions."
"The most valuable feature is that it analyzes data in real-time."
"I find the configuration of rules in Fortify Application Defender useful. Its integration is also easy."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to automatically feed it rules what it's coupled with the WebInspect dynamic application scanning technology."
"The most valuable features of Fortify Application Defender are the code packages that are default."
"The solution helped us to improve the code quality of our organization."
"Fortify Application Defender's most valuable features are machine learning algorithms, real-time remediation, and automatic vulnerability notifications."
"Its ability to find security defects is valuable."
 

Cons

"Reporting engine needs to be more robust."
"The product could be enhanced by providing video troubleshooting guides, making issue resolution more accessible. Troubleshooting without visual guides can be time-consuming."
"The solution's user interface and quality gate could be improved."
"Ideally, it would have a user-based license that does not have a restriction in the number of lines of code."
"Coverity is not a user-friendly product."
"The product lacks sufficient customization options."
"Coverity is not stable."
"The reporting tool integration process is sometimes slow."
"The workbench is a little bit complex when you first start using it."
"I encountered many false positives for Python applications."
"The solution is quite expensive."
"Support for older compilers/IDEs is lacking."
"Fortify Application Defender could improve by supporting more code languages, such as GRAAS and Groovy."
"The biggest complaint that I have heard concerns additional platform support because right now, it only supports applications that are written in .NET and Java."
"The product should integrate industry-standard code review tools internally with its system. This would streamline the coding process, as developers wouldn't need multiple tools for code review and security checks. Many independent and open-source tools are available, from Apache to various libraries. Using multiple DevOps pipeline tools can slow the turnaround time."
"The solution could improve the time it takes to scan. When comparing it to SonarQube it does it in minutes while in Fortify Application Defender it can take hours."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price is competitive with other solutions."
"This is a pretty expensive solution. The overall value of the solution could be improved if the price was reduced. Licensing is done on an annual basis."
"Depending on the usage types, one has to opt for different types of licenses from Coverity, especially to be able to use areas like report viewing or report generation."
"The solution is affordable."
"The solution's pricing is comparable to other products."
"I would rate the pricing a six out of ten, where one is low, and ten is high price."
"Coverity’s price is on the higher side. It should be lower."
"Coverity is very expensive."
"The licensing is very complex, it's project based and can range from $10,000 to $200,000+ depending on the project type and size."
"I rate the solution's pricing a five out of ten. It comes as an annual cloud subscription. The tool's pricing is around 50 lakhs."
"Fortify Application Defender is very expensive."
"The product’s price is much higher than other tools."
"The base licensing costs for the SaaS platform is about $900 USD per application, per year."
"The price of this solution could be less expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
32%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Government
4%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Manufacturing Company
15%
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How would you decide between Coverity and Sonarqube?
We researched Coverity, but in the end, we chose SonarQube. SonarQube is a tool for reviewing code quality and security. It helps to guide our development teams during code reviews by providing rem...
What do you like most about Coverity?
The solution has improved our code quality and security very well.
What do you like most about Fortify Application Defender?
I find the configuration of rules in Fortify Application Defender useful. Its integration is also easy.
What needs improvement with Fortify Application Defender?
The product should integrate industry-standard code review tools internally with its system. This would streamline the coding process, as developers wouldn't need multiple tools for code review and...
What is your primary use case for Fortify Application Defender?
We use the solution for fast code review. It is integrated into our DevOps pipeline.
 

Also Known As

Synopsys Static Analysis
HPE Fortify Application Defender, Micro Focus Fortify Application Defender
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

SAP, Mega International, Thales Alenia Space
ServiceMaster, Saltworks, SAP
Find out what your peers are saying about Coverity vs. Fortify Application Defender and other solutions. Updated: September 2022.
861,390 professionals have used our research since 2012.