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Coverity vs Fortify on Demand vs SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) 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:
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category, the mindshare of Coverity is 7.5%, up from 6.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortify on Demand is 4.1%, down from 4.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) is 24.9%, down from 27.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
 

Featured Reviews

Md. Shahriar Hussain - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers impressive reporting features with user-friendliness and high scalability
The solution can be easily setup but requires heavy integration due to the multiple types of port and programming languages involved. Comparing the resource requirements of the solution I would say it can be installed effortlessly. I would rate the initial setup an eight out of ten. A professional needs some pre-acquired knowledge to manage Coverity's deployment process, but the local solution partners provide support well enough for trouble-free deployment. The overall deployment process of Coverity took around two and a half hours in our organization. The deployment duration depends upon the operating system and resources including high-end RAM and CPU processors.
Jonathan Steyn - PeerSpot reviewer
Source code analyzer, FPR file generation, reduction of false positives and generates compliance reports, for in-depth analysis
Not challenges with the product itself. The product is very reliable. It does have a steep learning curve. But, again, one thing that Fortify or OpenText does very well is training. There are a lot of free resources and training in the community forums, free training as well as commercial training where users can train on how to use the back-end systems and the scanning engines and how to use command-line arguments because some of the procedures or some of the tools do require a bit of a learning curve. That's the only challenge I've really seen for customers because you have to learn how to use the tool effectively. But Fortify has, in fact, improved its user interface and the way users engage the dashboards and the interfaces. It is intuitive. It's easy to understand. But in some regards, the cybersecurity specialist or AppSec would need a bit of training to engage the user interface and to understand how it functions. But from the point of the reliability index and how powerful the tool is, there's no challenge there. But it's just from a learning perspective; users might need a bit more skill to use the tool. The user interface isn't that tedious. It's not that difficult to understand. When I initially learned how to use the interfaces, I was able to master it within a week and was able to use it quite effectively. So training is required. All skills are needed to learn how to use the tool. I would like to see more enhancements in the dashboards. Dashboards are available. They do need some configuration and settings. But I would like to see more business intelligence capabilities within the tool. It's not particularly a cybersecurity function, but, for instance, business impact analysis or other features where you can actually use business intelligence capabilities within your security tool. That would be remarkable because not only do you have a cybersecurity tool, but you also have a tool that can give you business impact analysis and some other measurements. A bit more intelligence in terms of that from a cybersecurity perspective would be remarkable.
Wang Dayong - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to integrate and has a plug-in that supports both C and C++ languages
The product provides false reports sometimes. It also fails to understand the context of the code. It reports that a line of code has issues without considering its relation with the previous line. The product should improve the report quality. While it asks us to improve the code quality, it would be good if it also suggests how to improve the quality.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The product has deeper scanning capabilities."
"The solution has helped to increase staff productivity and improved our work significantly by approximately 20 percent."
"The security analysis features are the most valuable features of this solution."
"The solution has improved our code quality and security very well."
"The most valuable feature is the integration with Jenkins."
"The interface of Coverity is quite good, and it is also easy to use."
"I like Coverity's capability to scan codes once we push it. We don't need more time to review our colleagues' codes. Its UI is pretty straightforward."
"The product has been beneficial in logging functionality, allowing me to categorize vulnerabilities based on severity. This aids in providing updated reports on subsequent scans."
"There is not only one specific feature that we find valuable. The idea is to integrate the solution in DevSecOps which we were able to do."
"I don’t know of any other On-Demand enterprise solution like this one where we can load the details and within a few days, receive the results of intrusion attacks, and work with HP Security Experts when needed for clarification"
"One of the valuable features is the ability to submit your code and have it run in the background. Then, if something comes up that is more specific, you have the security analyst who can jump in and help, if needed."
"It helps deploy and track changes easily as per time-to-time market upgrades."
"Fortify is effective in identifying such oversights, making it a really helpful tool despite its problems."
"The SAST feature is the most valuable."
"Fortify helps us to stay updated with the newest languages and versions coming out."
"I use the solution in my company for security code scans."
"Before you even compile, it can catch known vulnerability issues or patterns."
"It automatically scans for code, detects vulnerabilities, and generates daily reports."
"The most valuable feature is the security hotspot feature that identifies where your code is prone to have security issues."
"Apart from the security point of view, I like that it makes it easy to detect code smells and other issues in terms of code quality and standards."
"The solution can verify vulnerabilities, code smells, and hotspots. It makes the software more secure and it helps make a junior or novice developer sharper."
"If you want to have your code scanned and timed then this is a good tool."
"The stability is good."
"The static code analysis of the solution is the most important aspect for us. When it comes to security breaches within the code, we can leverage some rules to allow us to identify the repetition in our code and the possible targets that we may have. It makes it very easy to review our code for security purposes."
 

Cons

"The solution could use more rules."
"The product should include more customization options. The analytics is not as deep as compared to SonarQube."
"They could improve the usability. For example, how you set things up, even though it's straightforward, it could be still be easier."
"It should be easier to specify your own validation routines and sanitation routines."
"There should be additional IDE support."
"Sometimes it's a bit hard to figure out how to use the product’s UI."
"We use GitHub and Gitflow, and Coverity does not fit with Gitflow. I have to create a screen for our branches, and it's a pain for developers. It has been difficult to integrate Coverity with our system."
"There is an extra step in my organization that involves uploading to servers, which adds overhead."
"I would like the solution to add AI support."
"Integration to CI/CD pipelines could be improved. The reporting format could be more user friendly so that it is easy to read."
"In terms of what could be improved, we need more strategic analysis reports, not just for one specific application, but for the whole enterprise. In the next release, we need more reports and more analytic views for all the applications. There is no enterprise view in Fortify. I would like enterprise views and reports."
"They have very good support, but there is always room for improvement."
"Micro Focus Fortify on Demand can improve by having more graphs. For example, to show the improvement of the level of security."
"Reporting could be improved."
"They have a release coming out, which is full of new features. Based on their roadmap, there's nothing that I would suggest for them to put in it that they haven't already suggested. However, I am a customer, so I always think the pricing is something that could be improved. I am working with them on that, and they're very flexible. They work with their customers and kind of tailor the product to the customer's needs. So far, I am very happy with what they're able to provide. Their subscriptions could use a little bit of a reworking, but that would be about it."
"It lacks of some important features that the competitors have, such as Software Composition Analysis, full dead code detection, and Agile Alliance's Best Practices and Technical Debt."
"The solution could improve the management reports by making them easier to understand for the technical team that needs to review them."
"It would be a great add-on if SonarQube could update its database for vulnerabilities or plugging parts."
"Code security could be better. They are already focusing on it, but I see a lot of improvement opportunities over there. I can see a lot of false positives in terms of security. They need to make the tests more accurate so that the false positives are not detected so frequently. It would also help if they provided us with an installer."
"It does not provide deeper scanning of vulnerabilities in an application, on a live session. This is something we are not happy about. Maybe the reason for that is we are running the community edition currently, but other editions may improve on that aspect."
"The reporting is good, but I am not able to download a specific report as a PDF, so downloading reports is something that should be looked at."
"The reporting can be improved."
"I have found this solution creates more noise than competitors."
"In terms of what can be improved, the areas that need more attention in the solution are its architecture and development."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is on the expensive side, and we are paying for a couple of items."
"Coverity’s price is on the higher side. It should be lower."
"The tool was fairly priced."
"The solution is affordable."
"The price is competitive with other solutions."
"I would rate Coverity's pricing as a nine out of ten. It's already very expensive, and it's a problem for us to get more licenses due to the price. The pricing model has some good aspects - for example, a personal license gives access to all languages without code limitations, which is better than some competitors. However, it's still a lot of money for us to spend."
"The pricing is very reasonable compared to other platforms. It is based on a three year license."
"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."
"It is quite expensive. Pricing and the licensing model could be improved."
"The solution is a little expensive."
"It is not more expensive than other solutions, but the pricing is competitive."
"Fortify on Demand is moderately priced, but its pricing could be more flexible."
"Despite being on the higher end in terms of cost, the biggest value lies in its abilities, including robust features, seamless integration, and high-quality findings."
"We make an annual purchase of the licenses we need."
"The pricing model it's based on how many applications you wish to scan."
"Fortify on Demand is more expensive than Burpsuite. I rate its pricing a nine out of ten."
"As a user and a consumer of this solution, it can be pricey for my company to support and use, even though there are many benefits. For this reason, we use the free version. In the future, as our product cycles develop and evolve at a more steady pace, we hope to invest in the licensing for this tool."
"This is open source."
"SonarQube is a cost-effective solution."
"We're using an older version because it is the open-source flavor of it and we can continue using it at no cost. We're not paying any licensing at all, which was another factor in choosing this route so that we can learn and grow with it and not be committed to licenses and other similar things. If we choose to get something else, we have to relearn, but we don't have to relicense. Basically, we're paying no license costs."
"SonarQube is an open-source product that can be used free of charge."
"I use the full trial version of SonarQube."
"I think comparing the product to competitors it should be less expensive."
"The beauty of this solution is the free open-source version is capable enough in doing pretty much what an enterprise-level version can do."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
33%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Government
4%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Manufacturing Company
15%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
8%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
15%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Government
6%
 

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 securi...
What do you like most about Coverity?
The solution has improved our code quality and security very well.
What do you like most about Micro Focus Fortify on Demand?
It helps deploy and track changes easily as per time-to-time market upgrades.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Micro Focus Fortify on Demand?
In comparison with other tools, they're competitive. It is not more expensive than other solutions, but their pricing...
What needs improvement with Micro Focus Fortify on Demand?
There are frequent complaints about false positives from Fortify. One day it may pass a scan with no issues, and the ...
Is SonarQube the best tool for static analysis?
I am not very familiar with SonarQube and their solutions, so I can not answer. But if you are asking me about which ...
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. Son...
How does Snyk compare with SonarQube?
Snyk does a great job identifying and reducing vulnerabilities. This solution is fully automated and monitors 24/7 to...
 

Also Known As

Synopsys Static Analysis
Micro Focus Fortify on Demand
Sonar
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

SAP, Mega International, Thales Alenia Space
SAP, Aaron's, British Gas, FICO, Cox Automative, Callcredit Information Group, Vital and more.
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Find out what your peers are saying about Sonar, Veracode, Checkmarx and others in Static Application Security Testing (SAST). Updated: April 2025.
850,834 professionals have used our research since 2012.