GitHub Code Scanning vs SonarQube comparison

GitHub and SonarSource Sàrl are both solutions in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category. GitHub is ranked #13 with an average rating of 8.5, while SonarSource Sàrl is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.3. GitHub holds a 1.6% mindshare in SAST, compared to SonarSource Sàrl’s 20.8% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of GitHub users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 83% of SonarSource Sàrl users who would recommend it.

GitHub Code Scanning

Read 6 GitHub Code Scanning reviews

1,223 Views
1,174 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

SonarQube

Read 134 SonarQube reviews

40,284 Views
29,407 Comparison Views

83% willing to recommend

GitHub Code Scanning

SonarQube

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 2025

SonarQube and GitHub Code Scanning compete in the code analysis and vulnerability detection category. Based on data comparisons, GitHub Code Scanning often has the upper hand due to its integration capabilities and automation features.

Features: SonarQube offers static code analysis across multiple languages and provides detailed insights into code quality, maintainability, and supports customizable rules and quality gates. GitHub Code Scanning facilitates integrated security scanning within development workflows, automates security vulnerability detection, and offers easy pull request analysis with seamless GitHub repository integration.

Room for Improvement: SonarQube could enhance security scanning capabilities and ease of integration with modern CI/CD pipelines. GitHub Code Scanning may improve by expanding support for languages not actively supported by GitHub and providing more advanced code quality metrics to match SonarQube.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: SonarQube requires setting up a dedicated server, which may demand more configuration time but offers flexible deployment options. GitHub Code Scanning’s native integration within GitHub streamlines setup for teams using GitHub, with GitHub's support channels and community resources aiding service and deployment.

Pricing and ROI: SonarQube offers competitive pricing especially attractive for standalone deployments requiring extensive language support, potentially offering lower entry costs. GitHub Code Scanning, as part of GitHub’s offerings, may involve higher costs, particularly for larger teams, but its rapid value realization through integrated workflows can justify the investment.

To learn more, read our detailed GitHub Code Scanning vs. SonarQube Report (Updated: November 2025).

Buyer's Guide

GitHub Code Scanning vs. SonarQube

November 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 873,085 peers since 2012

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

GitHub Code Scanning

Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)

13th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

SonarQube

Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)

1st

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

134

Ranking in other categories

Application Security Tools (1st), Software Development Analytics (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2025, in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category, the mindshare of GitHub Code Scanning is 1.6%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SonarQube is 20.8%, down from 26.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Static Application Security Testing (SAST) Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube)	20.8%
GitHub Code Scanning	1.6%
Other	77.6%

Static Application Security Testing (SAST)

Featured Reviews

VishalSingh15

Head of Business at Variyas Labs Pvt Ltd

Traverses the entire network, scanning every system to determine which ports are open

You can use the tool locally on your system or in the cloud. I rate it a nine out of ten. It's a very good tool for people who want to start using GitHubCode Scanning, especially for software development or team collaboration. GitHubCode Scanning allows teams to collaborate by uploading files to repositories. For example, if someone is developing an application, they can host the code on GitHub Code Scanning. Other developers can then download the code for testing purposes. If bugs are found, fixes can be applied using the GitHub Code Scanningrepository, and everyone on the team can see the changes. Software developers often use GitHub Code Scanning for version control, and it's essential for CI/CD pipelines to work.

Read full review

Sthembiso Zondi

Head of Software Engineering at ronaldmariah@gmail.com

Consistent improvements in code quality and security with effective integration and reliable technical support

The features of SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) that I find most useful are the suggestions received from reviewing the code. When they review the code, they provide suggestions on how to fix it, and we find those very useful from a development perspective. We use SonarQube Server's (formerly SonarQube) centralized management and visualization of code quality metrics on the dashboard because that's the executive dashboard that we send to the executives to show where we are in terms of quality, security, and where the company can improve. We use that for organizational improvement purposes. The ability to tailor metrics tracking in SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) has been beneficial to my team. There are team-specific dashboards which are related to specific repositories they utilize, and we have that aggregative dashboard that shows the whole organization's performance. We can drill down per specific repository, which makes it easier for the team to improve specific things.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"GitHub Code Scanning has positively impacted my organization as it helps us recognize errors and avoid many later issues which may arise."

"The solution helps identify vulnerabilities by understanding how ports communicate with applications running on a system. Ports are like house numbers; to visit someone's house, you must know their number. Similarly, ports are used to communicate with applications. For example, if you want to use an HTTP web server, you must use port 80. It is the port on which the web application or your server listens for incoming requests."

"The static code analysis capability in GitHub Code Scanning is a very powerful feature, providing the ability to identify vulnerabilities and ensure code quality."

"It's very scalable, very easy to handle, and very intuitive."

"GitHub Code Spaces brings significant value with its simplicity and ease of use."

"We use GitHub Code Scanning mostly for source code management."

"All the features of the solution are quite good."

"The most valuable feature of SonarQube I have found to be the configuration that has allowed us to can make adjusts to the demands of the code review. It gives a specified classification regarding the skill, prioritization, and it is easy for me to review and make my code."

"It is a very good tool for analysis and security vulnerability checking."

"It automatically scans for code, detects vulnerabilities, and generates daily reports."

"SonarQube has a lot of value, it reviews the basic coding standards and security vulnerabilities of code that help to reduce issues."

"I find SonarQube Cloud very easy to use and simple to integrate initially."

"SonarQube is good in terms of code review and to report on basic vulnerabilities in your applications."

"It assists during the development with SonarLint and helps the developer to change his approach or rather improve his coding pattern or style. That's one advantage I've seen. Another advantage is that we can customize the rules."

More SonarQube pros

Cons

"At times it becomes very annoying as it highlights certain things which are intuitive. They require code coverage for those aspects as an extra overhead."

"GitHub Code Scanning should add more templates."

"When running code scans, GitHub Code Scanning provides recommendations for probable fixes. However, integrating a feature where developers receive real-time highlights of vulnerabilities when checking in or merging a PR would be beneficial."

"One area for improvement could be the ability to have an AI system digest the reports generated from code scanning and provide a summary. Currently, the reports can be extensive, and users may overlook details, such as outdated libraries, which could be highlighted for attention."

"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."

"I find it is light on the security side."

"The product provides false reports sometimes."

"I've been told by the developers that the solution is too limited. It's not testing enough within the containers."

"There is no automation. You need to put the code there and test. You then pull the results and put them back in the development environment. There is no integration with the development environment. We would like it to be integrated with our development environment, which is basically the CI/CD pipeline or the IDE that we have."

"The interface could be a little better and should be enhanced."

"We have tens of millions of code to be analyzed and processed. There can be some performance degradation if we are applying Sonar Link to large code or code that is complex. When the code had to be analyzed is when we ran into the main issues. There were several routines involved to solve those performance issues but this process should be improved."

"If there was an official Docker image of SonarQube that could easily integrate into the pipeline would help the user to plug in and plug out and use it directly without any custom configuration. I am not sure if this is being offered already in an update but it would be very helpful."

More SonarQube cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The minimum pricing for the tool is five dollars a month."

"GitHub Code Scanning is a moderately priced solution."

"We pay €10 per month for this solution, which is good. It provides a good value for money."

"We use the tool's community edition."

"It is very expensive. Its price should be improved."

"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."

"We are using the community version of the solution and we plan on purchasing licenses for the upgraded version soon. There is a limitation on how many lines of code can be scanned and this is why we are going to purchase a license for an increased amount."

"Previously, the pricing was 17,000 euros for five million lines analyzed. However, they now charge $15,000 per one million lines, significantly increasing the cost."

"We are using the Community edition of SonarQube."

"We use the solution free of cost."

More SonarQube pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

13%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

Transportation Company

Financial Services Firm

15%

Computer Software Company

14%

Manufacturing Company

14%

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	41
Midsize Enterprise	24
Large Enterprise	79

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about GitHub Code Scanning?

We use GitHub Code Scanning mostly for source code management.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for GitHub Code Scanning?

The organization pays for the license of GitHub Code Scanning, but specific price details are unknown.

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What needs improvement with GitHub Code Scanning?

In my opinion, areas of GitHub Code Scanning that could be improved include that a few things are not visible to us, such as where it stores data and which path. There is a separate team for that w...

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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 tools that are the best for for Static Code Analysis, I suggest you have a look...

See all answers

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...

See all answers

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...

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Comparisons

Coverity Static vs GitHub Code Scanning

Compared 24% of the time

HCL AppScan vs GitHub Code Scanning

Compared 9% of the time

Aikido Security vs GitHub Code Scanning

Compared 8% of the time

OWASP Zap vs GitHub Code Scanning

Compared 6% of the time

Checkmarx SAST vs GitHub Code Scanning

Compared 5% of the time

More GitHub Code Scanning Competitors

Checkmarx One vs SonarQube

Compared 22% of the time

Coverity Static vs SonarQube

Compared 9% of the time

GitHub Advanced Security vs SonarQube

Compared 9% of the time

Snyk vs SonarQube

Compared 7% of the time

Kiuwan vs SonarQube

Compared 1% of the time

More SonarQube Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

GitHub Code Scanning

October 2025

Download GitHub Code Scanning product report

Buyer's Guide

SonarQube

October 2025

Download SonarQube product report

Also Known As

No data available

Sonar, SonarQube Cloud

Overview

Code scanning is a feature that you use to analyze the code in a GitHub repository to find security vulnerabilities and coding errors. Any problems identified by the analysis are shown in GitHub.

GitHub

SonarQube provides comprehensive support for multi-language development, custom coding rules, and quality gates, integrated seamlessly into CI/CD pipelines. It empowers teams with clear insights through intuitive dashboards, identifying vulnerabilities, code smells, and technical debt.

SonarQube is renowned for its extensive capabilities in static code analysis, making it an invaluable tool for maintaining code quality. By fully integrating into development processes, it allows organizations to manage vulnerabilities and ensure compliance with coding standards. Its extensive community and open-source roots contribute to its accessibility, while robust dashboards facilitate code quality monitoring. Despite its strengths, feedback suggests enhancing analysis speed, better integration with DevOps tools, and refining the user interface. Users also point to the need for handling false positives effectively and expanding on AI-based features for dynamic code analysis.

What are SonarQube's main features?

Multi-language Support: Broad compatibility with diverse programming languages
Custom Coding Rules: Flexible customization of coding standards
Quality Gates: Set thresholds for maintaining coding standards
Vulnerability Identification: Detects security and performance issues
Integration with CI/CD: Streamlines quality checks in development workflows
Open Source Access: Supported by an active developer community
Technical Debt Tracking: Identifies and manages coding inefficiencies

What benefits should users expect?

Enhanced Code Quality: Improve code reliability and maintainability
Security Assurance: Identify and mitigate potential vulnerabilities
Reduced Technical Debt: Streamline the process of managing poor coding practices
Development Efficiency: Facilitates continuous integration and delivery processes
Community Support: Leverages an active network for continual improvements

In industries like finance and healthcare, SonarQube aids in obtaining regulatory compliance through rigorous code quality assessments. It is implemented to enhance cybersecurity by identifying potential vulnerabilities, while ensuring code meets the stringent standards demanded in these fields. As part of a broader development ecosystem, its integration in CI/CD pipelines ensures smooth and efficient software delivery, catering to phases from code inception to deployment, effectively supporting large-scale and critical software applications.

SonarSource Sàrl

Buyer's Guide

GitHub Code Scanning vs. SonarQube

November 2025

Free Report: GitHub Code Scanning vs. SonarQube

Find out what your peers are saying about GitHub Code Scanning vs. SonarQube and other solutions. Updated: November 2025.

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