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Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs Xops 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

Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Ranking in Compliance Management
5th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
79
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (7th), Container Management (9th), Container Security (7th), Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (1st), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (4th), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (4th), Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (4th), Microsoft Security Suite (8th), Cloud Detection and Response (CDR) (2nd)
Xops
Ranking in Compliance Management
11th
Average Rating
9.0
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Cost Management (19th)
 

Featured Reviews

Vibhor Goel - PeerSpot reviewer
A single tool for complete visibility and addressing security gaps
Currently, issues are structured in Microsoft Defender for Cloud at severity levels of high, critical, or warning, but these severity levels are not always right. For example, Microsoft might consider a port being open as critical, but that might not be the case for our company. Similarly, it might suggest closing some management ports, but you might need them to be able to log in, so the severity levels for certain things can be improved. Even though Microsoft Defender for Cloud provides a way to temporarily disable certain alerts or notifications without affecting our security score, it would be better to have more granularized control over these recommendations. Currently, we cannot even disable certain alerts or notifications. There should be an automated mechanism to design Azure policies based on the recommendations, possibly with AI integration. Instead of an engineer having to write a policy to fix security gaps, which is very time-consuming, there should be an inbuilt capability to auto-remediate everything and have proper control in place. Additionally, enabling Defender for Cloud at the resource group level, rather than only at the subscription level, would be beneficial.
SS
User interface needs refinement while providing robust security and cost management
Xops helps me with cloud finance management by allowing me to monitor my spending, and just a couple of months ago, I noticed that my AWS bill, which usually hovers around 50k monthly, spiked unexpectedly. I received an alert on the dashboard and via email about a sudden increase in usage, enabling me to rectify the actual problem and bring things back to normal. The best features of Xops, in my experience, include the FinOps component for checking unnecessary spending trends, the cloud security features, and the cybersecurity and workload security features that allow me to frequently check for vulnerabilities on images and websites. The cloud security feature of Xops stands out to me because it helps maintain compliance status by providing multiple compliance checks, including ISO and CIS benchmarks, and it is not limited to AWS, as it also includes Azure cloud scans and O365 cloud scans, allowing me to monitor security across various platforms. Other useful features of Xops include asset management tools and automation scripts, which help me check what assets I have across all regions, giving me a global view whenever I need it. Xops has positively impacted my organization by enabling me to save money and proactively detect issues, especially related to cloud spending, while also improving my routine security checks for any misconfigurations. While some metrics are difficult to quantify, I regularly run scans to catch security vulnerabilities that may arise due to changing user settings.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is up-to-date with the latest updates and identified threats."
"I would rate Microsoft Defender for Cloud a nine out of 10."
"Microsoft Defender for Cloud has definitely helped us manage and secure our multi-cloud environment by providing ease of use."
"It helps you to identify the gaps in your solution and remediate them. It produces a compliance checklist against known standards such as ISO 27001, HIPAA, iTrust, etc."
"The technical support is very good."
"Microsoft Defender for Cloud can find potential phishing links and malicious code in data at rest."
"It has seamless integration with any of the services I mentioned, on Azure, such as IaaS platforms, virtual machines, applications, or databases, because it's an in-house product from Microsoft within the Azure ecosystem."
"This is a platform as a service provided by Azure. We don't need to install or maintain Azure Security Center. It is a ready-made service available in Azure. This is one of the main things that we like. If you look at similar tools, we have to install, maintain, and update services. Whereas, Azure Security Center manages what we are using. This is a good feature that has helped us a lot."
"The most valuable aspects of the solution include the Cloud FinOps Dashboards and the vulnerability scans."
"The automated compliance monitoring reduced our manual security audits by 60%, allowing our team to focus on strategic initiatives rather than repetitive checks."
 

Cons

"Microsoft Graph needs improvement."
"I recommend that they extend the scope for legacy infra assets."
"Support needs to be highly responsive, especially in large enterprise environments."
"The initial setup is not actually so complex but it feels complex because there are many add-ons. There are many options and my team needs to be aware of all of these changes happening on the backend which is a distraction."
"Microsoft Defender could be more centralized. For example, I still need to go to another console to do policy management."
"Defender could improve how data is represented. It can be unstructured or slow to load."
"The product was a bit complex to set up earlier, however, it is a bit streamlined now."
"I would suggest building a single product that addresses endpoint server protection, attack surface, and everything else in one solution. That is the main disadvantage with the product. If we are incorporating some features, we end up in a situation where this solution is for the server, and that one is for the client, or this is for identity, and that is for our application. They're not bundling it. Commercially, we can charge for different licenses, but on the implementation side, it's tough to help our end-customer understand which product they're getting."
"While Xops delivers on core functionality, the platform could benefit from more mature AI models for anomaly detection."
"I do not have notes for improvements."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Pricing is difficult because each license has its own metrics and cost."
"The cost of the license is based on the subscriptions that you have."
"The price of the solution is good for the features we receive and there is an additional cost for Microsoft premier support. However, some of my potential customers have found it to be expensive and have gone on to choose another solution."
"There is a helpful cost-reducing option that allows you to integrate production subscriptions with non-production subscriptions."
"They have a free version, but the license for this one isn't too high. It's free to start with, and you're charged for using it beyond 30 days. Some other pieces of Defender are charged based on usage, so you will be charged more for a high volume of transactions. I believe Defender for Cloud is a daily charge based on Azure's App Service Pricing."
"I rate Microsoft Defender a three out of ten for affordability. The price could be a little lower."
"The licensing cost per server is $15 per month."
"This solution is more cost-effective than some competing products. My understanding is that it is based on the number of integrations that you have, so if you have fewer subscriptions then you pay less for the service."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise45
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

How is Prisma Cloud vs Azure Security Center for security?
Azure Security Center is very easy to use, integrates well, and gives very good visibility on what is happening across your ecosystem. It also has great remote workforce capabilities and supports a...
What do you like most about Microsoft Defender for Cloud?
The entire Defender Suite is tightly coupled, integrated, and collaborative.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Xops?
I recommend ensuring you fully understand the pricing tiers and the features included at each level. You should evaluate it based on your actual cloud usage and security needs. X-Ops offers strong ...
What needs improvement with Xops?
I would like to see built-in anomaly detection for trading patterns using machine learning. It would also be helpful to have customizable dashboards for each business unit. Native support for cross...
What is your primary use case for Xops?
I use X-Ops to monitor and optimize AWS infrastructure costs for our trading workloads. It helps me ensure continuous security compliance and real-time threat detection. Additionally, I automate de...
 

Also Known As

Microsoft Azure Security Center, Azure Security Center, Microsoft ASC, Azure Defender
No data available
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Defender for Cloud is trusted by companies such as ASOS, Vatenfall, SWC Technology Partners, and more.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs. Xops and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
869,202 professionals have used our research since 2012.