OWASP Zap vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional comparison

OWASP and PortSwigger are both solutions in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category. OWASP is ranked #10 with an average rating of 8.0, while PortSwigger is ranked #7 with an average rating of 9.0. OWASP holds a 3.5% mindshare in SAST, compared to PortSwigger’s 2.1% mindshare. Additionally, 88% of OWASP users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 98% of PortSwigger users who would recommend it.

OWASP Zap

Read 41 OWASP Zap reviews

7,287 Views
6,704 Comparison Views

88% willing to recommend

PortSwigger Burp Suite Prof...

Read 65 PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional reviews

5,347 Views
3,262 Comparison Views

98% willing to recommend

OWASP Zap

PortSwigger Burp Suite Prof...

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 8, 2026

PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional and OWASP Zap are prominent competitors in web application security testing tools. Burp Suite often has the upper hand due to its extensive features and more integrated approach, while Zap stands out for its cost-free accessibility, benefiting budget-conscious users.

Features: Burp Suite Professional offers a comprehensive suite including Proxy, Repeater, and Intruder, with robust auto-scanning and vulnerability detection. It supports customizable payloads and extensions through an active community. OWASP Zap provides features like automated scanning, a unique Heads Up Display, and manual testing capabilities, thriving as an open-source platform that benefits from extensive community-backed enhancements.

Room for Improvement: Burp Suite users seek better integration options, improved reporting functionalities, and reduced false positives, particularly in REST API testing. OWASP Zap can enhance reporting templates and provide regular feature updates, along with improved documentation and integration features to bridge the gap with Burp's functionality.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Both tools primarily deploy on-premises, with Burp Suite also available in private and hybrid clouds. Burp's direct technical support is praised for its responsiveness, while Zap's community forums serve as a primary resource due to its open-source nature.

Pricing and ROI: Burp Suite Professional is recognized for its high-value features, though its licenses might be costly for smaller businesses, yet offering substantial ROI through its reliability and comprehensive capabilities. OWASP Zap, being entirely free and open-source, is invaluable for budget-restricted organizations, despite lacking some premium features found in Burp Suite.

To learn more, read our detailed OWASP Zap vs. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional Report (Updated: February 2026).

Buyer's Guide

OWASP Zap vs. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

February 2026

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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

OWASP Zap

Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)

10th

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

PortSwigger Burp Suite Prof...

Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)

7th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Security Tools (9th), Fuzz Testing Tools (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category, the mindshare of OWASP Zap is 3.5%, down from 4.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is 2.1%, up from 2.1% 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 (%)
PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional	2.1%
OWASP Zap	3.5%
Other	94.4%

Static Application Security Testing (SAST)

Featured Reviews

Nithin-K

Technical Analyst at Hexaware Technologies Limited

Open source testing tool empowers manual activities and has room to improve integration and reporting features

The improvement that has to be done for APIs focuses on manual activities where the feature exists, but it is not at the same level as what Burp Suite does with intercepting and tools such as Postman, so it needs improvement. There are limitations with authentication levels, particularly with form-based and cookie-based authentication. However, overall, we are satisfied with OWASP Zap as there are no major issues, and improving the scan engine could be beneficial. When comparing OWASP Zap and Burp Suite, the main difference besides pricing is that OWASP Zap has limitations with reporting levels and UI, which affects its reporting capabilities, whereas Burp Suite is already advancing with new AI features and scanning capabilities that OWASP Zap seems to be lacking.

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Moti Huberman

Penetration Tester & Information Security Expert at a comms service provider with 11-50 employees

Dedicated browser and repeater have improved my proxy testing and manual vulnerability checks

I'm hoping perhaps for something to make it easier, such as to define things where if a message or a response is such and such, automatically make a request that is such and such. Perhaps something like this because otherwise, nowadays we have to do it manually. Perhaps they can automate it a bit more. Perhaps they could add some automation to things, to see what we do manually, which it has the tools to do manually, and perhaps enable with a click of a button to do things automatically. I'm not too sure which, but I'm sure they can from a product management point of view, do things that we need to do two, three, or four steps manually regarding specific testing. For instance, we want to check something specific if it's this or if it's that. Perhaps to define it once and have it more automatic, perhaps.

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

"The HUD is a good feature that provides on-site testing and saves a lot of time."

"We use the solution for security testing."

"You can run it against multiple targets."

"It has evolved over the years and recently in the last year they have added, HUD (Heads Up Display)."

"ZAP is easy to use. The automated scan is a powerful feature. You can simulate attacks with various parameters. ZAP integrates well with SonarQube."

"OWASP is quite matured in identifying the vulnerabilities."

"It updates repositories and libraries quickly."

"Fuzzer and Java APIs help a lot with our custom needs."

More OWASP Zap pros

"The initial setup is simple."

"The most valuable feature is Burp Collaborator."

"The most valuable feature of PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is the dashboard. It is very informative and you can receive all the information you need in one place. It's clear, well-defined, and organized. Anybody without any cybersecurity can use it."

"You can download different plugins if you don't have them in the standard edition."

"BurpSuite helps us to identify and fix silly mistakes that are sometimes introduced by our developers in their coding."

"The automated scan is what I find most useful because a lot of customers will need it. Not every domain will be looking for complete security, they just need a stamp on the security key. For these kinds of customers, the scan works really well."

"The Spider is the most useful feature. It helps to analyze the entire web application, and it finds all the passes and offers an automated identification of security issues."

"The suite testing models are very good. It's very secure."

More PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional pros

Cons

"Deployment is somewhat complicated."

"OWASP should work on reducing false positives by using AI and ML algorithms. They should expand their capabilities for broader coverage of business logic flaws and complex issues."

"Reporting format has no output, is cluttered and very long."

"The work that it does in the limited scope is good, but the scope is very limited in terms of the scanning features. The number of things it tests or finds is limited. They need to make it a more of a mainstream tool that people can use, and they can even think about having it on a proprietary basis. They need to increase the coverage of the scan and the results that it finds. That has always been Zap's limitation. Zap is a very good tool for a beginner, but once you start moving up the ladder where you want further details and you want your scan to show more in-depth results, Zap falls short because its coverage falls short. It does not have the capacity to do more."

"They stopped their support for a short period. They've recently started to come back again. In the early days, support was much better."

"Sometimes, we get some false positives."

"The documentation is lacking and out-of-date, it really needs more love."

"The forced browse has been incorporated into the program and it is resource-intensive."

More OWASP Zap cons

"The use of system memory is an area that can be improved because it uses a lot."

"One area for improvement is the integrated browser, Chromium. Single Sign-On (SSO) methods like Microsoft authentication login sometimes fail and show errors. As a workaround, I have to use a different browser, such as Firefox, to log in and make Burp work."

"The solution doesn't offer very good scalability."

"It would be beneficial to have privileged access management as a part of Burp Suite Professional."

"Improvement should be done as per the requirements of customers."

"It would be good if the solution could give us more details about what exactly is defective."

"I would like to see the return of the spider mechanism instead of the crawling feature. Burp Suite's earlier version 1.7 had an excellent spider option, and it would be beneficial if Burp incorporated those features into the current version. The crawling techniques used in the current version are not as efficient as those used in earlier versions."

"The tool is very expensive."

More PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We have used the freeware version. I believe Zap only has freeware."

"It's free. It's good for us because we don't know what the extent of our use will be yet. It's good to start with something free and easy to use."

"The tool is open source."

"It's free and open, currently under the Apache 2 license. If ZAP does what you need it to do, selling a free solution is a very easy."

"As Zap is free and open-source, with tons of features similar to those of commercial solutions, I would definitely recommend trying it out."

"This solution is open source and free."

"This app is completely free and open source. So there is no question about any pricing."

"The solution’s pricing is high."

More OWASP Zap pricing and cost advice

"There are different licenses available that include a free version."

"We have one license. The price is very nominal."

"The solution used to be expensive. However, they have reduced the price to approximately $400.00 which is reasonable."

"There is no setup cost and the cost of licensing is affordable."

"This solution requires a license. It is expensive but you receive a lot of functionality for the price."

"PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is an expensive solution."

"The solution is reasonably priced."

"The cost is approximately $500 for a single license, and there are no additional costs beyond the standard licensing fees."

More PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional pricing and cost advice

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Answers from the Community

reviewer1487928

Subdirector de Seguridad Informática e Infraestructura at a financial services firm with 201-500 employees

Nov 17, 2021

Is OWASP Zap better than PortSwigger Burp Suite Pro?

OWASP Zap and PortSwigger Burp Suite Pro have many similar features. OWASP Zap has web application scanning available with basic security vulnerabilities while Burp Suite Pro has it available with quality security vulnerabilities. Both are very comparable in terms of intercepting features, fuzzing capabilities, and encoder and decoders. Both OWASP Zap and PortSwigger Burp Suite Pro have a spide...

2 out of 3 answers

Avinash-Kumar

MCE at CGI

Mar 15, 2021

First things first both are having their own merits, however in my personal experience ZAP can replace your burpsuite for sure considering the License. Also as the latest ZAP versions are covering more advanced techniques and spidering patterns with lots of options in it, it is worth considering ZAP. However remember that burpsuite from latest versions with inbuilt chromium and it's emerging plugin support (Installable jars) you can use burp to the fullest and you can keep it as a swiss knife for your web and app pentesting. Couple of extensions in burp pro are interesting especially the race condition one. I always prefer using Burp and at instances I go with ZAP.

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reviewer1526550

Lead Security Architect at a comms service provider with 1,001-5,000 employees

Mar 17, 2021

Yes OWASP ZAP is a good option as it's an open source so always preferred but Burp Suite Pro will give you more options, its one of the best tool to have for pentesters so defo worth it.

Read full answer

See all 3 answers

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

12%

University

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Government

11%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Computer Software Company

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	11
Midsize Enterprise	11
Large Enterprise	21

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	17
Midsize Enterprise	14
Large Enterprise	35

Questions from the Community

Is OWASP Zap better than PortSwigger Burp Suite Pro?

See all answers

What do you like most about OWASP Zap?

The best feature is the Zap HUD (Heads Up Display) because the customers can use the website normally. If we scan websites with automatic scanning, and the website has a web application firewall, i...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for OWASP Zap?

OWASP might be cost-effective, however, people prefer to use the free edition available as open source.

See all answers

What do you like most about PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional?

The solution helped us discover vulnerabilities in our applications.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional?

The cost of PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is reasonable at approximately $500 per year per user.

See all answers

What needs improvement with PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional?

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 15% of the time

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Compared 14% of the time

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Compared 8% of the time

Veracode vs OWASP Zap

Compared 8% of the time

Qualys Web Application Scanning vs OWASP Zap

Compared 7% of the time

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Compared 12% of the time

Acunetix vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

Compared 8% of the time

SonarQube vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

Compared 6% of the time

HCL AppScan vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

Compared 5% of the time

Software Risk Manager ASPM vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

Compared 4% of the time

More PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

OWASP Zap

February 2026

Download OWASP Zap product report

Buyer's Guide

PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

February 2026

PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional report

Download PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional product report

Also Known As

No data available

Burp

Overview

OWASP Zap is a free and open-source web application security scanner.

The solution helps developers identify vulnerabilities in their web applications by actively scanning for common security issues.

With its user-friendly interface and powerful features, Zap is a popular choice among developers for ensuring the security of their web applications.

OWASP

Burp Suite Professional, by PortSwigger, is the world’s leading toolkit for web security testing. Over 52,000 users worldwide, across all industries and organization sizes, trust Burp Suite Professional to find more vulnerabilities, faster. With expertly-engineered manual and automated tooling, you're able to test smarter - not harder.

PortSwigger is the web security company that is enabling the world to secure the web. Over 50,000 security engineers rely on our software and expertise to secure their world.

PortSwigger

Sample Customers

1. Google 2. Microsoft 3. IBM 4. Amazon 5. Facebook 6. Twitter 7. LinkedIn 8. Netflix 9. Adobe 10. PayPal 11. Salesforce 12. Cisco 13. Oracle 14. Intel 15. HP 16. Dell 17. VMware 18. Symantec 19. McAfee 20. Citrix 21. Red Hat 22. Juniper Networks 23. SAP 24. Accenture 25. Deloitte 26. Ernst & Young 27. PwC 28. KPMG 29. Capgemini 30. Infosys 31. Wipro 32. TCS

Google, Amazon, NASA, FedEx, P&G, Salesforce

Buyer's Guide

OWASP Zap vs. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

February 2026

Free Report: OWASP Zap vs. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

Find out what your peers are saying about OWASP Zap vs. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional and other solutions. Updated: February 2026.

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