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OWASP Zap vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 8, 2026

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)
16th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
41
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
PortSwigger Burp Suite Prof...
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
6th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
65
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (8th), Fuzz Testing Tools (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category, the mindshare of OWASP Zap is 2.7%, down from 5.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is 3.1%, up from 2.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Static Application Security Testing (SAST) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional3.1%
OWASP Zap2.7%
Other94.2%
Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
 

Featured Reviews

Amit Beniwal - PeerSpot reviewer
Project Manager at Al Hassan LLC
Simplifies vulnerability discovery and has high quality support
There are areas for improvement with OWASP Zap, particularly in the alignment of vulnerabilities concerning CVSS scores. Sometimes, a vulnerability initially categorized as high severity may be reduced to medium or low over time after security patches are applied. This alignment with the present severity score and CVSS score could be improved.
MH
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.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The application scanning feature is the most valuable feature."
"The ZAP scan and code crawler are valuable features."
"They offer free access to some other tools."
"This is a very mature tool; it is capable of facilitating the work of many security experts, and I highly recommend it for beginners and advanced users when some other tools fail to catch traffic."
"Simple and easy to learn and master."
"OWASP Zap is a good tool, one of my favorites for a long time, and I would recommend it."
"It updates repositories and libraries quickly."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a nine out of ten. I think it's stable enough. I don't see any crashes within the application, so its stability is high."
"I personally love its capability to automatically and accurately detect vulnerabilities. So, I would say it is the Burp scanner that is THE most powerful, valuable, and an awesome feature."
"The suite testing models are very good. It's very secure."
"We are mostly using it for scanning the entire website. So, we basically create a script with the entire website and then run it for different injections."
"I have found this solution has more plugins than other competitors which is a benefit. You are able to attach different plugins to the security scan to add features. For example, you can check to see if there are any payment systems that exist on a server, or username and password brute force analysis."
"One useful function is the ability to send requests to the repeater without making actual requests through the browser, allowing me to modify requests easily."
"It is useful for scanning and tracing activities."
"Their flagship feature would be the active scanner, which carries out an automated look up of any web vulnerabilities reflecting over to one of the main compliance standards, like OWASP, and provides an accurate security audit for their web applications."
"It offers very good accuracy. You can trust the results."
 

Cons

"It needs more robust reporting tools that can be in an editable form."
"Lacks resources where users can internally access a learning module from the tool."
"It would be beneficial to enhance the algorithm to provide better summaries of automatic scanning results."
"The automatic scans need improvement. The automated vulnerability assessments that the application performs needs to be simplified as well as diversified."
"There are too many false positives."
"It would be a great improvement if they could include a marketplace to add extra features to the tool."
"Sometimes, we get some false positives."
"It doesn't run on absolutely every operating system."
"BurpSuite has some issues regarding authentication with OAT tokens that need to be improved."
"I need the solution to be more user-friendly. The solution needs to be user-friendly."
"There could be an improvement in the API security testing."
"Request handling capacity, it do not handle huge chuck of requests as it freezes."
"We've faced lots of challenges, including slowing down of the tool, and a lot of error messages, sometimes because of the interface."
"The technical support team's response time is mostly delayed and should be improved."
"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 lacks sufficient stability."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool is open source."
"This solution is open source and free."
"This app is completely free and open source. So there is no question about any pricing."
"It is highly recommended as it is an open source tool."
"OWASP Zap is free to use."
"The solution’s pricing is high."
"It is open source, and we can scan freely."
"This is an open-source solution and can be used free of charge."
"There is no setup cost and the cost of licensing is affordable."
"We are using the community version, which is free."
"It has a yearly license. I am satisfied with its price."
"The pricing of the solution is cost-effective and is best suited for small and medium-sized businesses."
"We have one license. The price is very nominal."
"They should reduce the license cost a little bit. It is $400 per user, and it would be better if they could reduce the licensing fee."
"We pay a yearly licensing fee for the solution, which is neither cheap nor expensive."
"There are multiple versions available of PortSwigger Burp Suite, such as enterprise, commercial, professional, and beginners."
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Answers from the Community

reviewer1487928 - PeerSpot reviewer
Subdirector de Seguridad Informática e Infraestructura at a financial services firm with 201-500 employees
Nov 17, 2021
Nov 17, 2021
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
AK
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.
reviewer1526550 - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
10%
University
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise22
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise35
 

Questions from the Community

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 ...
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.
What needs improvement with OWASP Zap?
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 Postm...
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.
What needs improvement with PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional?
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...
What is your primary use case for PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional?
I have used the Intruder tool in PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional at least once or twice. It is used to fuzz parameters or brute force login. I think I used it once. I don't remember if it gave ...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Burp
 

Overview

 

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
Find out what your peers are saying about OWASP Zap vs. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
911,493 professionals have used our research since 2012.