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OWASP Zap vs SonarQube comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 2025

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
41
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 January 2026, in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category, the mindshare of OWASP Zap is 3.9%, down from 4.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SonarQube is 18.8%, down from 26.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Static Application Security Testing (SAST) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
SonarQube18.8%
OWASP Zap3.9%
Other77.3%
Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
 

Featured Reviews

Prasant Pokarnaa - PeerSpot reviewer
Delivery Head - DevOps at Datamato Technologies
Effective vulnerability identification enhances security scans but AI-driven enhancements are needed
OWASP is only meant for two or three different types of scans. It is a tool which will scan the code for security for vulnerabilities We were able to convince the customers to really remove those rules when GitLab was able to show the results. Customers should be aware that GitLab is not just a…
KH
Sr Software Engineering Supervisor at Mozarc Medical
Gains control over rule customization and achieves reliable vulnerability assessment
The deployment process took me about 2 or 3 hours to deploy SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube), although I do not remember exactly since it was done about 2 years back. Currently, about 10 of my developers are using SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) in my company. I do not have plans to increase the usage of SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) in the future as there will not be any requirement to increase. I am a senior software engineer and supervisor at Mozark Medical. My corporate email address is karthik.k.a.r.t.h.i.k.h.a.r.p.a.n.h.a.l.l.i@mozarkmedical.com. Overall, I would rate SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) as a 9 out of 10.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution has tightened our security."
"The most valuable feature is scanning the URL to drill down all the different sites."
"We use the solution for security testing."
"The community edition updates services regularly. They add new vulnerabilities into the scanning list."
"The reporting is quite intuitive, which gives you a clear indication of what kind of vulnerability you have that you can drill down on to gather more information."
"The ZAP scan and code crawler are valuable features."
"The stability of the solution is very good."
"It can be used effectively for internal auditing."
"SonarQube is useful for controlling all of our Azure task tracking and scanning."
"Its dashboard provides a unified view of various code quality metrics, including code duplication, unit test coverage, and security hotspots."
"The integrations SonarQube provides with our software delivery pipeline are very seamless."
"The software quality gate streamlines the product's quality."
"When we push our code to the repo, while in continuous integration, it will run a few tests and based on the vulnerability data set it has, it can track the vulnerabilities, indicate the code line where the issue exists, and show how much code is covered by all the unit tests, integration tests, and those sorts of things."
"The features of SonarQube that I find most valuable for identifying code smells are its comprehensive code analysis capabilities, which cover various aspects of code sustainability."
"It is the best product we use for easy integration into YAML pipelines for scanning."
"SonarQube is a fantastic tool which saves us precious time."
 

Cons

"If there was an easier to understand exactly what has been checked and what has not been checked, it would make this solution better. We have to trust that it has checked all known vulnerabilities but it's a bit hard to see after the scanning."
"There are areas for improvement with OWASP Zap, particularly in the alignment of vulnerabilities concerning CVSS scores."
"The solution is somewhat unreliable because after we get the finding, we have to manually verify each of its findings to see whether it's a false positive or a true finding, and it takes time."
"There isn't too much information about it online."
"The forced browse has been incorporated into the program and it is resource-intensive."
"Lacks resources where users can internally access a learning module from the tool."
"The documentation is lacking and out-of-date, it really needs more love."
"Too many false positives; test reports could be improved."
"If you don't have any experience with the configuration or how to configure the files, it can be complicated."
"It would be a great add-on if SonarQube could update its database for vulnerabilities or plugging parts."
"I see a problem with SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) because the vulnerability assessment is continuous; if I fix some vulnerabilities today, they reappear in the next scan, and there will be completely different issues that need to be fixed."
"I don't believe you can have metrics of code quality based upon code analysis. I don't think it's possible for a computer to do it."
"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."
"There are sometimes security breaches in our code, which aren't be caught by SonarQube. In the security area, SonarCube has to improve. It needs to better compete with other products."
"In the next release, I would like to have notifications because now, it is a bit difficult. I think that's a feature which we could add there and it would benefit the users as well. For every full request, they should be able to see their bugs or vulnerability directly on the surface."
"The tool needs to be more compatible with C/C++ language"
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is open source, and we can scan freely."
"As Zap is free and open-source, with tons of features similar to those of commercial solutions, I would definitely recommend trying it out."
"The solution’s pricing is high."
"OWASP Zap is free to use."
"The tool is open source."
"This solution is open source and free."
"We have used the freeware version. I believe Zap only has freeware."
"The tool is open-source."
"We are using the Community edition of SonarQube."
"The licence is standard open source licensing"
"The free version of SonarQube does everything that we need it to."
"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."
"The developer edition is based on cost per lines of code."
"I rate the pricing a five out of ten."
"There are many different packages with different pricing options available. We are able to try what we have and if we need extra features we can upgrade the license."
"SonarQube is a fairly affordable solution for a larger scale if you have a specific role or specific department for secure code."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
14%
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise21
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business41
Midsize Enterprise24
Large Enterprise79
 

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 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...
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.
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...
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...
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...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Sonar, SonarQube Cloud
 

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
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about OWASP Zap vs. SonarQube and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,986 professionals have used our research since 2012.