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Rapid7 InsightVM vs Tenable Nessus comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 27, 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

Zafran Security
Sponsored
Average Rating
9.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (17th), Continuous Threat Exposure Management (CTEM) (1st)
Rapid7 InsightVM
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
64
Ranking in other categories
Risk-Based Vulnerability Management (4th)
Tenable Nessus
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.0
Number of Reviews
87
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

Risk-Based Vulnerability Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Rapid7 InsightVM13.8%
Qualys VMDR16.1%
Microsoft Defender Vulnerability Management9.7%
Other60.4%
Risk-Based Vulnerability Management
Vulnerability Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Tenable Nessus7.3%
Wiz10.5%
Qualys VMDR6.4%
Other75.8%
Vulnerability Management
 

Featured Reviews

Israel Cavazos Landini - PeerSpot reviewer
Weekly insights and risk analysis facilitate informed security decisions
I appreciate the weekly insights Zafran provides, which include critical topics for networks and IT security, allowing us to evaluate which insights apply to our environment. The organization score feature is valuable to keep the leadership team updated on how our infrastructure fares security-wise. The applicable risk level versus base risk level feature is beneficial because prior to Zafran, we only used the base risk level, but now understand that risk depends on the asset itself. Zafran is an excellent tool.
Anusha Sadasivani - PeerSpot reviewer
Rapid deployment and user-friendly architecture streamline vulnerability management but customer support response needs improvement
We are still using Rapid7 InsightVM I personally still use Rapid7 InsightVM. We use Rapid7 InsightVM for vulnerability scanning. It supports both agent-based and agentless scanning, which is part of our vulnerability management strategy. The agentless scan in Rapid7 InsightVM is effective and…
MohammedJaffir - PeerSpot reviewer
Has enabled me to reduce false positives and perform deep credential auditing with seamless integrations
I mostly use the configuration audit feature for the audit configuration as a scan policy, and I will use it for credential audit, which helps me scan credentials access such as local administrator or root access, performing a deeper and more accurate check of local configuration settings and file systems, making it a highly recommended feature. Regarding integration capabilities, we can integrate Tenable Nessus with SIM tools such as Splunk, IBM QRadar, and Azure Sentinel, as well as with ticketing systems such as ServiceNow, Jira, and Slack. There is no complexity as it is very easy to integrate everything. In terms of the reporting feature, while vulnerability scanning can throw some false positives, Tenable Nessus has very few, achieving a reduction of 75% to 80% false positives with manual analysis needed. We can generate standard Nessus reports that typically include host summaries and vulnerabilities by host and plugin, alongside solutions and remediation recommendations. The main benefits I get from Tenable Nessus are complete asset inventory and comprehensive attack surface management, allowing us to prioritize vulnerabilities based on risk, focusing on true risk and threat path analysis.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Overall, we have seen about eighty-seven percent reduction of the number of vulnerabilities that require urgency to remediate, specifically the number of criticals."
"We saw benefits from Zafran Security almost immediately after deploying it."
"Zafran is an excellent tool."
"We are able to see the real risk of a vulnerability on our environment with our security tools."
"Zafran has become an indispensable tool in our cybersecurity arsenal."
"The solution is very user friendly and easy to manage."
"Rapid7 InsightVM has given us a practical view of the vulnerabilities present in our organization."
"Customers are generally satisfied and do not ask for drastic price reductions during renewals."
"There are many integrations with things like the VMware NSX that are great, the reporting is really solid."
"The most important aspect of the solution is that it rarely gives false positives, especially compared to other products. It provides very clear reports for our IT teams to look at."
"The most valuable feature is the vulnerability scan."
"The most valuable features of Rapid7 InsightVM are the accurate level of scanning and the workflows are good."
"This solution's most useful feature is that it is entirely a single-page application."
"Tenable Nessus has a good performance, is very user-friendly, and is easy to use."
"Security is the key number because it can start to scan with a few clicks instead of credits, which is a bit complicated. So simplicity is the first advantage. Then the generated reports are well done and easy to present to management. The quality of the scan is quite good in detecting the severity. The solution has simplicity. Also, it has frequent updates so that is also a valuable feature."
"It gives you an unlimited IP scan."
"The main benefits I get from Tenable Nessus are complete asset inventory and comprehensive attack surface management, allowing us to prioritize vulnerabilities based on risk, focusing on true risk and threat path analysis."
"I like the fact that it was not expensive. I like that it's user-friendly."
"The solution is great for scanning servers."
"Tenable Nessus streamlines the process of scanning for our organization."
"My favorite part about Nessus is that you can customize the tool to scan exactly what you want. Microsoft releases new patches monthly on Patch Tuesday, and a lot of companies track that date. I set up Nessus for the day after Patch Tuesday to see which devices have already pushed those updates from Microsoft, so we can stay updated."
 

Cons

"The dashboarding and reporting functionality of Zafran Security is an area that definitely could use some improvements."
"I think the ability to have some enhanced reporting capabilities is something they can improve on, as they have good reports but we have asked for some specific reporting enhancements."
"Initially, we were somewhat concerned about the scalability of Zafran due to our large asset count and the substantial amount of information we needed to process."
"The authentication scan is not working."
"They should integrate the solution with multiple products."
"The product does not have the capability to do dynamic scanning of non-web applications."
"I would like to see more integration."
"Their customer support should be improved, and the effectiveness of scans also needs to be improved."
"The product's documentation could be enhanced with clearer and more detailed instructions."
"Rapid7 InsightVM, has impressive capabilities, especially when it comes to managing video equipment. However, we've noticed that Rapid7 also offers a cloud solution called CloudSec, and we don't have that. We think it would be better if InsightVM had all the features for both on-premise and cloud management."
"Rapid7 InsightVM is expensive, possibly one of the highest in pricing among similar products."
"The reporting feature needs to be improved."
"Tenable Nessus is very costly compared to OpenVAS and sits on the higher side."
"In terms of what could be improved, I would say its reporting portion."
"Sometimes, the categorization for clients was tricky at first, however, they eventually got used to it."
"There is room, overall, for improvement in the way it groups the workstations and the way it detects, when the vulnerability is scanned. Even when we would run a new scan, if it was an already existing vulnerability, it wouldn't put a new date on it."
"It wasn't very clear how the scripts are running the scans. There's information about the script but it's not straightforward. The script information for each of the plugins should be available, but it doesn't give us straightforward direct information about how it was executed. That needs to be more clear."
"Tenable Nessus could improve the price."
"The reporting could be improved. The reporting in Rapid7 is much better."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"We purchase annual licenses."
"I do not have experience with the pricing of the solution."
"Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."
"The licensing is asset-based and very straightforward."
"The price of the solution is less than the competitors."
"The product is cheaper than the other similar tools available in the market."
"The tool's price is neither too high nor too low. My company needs to pay 65,000 per year. There are no additional costs apart from the licensing fees attached to the solution."
"The license is IP based. How many IPs you are using to scan is the amount of the license you have to buy. The number of users doesn't matter; many users can use it or only person. It depends on the culture of the organization."
"The newer tools are quite pricey. There is a case of some fine tuning that can be done in terms of licensing. The IP based licensing that is offered makes the tool very expensive. If they want the IT industry to adopt it, the price should be looked at."
"The cost is around $4,300 per year. Use is unlimited. You don't pay more if you want to use it for another IP."
"In general, it is extremely expensive."
"We have a subscription, the licensing fees are paid yearly, and I am using the latest version."
"The solution has a single price for unlimited assets."
"Nessus Manager is not an expensive product. It has its limitations, but the pricing reflects that. We have a yearly subscription."
"This solution is affordable."
"I rate the product's price seven or eight on a scale of one to ten, where one is low price and ten is high price."
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Answers from the Community

NC
Nov 8, 2021
Nov 8, 2021
You have full visibility across cloud, network, virtual, and containerized infrastructures with Rapid7 Insight VM. You can easily prioritize vulnerabilities using attacker analytics. Overall, Rapid7 Insight VM is easy to understand, use, and deploy. This solution supplies many different types of valuable reporting and rarely reports false positives. Rapid7 can easily detect new devices and scan...
See 2 answers
MI
Sep 6, 2021
InsightVM - better functions on granting users different access to different asset groups.  It fits better for our company and is slightly cheaper.
Nov 8, 2021
You have full visibility across cloud, network, virtual, and containerized infrastructures with Rapid7 Insight VM. You can easily prioritize vulnerabilities using attacker analytics. Overall, Rapid7 Insight VM is easy to understand, use, and deploy. This solution supplies many different types of valuable reporting and rarely reports false positives. Rapid7 can easily detect new devices and scan endpoints quickly for vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, or missing patches. Rapid7 Insight VM will identify the risk and suggest how to resolve the problem. We would like to see the reporting improved to offer some of the options other solutions provide. Rapid7 Insight VM can be a very expensive solution - it is really only for larger enterprise accounts. Integration with other solutions would make Rapid7 Insight VM more desirable. It’s easy to combine local testing with network-based testing using Tenable Nessus, which can easily find vulnerabilities across different platforms and operating systems. Tenable Nessus will identify what nodes you have in place, then provide you with a report identifying each vulnerability found by node. It works quickly and stealthily, and offers clear-cut reporting and the ability to scan for specific vulnerabilities. We would like to see the reporting process with Tenable Nessus improved. Instead of only PDF reports, one option might be to track with an Excel-based structure to better track vulnerabilities and remediation efforts and build reports from there. An option to use the same license for the cloud and on-premises at the same time would be very useful. Conclusion We felt that Tenable Nessus provided better reporting of vulnerabilities per device in a clearer, easier to understand manner. It is a very easy solution to use and makes accountability for tracing and reporting vulnerabilities easy. The flexible scanning options offered by Tenable Nessus are what we found most advantageous.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
5%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
6%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business29
Midsize Enterprise13
Large Enterprise23
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business39
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise35
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zafran Security?
Since we stood Zafran Security up in our private cloud, we handle the maintenance on our side. As we opted not to use...
What needs improvement with Zafran Security?
In terms of areas for improvement, Zafran Security is doing a really great job as a new and emerging company. Oftenti...
What is your primary use case for Zafran Security?
My use cases for Zafran Security revolve around two primary areas. One is around vulnerability management and priorit...
How would you choose between Rapid7 InsightVM and Tenable Nessus?
You have full visibility across cloud, network, virtual, and containerized infrastructures with Rapid7 Insight VM. Yo...
What do you like most about Rapid7 InsightVM?
The product's initial setup phase was very easy.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Rapid7 InsightVM?
The customers are mostly SMBs, though some enterprise organizations have also deployed the solution. This is neither ...
What's the difference between Tenable Nessus and Tenable.io Vulnerability Management?
Tenable Nessus is a vulnerability assessment solution that is both easy to deploy and easy to manage. The design of ...
What do you like most about Tenable Nessus?
We have around 500 virtual machines. Therefore, we conduct monthly scans and open tickets for our developers to addre...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Tenable Nessus?
My experience with the pricing, setup cost, and licensing of Tenable Nessus is that the installation is somewhat easi...
 

Also Known As

No data available
InsightVM, NeXpose
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
ACS, Acosta, AllianceData, amazon.com, biogen idec, CBRE, CATERPILLAR, Deloitte, COACH, GameStop, IBM
Bitbrains, Tesla, Just Eat, Crosskey Banking Solutions, Covenant Health, Youngstown State University
Find out what your peers are saying about Rapid7 InsightVM vs. Tenable Nessus and other solutions. Updated: March 2023.
872,029 professionals have used our research since 2012.