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Tenable Nessus vs Tenable Vulnerability Management comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 2, 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
Ranking in Vulnerability Management
18th
Average Rating
9.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Continuous Threat Exposure Management (CTEM) (3rd)
Tenable Nessus
Ranking in Vulnerability Management
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.0
Number of Reviews
87
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Tenable Vulnerability Manag...
Ranking in Vulnerability Management
8th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Patch Management (15th), Risk-Based Vulnerability Management (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Vulnerability Management category, the mindshare of Zafran Security is 1.1%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Tenable Nessus is 5.2%, down from 10.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Tenable Vulnerability Management is 3.4%, down from 7.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Vulnerability Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Tenable Nessus5.2%
Tenable Vulnerability Management3.4%
Zafran Security1.1%
Other90.3%
Vulnerability Management
 

Q&A Highlights

NC
Content Manager at PeerSpot
Nov 24, 2021
 

Featured Reviews

Reviewer6233 - PeerSpot reviewer
Works at a healthcare company with 10,001+ employees
Has become an indispensable tool in our cybersecurity arsenal
While Zafran Security is already a powerful tool, there are areas where it could be further improved to provide even greater value. One key area for enhancement is the searching capabilities within its vulnerabilities module. By incorporating the ability to create Boolean searches, users would gain the ability to apply more complex filters and customize their search criteria. This would greatly enhance the precision and efficiency with which security teams can identify and prioritize vulnerabilities. Having such tailored search capabilities would save time and resources by narrowing down vast lists of vulnerabilities to those that meet specific parameters relevant to our unique risk environment. Additionally, integrating more robust reporting and visualization tools would be advantageous. Enhanced dashboards that offer customizable visual representations of risk configurations and threat landscapes would facilitate better communication with stakeholders, making it easier to explain vulnerabilities and the rationale behind certain security measures. This would also aid in demonstrating the improvements and value derived from existing security investments to leadership and non-technical team members.
MohammedJaffir - PeerSpot reviewer
Founder at Cipheroot
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.
Chethan Gowda - PeerSpot reviewer
Windows Security Patching Operation III (Cyber Operations) at CBTS
Have maintained accurate vulnerability scans and gained actionable remediation insights across thousands of servers
Tenable Vulnerability Management agents are very lightweight, and the results we get are very accurate. The solutions they provide to us, assuming if one vulnerability exists, there will be a solution. The resolution they give us in wording will be the best solution. The exploit rates and the reports we get provide a lot of information, making it very easy for us to verify.The main benefit of integration with Tenable Vulnerability Management is that there will be no lack of missing vulnerabilities when it comes to the patching environment. That is one of the key aspects of why we have integrated Tenable to our patching tools. It has a vast capacity of pushing the data to our tools due to its capability and compatibility. That is also one of the reasons why we are using Tenable Vulnerability Management.

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."
"With Zafran Security, it integrates with your security controls, allowing you to take that risk score and reduce it based on the controls in place or increase the risk based on different factors, such as if the issue is internet reachable or if there's an exploit in the wild."
"Zafran has become an indispensable tool in our cybersecurity arsenal."
"We are able to see the real risk of a vulnerability on our environment with our security tools."
"We saw benefits from Zafran Security almost immediately after deploying it."
"Zafran is an excellent tool."
"The solution can scale well."
"I am impressed with the tool's vulnerability scanning."
"The best features of Tenable Nessus include its compatibility with other applications such as SIEM and other apps, allowing Tenable Nessus to work smoothly with them."
"Tenable Nessus is an absolutely stable and fantastic product."
"The scanning capabilities are most valuable when compared to Nessus."
"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 provides multiple recommendations towards the remedy of vulnerabilities."
"It is a mature tool."
"It is quite straightforward to set up."
"The most valuable feature for me is container scanning because I am interested in CICD security."
"The integration of Tenable into our security ecosystem was very good."
"The vulnerability management itself is the most valuable feature as well as references to the mitigation techniques."
"The stability is commendable, and I would rate Tenable ten out of ten."
"It helps us create remediation projects and assign the console’s responsibility to specific engineers."
"The solution can integrate with third parties and meets standard compliance."
"The initial setup is straightforward so long as your infrastructure, components, and networks are in place."
 

Cons

"The dashboarding and reporting functionality of Zafran Security is an area that definitely could use some improvements."
"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."
"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."
"There could be an integration between Tenable Nessus and other Tenable products. It will help us manage all the solutions using one dashboard."
"I would like to see more on the automation side."
"Consumes more system resources when it's running."
"The solution should be able to support more devices."
"They need more flexible pricing."
"Tenable Nessus could improve the reporting by adding some dashboards. The reports are a hassle at this time. Tenable.io has more detailed reports. Having a better dashboard that can show where the vulnerabilities are and be categorized would be helpful. We then could present them to upper management for a deep overview of our network posture which they do not see."
"The scalability of Tenable Nessus is good. However, it could be more flexible."
"Tenable Nessus could improve the reporting."
"It would be helpful if Tenable could be more clear with regard to everything the solution can and cannot do with the particular license that you have."
"The UI has room for improvement."
"Technical support from Tenable is rated six out of ten. It needs improvement in response time and addressing feature requests promptly."
"AI integration for reporting in Tenable would be beneficial."
"The solution’s pricing could be improved."
"The user interface could be improved by being able to change the user interface to fit your position or your job. The graphs are set in stone and you can only print reports."
"Tenable.io Vulnerability Management could be improved with an increased number of dashboards and MSSP integration."
"The interface could be improved; right now it's running on two interfaces simultaneously."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"Tenable Nessus is affordable."
"The price of the solution is reasonable."
"In general, it is extremely expensive."
"We pay approximately $2,500 on a yearly basis."
"Our organization is huge so our license costs $30,000."
"While Tenable Nessus is a good enterprise solution, the high price would likely make it prohibitive to smaller organizations."
"I would like to see better discounts."
"The price of Tenable Nessus is too expensive for each service center."
"There are additional features that can be licensed for an additional cost."
"Yearly payments are to be made toward the licensing cost of the product. It is neither a cheap nor an expensive product."
"The product costs us around $137,000 annually for 4000 to 5000 assets."
"The total cost we pay for this solution is over 45K. This is for a large education organization."
"A yearly payment has to be made toward the solution's licensing costs."
"Tenable charges around $40 per device."
"I would rate the pricing a five out of ten. It is in the middle."
"On a scale of one to ten, where one is low, and ten is high price, I rate the pricing an eight. So, it is a pretty expensive solution."
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Answers from the Community

NC
Content Manager at PeerSpot
Nov 24, 2021
Nov 24, 2021
Tenable Nessus is a vulnerability assessment solution that is both easy to deploy and easy to manage. The design of the program is such that if a company should desire to handle the installation themselves, they would be able to do so. The updates that the program requires to keep up-to-date take up a large portion of the setup time. Tenable Nessus can be deployed in under an hour. The speed o...
See 2 answers
DG
Tech blogger
Nov 7, 2021
Tenable Nessus is a vulnerability assessment solution that is both easy to deploy and easy to manage. The design of the program is such that if a company should desire to handle the installation themselves, they would be able to do so. The updates that the program requires to keep up-to-date take up a large portion of the setup time. Tenable Nessus can be deployed in under an hour. The speed of an organization’s internet can impact how quickly the deployment will go. Furthermore, once it has been set up, only a small management team is necessary for maintenance. Tenable Nessus is an incredibly important program that provides businesses and organizations with robust protection. This ease of deployment and management gives it an edge over the competition. Tenable.io Vulnerability Management is basically comparable to Tenable Nessus in regards to setup and management. It is relatively straightforward to set up. A single person could deploy it in a non-business setting in a matter of hours. The setup can be handled without requiring a business to rely on the help of outside consultants. As with Tenable Nessus, a small team of two or three people is all that is necessary to manage the solution. Organizations can save a great deal of time and resources by choosing to utilize this solution. Tenable Nessus is a solution with good scalability. This can be accomplished with relative ease. However, the load that it can handle makes it a poor fit for larger organizations. At a certain point, the farther up you scale it, the more the solution quality diminishes. Tenable.io Vulnerability Management is able to offer a much higher level of scalability. It is typically used without trouble by organizations with many thousands of users. As with Tenable Nessus, the process is relatively simple. Conclusion: The actual difference in time and ease as far as deploying Tenable Nessus versus Tenable.io Vulnerability Management is negligible and cannot truly set one apart from the other. Ease of management is another area where these two solutions are very similar. A major difference between them is their scalability. While both can be scaled relatively easily, Tenable.io Vulnerability Management is able to handle a higher level of scalability, with the diminishment of quality being a far lesser concern than is the case with Tenable Nessus.
Jairo Willian Pereira - PeerSpot reviewer
Information Security Manager at a retailer with 10,001+ employees
Nov 24, 2021
Both, but I prefer Nessus Pro (costs and you can define out-of-band your better presentation/xLAP platform). Tenable.io has its facilities and extra plugins/views/analytics, but nothing that can't be externally performed by another ETL/presentation tool (for a fraction of cost, sometimes using free toolings like Pentaho, OpenRefine, OBIEE and others).
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
6%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business39
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise35
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise21
 

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'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 needs improvement with Tenable.io Vulnerability Management?
Tenable Vulnerability Management is not very effective for real-time risk prioritization for our organization's secur...
What advice do you have for others considering Tenable.io Vulnerability Management?
We use Tenable Vulnerability Management and are currently using its latest version.I rate Tenable Vulnerability Manag...
 

Also Known As

No data available
No data available
Tenable.io
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Bitbrains, Tesla, Just Eat, Crosskey Banking Solutions, Covenant Health, Youngstown State University
Global Payments AU/NZ
Find out what your peers are saying about Tenable Nessus vs. Tenable Vulnerability Management and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
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