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Acunetix vs Fortify on Demand comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 8, 2024

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

Acunetix
Ranking in Application Security Tools
17th
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
14th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
32
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (23rd), DevSecOps (6th)
Fortify on Demand
Ranking in Application Security Tools
15th
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
12th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
60
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Application Security Tools category, the mindshare of Acunetix is 2.7%, up from 2.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortify on Demand is 4.5%, down from 4.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Security Tools
 

Featured Reviews

AnubhavGoswami - PeerSpot reviewer
Attractive automated reports with boost user productivity and an easy setup
The primary use is mainly related to vulnerability assessment, including both public and internal IP addresses By using this tool, we have reduced the workload and increased the productivity of users. It generates automated reports. This feature is beneficial when sharing reports with clients as…
Jonathan Steyn - PeerSpot reviewer
Source code analyzer, FPR file generation, reduction of false positives and generates compliance reports, for in-depth analysis
Not challenges with the product itself. The product is very reliable. It does have a steep learning curve. But, again, one thing that Fortify or OpenText does very well is training. There are a lot of free resources and training in the community forums, free training as well as commercial training where users can train on how to use the back-end systems and the scanning engines and how to use command-line arguments because some of the procedures or some of the tools do require a bit of a learning curve. That's the only challenge I've really seen for customers because you have to learn how to use the tool effectively. But Fortify has, in fact, improved its user interface and the way users engage the dashboards and the interfaces. It is intuitive. It's easy to understand. But in some regards, the cybersecurity specialist or AppSec would need a bit of training to engage the user interface and to understand how it functions. But from the point of the reliability index and how powerful the tool is, there's no challenge there. But it's just from a learning perspective; users might need a bit more skill to use the tool. The user interface isn't that tedious. It's not that difficult to understand. When I initially learned how to use the interfaces, I was able to master it within a week and was able to use it quite effectively. So training is required. All skills are needed to learn how to use the tool. I would like to see more enhancements in the dashboards. Dashboards are available. They do need some configuration and settings. But I would like to see more business intelligence capabilities within the tool. It's not particularly a cybersecurity function, but, for instance, business impact analysis or other features where you can actually use business intelligence capabilities within your security tool. That would be remarkable because not only do you have a cybersecurity tool, but you also have a tool that can give you business impact analysis and some other measurements. A bit more intelligence in terms of that from a cybersecurity perspective would be remarkable.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The scalability is good. The scalability is more than good because it can operate both as a standalone and it can be integrated as part of applications. So that really makes it a very, very versatile solution to have."
"The most important feature is that it's a web-based graphical user interface. That is a great addition. Also, the ability to schedule scans is great."
"It generates automated reports."
"Their technical support has been very active. If I have an issue, I can reach out to them and get an answer pretty quick."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is the speed at which it can scan multiple domains in just a few hours."
"The solution is highly stable."
"It comes equipped with an internal applicator, which automatically identifies and addresses vulnerabilities within the program."
"We are able to create a report which shows the PCI DSS scoring and share it with the application teams. Then, they can correlate and see exactly what they need to fix, and why."
"The quality of application security testing reduces risk and gives very few false positives."
"It improves future security scans."
"It is an extremely robust, scalable, and stable solution."
"Being able to reduce risk overall is a very valuable feature for us."
"I use the solution in my company for security code scans."
"It has saved us a lot of time as we focus primarily on programming rather than tool operational work."
"We have the option to test applications with or without credentials."
"The feature that I find the most useful is being able to just see the vulnerabilities online while checking the code and then checking suggestions for fixing them."
 

Cons

"There are some versions of the solution that are not as stable as others."
"There was an issue related to updates from the internet."
"Integration into other tools is very limited for Acunetix. While we're trying to incorporate a CI/CD process where we're integrating with JIRA and we're integrating with Jenkins and Chef, it becomes problematic. Other tools give you a high integration capability to connect into different solutions that you may already have, like JIRA."
"Tools that would allow us to work more efficiently with the mobile environment, with Android and iOS."
"There's a clear need for a reduction in pricing to make the service more accessible."
"The solution can be improved by adding the ability to scan subdomains automatically, and by providing reports that can be exported to external databases to share with other solutions."
"It should be easier to recreate something manually, with the manual tool, because Acunetix is an automatic tool. If it finds something, it should be easier to manually replicate it. Sometimes you don't get the raw data from the input and output, so that could be improved."
"Currently only supports web scanning."
"It does scanning for all virtual machines and other things, but it doesn't do the scanning for containers. It currently lacks the ability to do the scanning on containers. We're asking their product management team to expand this capability to containers."
"It natively supports only a few languages. They can include support for more native languages. The response time from the support team can also be improved. They can maybe include video tutorials explaining the remediation process. The remediation process is sometimes not that clear. It would be helpful to have videos. Sometimes, the solution that the tool gives in the GUI is not straightforward to understand for the developer. At present, for any such issues, you have to create a ticket for the support team and request help from the support team."
"The technical support is actually a problem that needs to be addressed. Since the acquisition and merger with Hewlett Packard, it has been really hard to know who the technical or salesperson to talk to."
"In terms of communication, they can integrate a few more third-party tools. It would be great if we can have more options for microservice communication. They can also improve the securability a bit more because security is one of the biggest aspects these days when you are using the cloud. Some more security features would be really helpful."
"They have very good support, but there is always room for improvement."
"Temenos's (T-24) info basic is a separate programming interface, and such proprietary platforms and programming interfaces were not easily supported by the out-of-the-box versions of Fortify."
"There are frequent complaints about false positives from Fortify. One day it may pass a scan with no issues, and the next day, without any code changes, it will report vulnerabilities such as password exposure."
"Takes up a lot of resources which can slow things down."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"All things considered, I think it has a good price/value ratio."
"I would say that Acunetix is expensive because there are products on the market with similar features that are equally or better-priced."
"The solution is expensive."
"It is a bit expensive. If you need to check five applications, you have to pay almost 14,000. It is an agreement for two years at 7,000 per year for only five applications. You cannot change the applications in the license. So, you are stuck with the same license for the five applications for one full year."
"When compared with other products, the pricing is a little bit high. But it gives value for the price. It serves the purpose and is worthwhile for the price we pay."
"When we looked at all other vendors and what they were asking for, to provide a third of what Acunetix was capable of doing, it was an easy decision... But now that it's coming to a cost where it's line with market value, it becomes more of a competition... Acunetix is raising the cost of licensing. It's 3.5 times what we were initially quoted."
"The pricing is a little high, and moreover, it's kind of domain-based."
"The costs aren't very expensive. It costs around $3000 or $4000."
"It's a yearly contract, but I don't remember the dollar amount."
"It is cost-effective."
"The licensing was good because the licenses have the heavy centralized server."
"The pricing model it's based on how many applications you wish to scan."
"We are still using the trial version at this point but I can already see from the trial version alone that it is a good product. For others, I would say that Fortify on Demand might look expensive at the beginning, but it is very powerful and so you shouldn't be put off by the price."
"Fortify on Demand is moderately priced, but its pricing could be more flexible."
"It is quite expensive. Pricing and the licensing model could be improved."
"The price is fair compared to that of other solutions."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Manufacturing Company
15%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Acunetix Vulnerability Scanner?
The tool's most valuable feature is scan configurations. We use it for external physical applications. The scanning time depends on the application's code.
What is your primary use case for Acunetix Vulnerability Scanner?
I typically use Acunetix ( /products/acunetix-reviews ) to identify vulnerabilities for clients.
What advice do you have for others considering Acunetix Vulnerability Scanner?
I would recommend Acunetix to others. Overall, I rate this solution seven out of ten.
What do you like most about Micro Focus Fortify on Demand?
It helps deploy and track changes easily as per time-to-time market upgrades.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Micro Focus Fortify on Demand?
In comparison with other tools, they're competitive. It is not more expensive than other solutions, but their pricing is competitive. The licenses for Fortify On Demand are generally bought in unit...
What needs improvement with Micro Focus Fortify on Demand?
There are frequent complaints about false positives from Fortify. One day it may pass a scan with no issues, and the next day, without any code changes, it will report vulnerabilities such as passw...
 

Also Known As

AcuSensor
Micro Focus Fortify on Demand
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Joomla!, Digicure, Team Random, Credit Suisse, Samsung, Air New Zealand
SAP, Aaron's, British Gas, FICO, Cox Automative, Callcredit Information Group, Vital and more.
Find out what your peers are saying about Acunetix vs. Fortify on Demand and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
848,716 professionals have used our research since 2012.