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BigFix vs Qualys Patch Management comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 16, 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

BigFix
Ranking in Patch Management
2nd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
96
Ranking in other categories
Configuration Management (6th), Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) (22nd), Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) (4th)
Qualys Patch Management
Ranking in Patch Management
4th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
33
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Patch Management category, the mindshare of BigFix is 10.4%, down from 12.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Qualys Patch Management is 4.1%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Patch Management
 

Featured Reviews

Bella Yakoby - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers third-party patching feature, good scalability, and enhance endpoint management capabilities
From the perspective of the team that's handling the environment, it's not so user-friendly compared to other solutions, the competitors. We hire new teams from time to time, and they are complaining, look, although BigFix is very robust and cross-platform, it's not so fun to work with. The user interface for the technical teams is not so advanced. It's not so intuitive compared to SCCM, compared to ManageEngine. And this is the fact that they have, with the teams, because they have the rejection. The look and feel of the system are old-fashioned. For new employees, it's less easy to find someone I don't need to educate on how to work with BigFix. Although it's easy, it's not as intuitive as the other solutions, and the functionality of the other solutions is less advanced. Let's summarize: The user interface has to be changed from the perspective of the teams that are managing the product. It's old school.
Revathi VeeraRaghavan - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides a centralized platform for managing assets and vulnerabilities, enabling assessment, prioritization, and remediation
Qualys Patch Management system requires several improvements. Firstly, the inability to download asset patches and the lack of third-party application integration limit patch accessibility. Additionally, rollback options are unreliable, and pre-deployment patch testing is crucial. Reporting needs enhancement, particularly with group-based compliance percentages and clearer, VMDR-like reporting in the Patch Management module. Furthermore, detection speed should be improved, as patches are released 24 hours after QIDs are published. The user interface could be more functional, with dashboards for patch compliance visualization and simplified error code language. Finally, the Mac patch catalogue needs expansion, and automated workflows, policy enforcement, and testing procedures should be streamlined for seamless, user-independent operation.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is pretty secure, and it gives extensive vulnerability features as compared to other applications. It supports multiple languages, and the security checks are pretty high as compared to other tools in the market."
"The most valuable and essential features of BigFix are all of them, they are needed when serving the purpose of the desktop operation framework. We cannot run operations without patching or without having an appropriate mechanism for deploying software, et cetera. The features all serve their purpose for our use case."
"Being able to intelligently create reports, gather data, export CSVs and give that to the leadership of some of the client groups that my team supports has helped my organization."
"I would advise someone considering this product to go for it. It's easy to use, cheaper than the value, and there is tons and tons of support from the BigFix community. With almost every challenge we have someone who has encountered it, and you will have a solution right away."
"I think BigFix is a very good solution, and I rate it ten out of ten."
"Software distribution and patch management are the most valuable."
"BigFix has drastically reduced the maintenance window period to patch and reboot servers."
"The most valuable feature for us is the ability to manage TWS, the relevance is really what sets it apart. Also, using it as a software deployment tool is the key for us."
"We have all the information on one page. The dashboard provides comprehensive information on one page, making it easy to apply patches and monitor pending updates."
"We've been able to reduce organizational risk by 50%."
"Qualys Patch Management is an effective tool for vulnerability remediation."
"Qualys Patch Management offers valuable features like scheduling and on-demand patching, allowing us to conveniently push patches to our servers at designated times."
"Policy enforcement requires less time for my team because users cannot avoid applying updates. The user can skip two or three times or for a maximum of eight hours. After that, there is no way to avoid it. It helps us keep the environment safe."
"Qualys Patch Management leverages vulnerability feeds from the VMDR module, allowing us to identify vulnerabilities missing Qualys patches."
"The integrations with VMware include configurations to mitigate vulnerabilities. It helps us identify permissions and whatever is applicable for the vulnerability for faster patching."
"Qualys Patch Management streamlines our vulnerability management process by providing a single source of truth to assess, prioritize, and remediate vulnerabilities across all assets."
 

Cons

"BigFix is actually a little bit on the expensive side in Turkey because of the dollar's exchange rate in our currency."
"They need better integration."
"I'd like to see better API integration with BigFix. We have some tremendous API capability inside of CyFIR and the ability to take textual search results, for example, and bring that back into the BigFix dashboard. This would be of extreme interest to us and our customers."
"We would like to see a different license plan, e.g. to include features from lifecycle with Patch Management, as an example."
"I would like to see a web UI SDK so we could take what is provided currently and be able to build our own customized web UI for particular customers that want to sell service."
"We need a much better multi-tenant option."
"I would like to see for it to be a little easier for new users to be able to learn and create relevant statements. In my opinion, that's the hardest part for bringing on new people that haven't had BigFix experience. Being able to have easier ways to build relevance in ActionScript would be the biggest improvement I'd like to see."
"I would like to see more emphasis on using the web console, to have the same power as the full fat client console that they do they now. It's a lighter way to log in and it would be faster for our operators to do their work. The console tends to take a long time for a large number of clients."
"There is room for improvement in terms of adding more patches."
"False positives were the biggest concern."
"The GUI has areas that need improvement, particularly in the accuracy of results when adding dashboards and running queries."
"Pricing is on the higher side. We found it costly compared to other vendors."
"They need to improve the user-friendliness of identifying how many devices are affected by a particular patch."
"False positives were the biggest concern. We also had some concerns with respect to the Cloud Agent."
"A common area for improvement in Patch Management, both within our environment and others I've encountered, is the lack of built-in driver updates."
"Qualys's current response time for releasing solutions to zero-day vulnerabilities, which takes approximately 12 to 16 hours, needs improvement."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We have a subscription-based contract with BigFix."
"The price of BigFix is better than the solutions. You are able to pay monthly or annually. There are not any hidden costs with BigFix. There is an additional cost for the SQL database."
"The product is less costly when compared to other solutions, and this is a good solid solution for what we have paid."
"On a scale from one to ten, where one is expensive and ten is cheap, I rate the solution's pricing one out of ten."
"The license is subscription-based."
"Its price is very reasonable."
"The price of the solution is high. There are not any additional fees from the standard license."
"When purchasing, buying with other IBM tools provided us with a very good discount in pricing."
"The pricing is reasonable and less expensive than the previous tool."
"Pricing is on the higher side. We found it costly compared to other vendors."
"Compared to other tools, the price of Qualys Patch Management is reasonable."
"While the cost of Qualys Patch Management is slightly high compared to alternative tools, it is not excessively expensive."
"The licensing cost is more than 2,000 for the whole Americas region"
"From what I have heard, Qualys Patch Management is pricey, which is a main barrier to entry. Another aspect that I do not like about Qualys is that they do not add new patch management functionalities to the existing package. It is a separate SKU, so you have to pay more money."
"The pricing is reasonable and competitive. We get many more features at the same price compared to other solutions such as Microsoft SCCM. It is worth the money considering the services and features it has. Their support team is also awesome."
"Qualys Patch Management offers a moderate price point, neither cheap nor expensive, considering its comprehensive functionality."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
47%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Government
6%
Computer Software Company
6%
Computer Software Company
17%
Government
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about BigFix?
The most valuable features of the solution are Windows patching and the hardware and software inventory.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for BigFix?
The pricing is competitive, but not the most competitive.
What needs improvement with BigFix?
Implementing a business solution with BigFix has some issues, primarily concerning the time required for distribution to clients if there are too many. Building a management console is quick and si...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Qualys Patch Management?
Qualys Patch Management comes as part of a bundled package with several modules, making it a cost-effective deal for us. I cannot speak to the separate cost, as we have always used it as part of th...
What needs improvement with Qualys Patch Management?
I deploy patches to endpoints and servers every month. However, despite a job showing as successful, I need to examine the job in detail. For instance, if I have deployed patches to 100 endpoints, ...
What is your primary use case for Qualys Patch Management?
I use Qualys Patch Management as a single platform for patch management. We have Microsoft, Adobe, and various other apps. I create a scheduled task to push all the required patches to the laptops ...
 

Also Known As

Tivoli Endpoint Manager
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

US Foods, Penn State, St Vincent's Health US Foods, Sabadell Bank, SunTrust, Australia Sydney, Stemac, Capgemini, WNS Global Services, Jebsen & Jessen, CenterBeam, Strauss, Christian Hospital Centre, Brit Insurance, Career Education Corporation
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848,716 professionals have used our research since 2012.