Contrast Security Assess vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional comparison

Contrast Security and PortSwigger are both solutions in the Application Security Tools category. Contrast Security is ranked #27 with an average rating of 8.7, while PortSwigger is ranked #9 with an average rating of 8.8. Contrast Security holds a 0.5% mindshare in AS, compared to PortSwigger’s 2.0% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Contrast Security users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 98% of PortSwigger users who would recommend it.

Contrast Security Assess

Read 11 Contrast Security Assess reviews

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561 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

PortSwigger Burp Suite Prof...

Read 62 PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional reviews

3,469 Views
2,300 Comparison Views

98% willing to recommend

Contrast Security Assess

PortSwigger Burp Suite Prof...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 8, 2024

PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional and Contrast Security Assess are tools in the web application security testing category. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional appears to have the upper hand in competitive pricing and user satisfaction in support, while Contrast Security Assess is noted for having advanced features and perceived value.

Features: PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is recognized for its comprehensive manual testing tools, integration capabilities, and extensive functionality for testing web applications. Contrast Security Assess is distinguished by automatic vulnerability detection, a robust set of integrations, and ease of use in continuous integration workflows.

Room for Improvement: PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional users suggest enhancements in reducing false positives, improving automated scanning capabilities, and increasing customization options. Contrast Security Assess users recommend refining customization options, streamlining setup complexity, and offering more scalable solutions.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is known for its easy deployment process and reliable customer support. Contrast Security Assess provides smooth deployment in integrated environments, though it may need additional support resources for optimal use.

Pricing and ROI: PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is recognized for cost-effectiveness and delivering strong ROI, with users quickly benefiting from initial investments. Contrast Security Assess, while higher in cost, justifies its expense through outstanding features that offer substantial long-term value.

To learn more, read our detailed Contrast Security Assess vs. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional Report (Updated: January 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Contrast Security Assess vs. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

January 2025

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Helped 838,713 peers since 2012

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

Contrast Security Assess

Ranking in Application Security Tools

27th

Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)

23rd

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

PortSwigger Burp Suite Prof...

Ranking in Application Security Tools

9th

Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)

6th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Fuzz Testing Tools (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Application Security Tools category, the mindshare of Contrast Security Assess is 0.5%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is 2.0%, down from 2.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Security Tools

Featured Reviews

ToddMcAlister

Lead Application and Data Security Engineer at a insurance company with 5,001-10,000 employees

It has an excellent API interface to pull APIs.

Assess has brought our development time down because it helps create code the first time. Instead of going through the Jenkins process to build an application, they can see right off the bat that if there are errors in the code and fix them before it even goes to build.

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Anuradha.Kapoor Kapoor

Head - Quality Control at Net Solutions

Offers efficient scanning of entire websites but presence of false positive bugs, leading to time-consuming efforts in distinguishing real bugs from false alarms

We have found that so many times, false positive bugs are there, and then we spend a lot of time basically separating them from real bugs. So that's the reason we are looking for some other tool. So we were in discussion with Acunetix. Therefore, the false positive rate is, like, something that we would like to improve. What we are looking for is if this false positive rate goes down because we were OWASP Zap tool users, which was free anyway. But there were a lot of false positives there, and we used to spend a lot of time, like, for security reasons, reproducing those bugs for the development team to fix it. So then we thought, okay, why not we go with the tool? Even if it is not very expensive. But still, every year, we have to renew the license. And we got this tool. Again, we found that in this tool also, even if it is less, there are still a lot of false positive bugs out there. So we again have to spend so much time. So we hired a security tester, who was basically using Acunetix in his previous company for almost three years, and then you said that in that scanning is very slow. The scanning is also slow. Like, sometimes the site scan takes eight hours, six to eight hours. Yeah. And whereas in Acunetix, it took three to four hours. And plus, there are no false positives. I'm not saying none but there's very little. But here, the rate sometimes is very high. These are the two features I think we would like to improve further.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"In our most critical applications, we have a deep dive in the code evaluation, which was something we usually did with periodic vulnerability assessments, code reviews, etc. Now, we have real time access to it. It's something that has greatly enhanced our code's quality. We have actually embedded a KPI in regards to the improvement of our code shell. For example, Contrast provides a baseline where libraries and the usability of the code are evaluated, and they produce a score. We always aim to improve that score. On a quarterly basis, we have added this to our KPIs."

"We use the Contrast OSS feature that allows us to look at third-party, open-source software libraries, because it has a cool interface where you can look at all the different libraries. It has some really cool additional features where it gives us how many instances in which something has been used... It tells us it has been used 10 times out of 20 workloads, for example. Then we know for sure that OSS is being used."

"The accuracy of the solution in identifying vulnerabilities is better than any other product we've used, far and away. In our internal comparisons among different tools, Contrast consistently finds more impactful vulnerabilities, and also identifies vulnerabilities that are nearly guaranteed to be there, meaning that the chance of false positives is very low."

"This has changed the way that developers are looking at usage of third-party libraries, upfront. It's changing our model of development and our culture of development to ensure that there is more thought being put into the usage of third-party libraries."

"When we access the application, it continuously monitors and detects vulnerabilities."

"I am impressed with the product's identification of alerts and vulnerabilities."

"It is a stable solution...Contrast Security Assess is one of the first players in this market, so they have experience and customers, especially abroad. Overall, it's a good product."

"By far, the thing that was able to provide value was the immediate response while testing ahead of release, in real-time."

More Contrast Security Assess pros

"PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional has an intercept tab that helps us to scan our APIs, set the response, and request errors."

"The most valuable feature is Burp Collaborator."

"Once I capture the proxy, I'm able to transfer across. All the requested information is there. I can send across the request to what we call a repeater, where I get to ready the payload that I send to the application. Put in malicious content and then see if it's responding to it."

"The solution has a pretty simple setup."

"Some of the extensions, available using Burp Extender, are also very good and we have found issues by using them."

"The solution has a limited range of functions, which is good for small companies. This is because, in small companies, websites are less complex. They also have single services which makes the solution good enough for them. However, the most advantageous aspect of the solution is its affordable price."

"This tool is more accurate than the other solutions that we use, and reports fewer false positives."

"The automated scan is what I find most useful because a lot of customers will need it. Not every domain will be looking for complete security, they just need a stamp on the security key. For these kinds of customers, the scan works really well."

More PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional pros

Cons

"The setup of the solution is different for each application. That's the one thing that has been a challenge for us. The deployment itself is simple, but it's tough to automate because each application is different, so each installation process for Contrast is different."

"Contrast's ability to support upgrades on the actual agents that get deployed is limited. Our environment is pretty much entirely Java. There are no updates associated with that. You have to actually download a new version of the .jar file and push that out to your servers where your app is hosted. That can be quite cumbersome from a change-management perspective."

"The product's retesting part needs improvement. The tool also needs improvement in the suggestions provided for fixing vulnerabilities. It relies more on documentation rather than on quick fixes."

"Regarding the solution's OSS feature, the one drawback that we do have is that it does not have client-side support. We'll be missing identification of libraries like jQuery or JavaScript, and such, that are client-side."

"To instrument an agent, it has to be running on a type of application technology that the agent recognizes and understands. It's excellent when it works. If we're using an application that is using an unsupported technology, then we can't instrument it at all. We do use PHP and Contrast presently doesn't support that, although it's on their roadmap. My primary hurdle is that it doesn't support all of the technologies that we use."

"The solution should provide more details in the section where it shows that third-party libraries have CVEs or some vulnerabilities."

"I think there was activity underway to support the centralized configuration control. There are ways to do it, but I think they were productizing more of that."

"Contrast Security Assess covers a wide range of applications like .NET Framework, Java, PSP, Node.js, etc. But there are some like Ubuntu and the .NET Core which are not covered. They have it in their roadmap to have these agents. If they have that, we will have complete coverage."

More Contrast Security Assess cons

"Sometimes the solution can run a little slow."

"The solution doesn't offer very good scalability."

"The pricing of the solution is quite high."

"The scanner and crawler need to be improved."

"I would like to see the return of the spider mechanism instead of the crawling feature. Burp Suite's earlier version 1.7 had an excellent spider option, and it would be beneficial if Burp incorporated those features into the current version. The crawling techniques used in the current version are not as efficient as those used in earlier versions."

"The one feature that I would like to see in Burp is active scanning of REST based web services. A lot of organizations are providing APIs to access their services to support different business models like SaaS. Scanning these APIs is still a challenge for many security product companies."

"There were a lot of false positives there, and we used to spend a lot of time, like, for security reasons, reproducing those bugs for the development team to fix it."

"The biggest improvement that I would like to see from PortSwigger that today many people see as an issue in their testing. There might be a feature which might be desired."

More PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's a tiered licensing model. The more you buy, as you cross certain quantity thresholds, the pricing changes. If you have a smaller environment, your licensing costs are going to be different than a larger environment... The licensing is primarily per application. An application can be as many agents as you need. If you've got 10 development servers and 20 production servers and 50 QA servers, all of those agents can be reporting as a single application that utilizes one license."

"The solution is expensive."

"I like the per-application licensing model... We just license the app and we look at different vulnerabilities on that app and we remediate within the app. It's simpler."

"The good news is that the agent itself comes in two different forms: the unlicensed form and the licensed form. Unlicensed gives use of that software composition analysis for free. Thereafter, if you apply a license to that same agent, that's when the instrumentation takes hold. So one of my suggestions is to do what we're doing: Deploy the agent to as many applications as possible, with just the SCA feature turned on with no license applied, and then you can be more choosy and pick which teams will get the license applied."

"You only get one license for an application. Ours are very big, monolithic applications with millions of lines of code. We were able to apply one license to one monolithic application, which is great. We are happy with the licensing. Pricing-wise, they are industry-standard, which is fine."

"The product's pricing is low. I would rate it a two out of ten."

"For what it offers, it's a very reasonable cost. The way that it is priced is extremely straightforward. It works on the number of applications that you use, and you license a server. It is something that is extremely fair, because it doesn't take into consideration the number of requests, etc. It is only priced based on the number of onboarded applications. It suits our model as well, because we have huge traffic. Our number of applications is not that large, so the pricing works great for us."

"Licensing costs are about $450/year for one use. For larger organizations, they're able to test against multiple applications while simultaneously others might have multiple versions of applications which needs to be tested which is why we have the enterprise edition."

"This is a value for money product."

"PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional is expensive compared to other tools."

"The pricing of the solution is reasonable. We only need to pay for the annual subscription. I rate the pricing five out of ten."

"We are using the community version, which is free."

"There are different licenses available that include a free version."

"It is a cheap solution, but it may not be cheaper than other solutions."

"Pricing is not very high. It was around $200."

More PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

21%

Manufacturing Company

13%

Computer Software Company

11%

Government

Computer Software Company

16%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Government

11%

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Contrast Security Assess?

When we access the application, it continuously monitors and detects vulnerabilities.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Contrast Security Assess?

The product's pricing is low. I would rate it a two out of ten.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Contrast Security Assess?

Technical support for the solution should be faster. We have to further analyze what kind of CVEs are in the reported libraries and what part of the code is affected. That analysis can be added to ...

See all answers

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 ...

See all answers

What do you like most about PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional?

The solution helped us discover vulnerabilities in our applications.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional?

The pricing for Burp Suite Professional is not very high, however, it could be more flexible for clients.

See all answers

Comparisons

Seeker vs Contrast Security Assess

Compared 18% of the time

Veracode vs Contrast Security Assess

Compared 12% of the time

SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) vs Contrast Security Assess

Compared 10% of the time

OWASP Zap vs Contrast Security Assess

Compared 8% of the time

Qualys Web Application Scanning vs Contrast Security Assess

Compared 5% of the time

More Contrast Security Assess Competitors

Acunetix vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

Compared 19% of the time

Fortify WebInspect vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

Compared 14% of the time

OWASP Zap vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

Compared 10% of the time

SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

Compared 8% of the time

HCL AppScan vs PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

Compared 7% of the time

More PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Contrast Security Assess

February 2025

Download Contrast Security Assess product report

Buyer's Guide

PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

February 2025

PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional report

Download PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional product report

Also Known As

Contrast Assess

Burp

Overview

Contrast Security is the world’s leading provider of security technology that enables software applications to protect themselves against cyberattacks, heralding the new era of self-protecting software. Contrast's patented deep security instrumentation is the breakthrough technology that enables highly accurate assessment and always-on protection of an entire application portfolio, without disruptive scanning or expensive security experts. Only Contrast has sensors that work actively inside applications to uncover vulnerabilities, prevent data breaches, and secure the entire enterprise from development, to operations, to production.

Contrast Security

Burp Suite Professional, by PortSwigger, is the world’s leading toolkit for web security testing. Over 52,000 users worldwide, across all industries and organization sizes, trust Burp Suite Professional to find more vulnerabilities, faster. With expertly-engineered manual and automated tooling, you're able to test smarter - not harder.

PortSwigger is the web security company that is enabling the world to secure the web. Over 50,000 security engineers rely on our software and expertise to secure their world.

PortSwigger

Sample Customers

Williams-Sonoma, Autodesk, HUAWEI, Chromeriver, RingCentral, Demandware.

Google, Amazon, NASA, FedEx, P&G, Salesforce

Buyer's Guide

Contrast Security Assess vs. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

January 2025

Free Report: Contrast Security Assess vs. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional

Find out what your peers are saying about Contrast Security Assess vs. PortSwigger Burp Suite Professional and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.

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