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Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs Vanta comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 6, 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

Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Ranking in Compliance Management
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
76
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (7th), Container Management (9th), Container Security (4th), Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (2nd), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (4th), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (4th), Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (3rd), Microsoft Security Suite (4th)
Vanta
Ranking in Compliance Management
4th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Compliance Consulting (1st), Data Governance (13th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Compliance Management category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is 17.3%, up from 13.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Vanta is 12.6%, down from 22.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Compliance Management
 

Featured Reviews

Vibhor Goel - PeerSpot reviewer
A single tool for complete visibility and addressing security gaps
Currently, issues are structured in Microsoft Defender for Cloud at severity levels of high, critical, or warning, but these severity levels are not always right. For example, Microsoft might consider a port being open as critical, but that might not be the case for our company. Similarly, it might suggest closing some management ports, but you might need them to be able to log in, so the severity levels for certain things can be improved. Even though Microsoft Defender for Cloud provides a way to temporarily disable certain alerts or notifications without affecting our security score, it would be better to have more granularized control over these recommendations. Currently, we cannot even disable certain alerts or notifications. There should be an automated mechanism to design Azure policies based on the recommendations, possibly with AI integration. Instead of an engineer having to write a policy to fix security gaps, which is very time-consuming, there should be an inbuilt capability to auto-remediate everything and have proper control in place. Additionally, enabling Defender for Cloud at the resource group level, rather than only at the subscription level, would be beneficial.
Anupam Dutta - PeerSpot reviewer
Helps us maintain compliance with standards like SOC 2 and various data policies, but the customer support needs improvement
It helps us track the compliance of the components listed in our partner's directory. We can also check if the password manager, XML, and three log policies have been properly implemented on the desktop. We use JEM Cloud, which is a SaaS solution, and sometimes it experiences access issues. With Vanta, we can work on resolving these issues and ensuring policy compliance. Vanta also helps us maintain compliance with standards like SOC 2 and various data policies, which are essential for our documentation and communication requirements, ultimately ensuring enterprise software policy compliance. In my role, which primarily involves IT responsibilities, I often deal with various policies. There are instances where specific policies, especially those related to quality, may not be implemented correctly. This primarily occurs with mainframes and devices owned by particular users. In such cases, Vanta helps us enable these policies on the devices and assign them to the relevant users. It also highlights when certain policies, such as version 86.x, are not assigned through SAP. Vanta provides guidance on configuring and mitigating these issues. Additionally, it helps us with GitHub account provisioning and deprovisioning, as well as managing GitHub and Google Workspace Flex. We also use the 1Password password manager, which Vanta assists in overseeing.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"DSPM is the most valuable feature."
"It's quite a good product. It helps to understand the infections and issues you are facing."
"The most valuable features of this solution are the vulnerability assessments and the glossary of compliance."
"The product has given us more insight into potential avenues for attack paths."
"The most valuable feature of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is its ability to assess an environment and give us a clear idea of what security components are lacking and which are not."
"The most valuable features are ransomware protection and access controls. The solution has helped us secure some folders on our systems from unauthorized modifications."
"Most importantly, it's an integrated solution. We not only have Defender for Cloud, but we also have Defender for Endpoint, Defender for Office 365, and Defender for Identity. It's an integrated, holistic solution."
"This is a platform as a service provided by Azure. We don't need to install or maintain Azure Security Center. It is a ready-made service available in Azure. This is one of the main things that we like. If you look at similar tools, we have to install, maintain, and update services. Whereas, Azure Security Center manages what we are using. This is a good feature that has helped us a lot."
"The product has provided automated security controls for our cloud provider. It helps to automate security checks. Vanta offers a list of things that can be done to achieve ISO 27001 compliance."
"The most valuable feature of Vanta would be the time savings from the automation and the continuous compliance monitoring once set up."
"Task management and vendor assurance are the most valuable features. It is also an easy tool to use."
"It helps us track the compliance of the components listed in our partner's directory. We can also check if the password manager, XML, and three log policies have been properly implemented on the desktop."
"The most valuable feature of Vanta is its prebuilt control frameworks."
"They integrate into New Relic as a performance monitoring tool."
 

Cons

"As an analyst, there is no way to configure or create a playbook to automate the process of flagging suspicious domains."
"I rate Microsoft support five out of 10. It gets better once you're escalated past the first and second levels. It's difficult to get the necessary support when tickets are first opened."
"Microsoft Graph needs improvement."
"No possibility to write or edit any capability."
"Defender could improve how data is represented. It can be unstructured or slow to load. The recent update allowing policy grouping into control groups is beneficial, but further enhancements for speed and clarity are needed."
"Support needs to be highly responsive, especially in large enterprise environments."
"After getting a recommendation, it takes time for the solution to refresh properly to show that the problem has been eliminated."
"Agent features need to be improved. They support agents through Azure Arc or Workbench. Sometimes, we are not able to get correct signals from the machines on which we have installed these agents. We are not able to see how many are currently reporting to Azure Security Center, and how many are currently not reporting. For example, we have 1,000 machines, and we have enrolled 1,000 OMS agents on these machines to collect the log. When I look at the status, even though at some places, it shows that it is connected, but when I actually go and check, I'm not getting any alerts from those. There are some discrepancies on the agent, and the agent features are not up to the mark."
"They have an AI generator for the system description for SOC 2, however, the outline is a little sketchy."
"Scalability could be improved."
"There is a delay with customer support and they are unsure of the answers we need."
"Some of the tool's automated tests do not work the way it should."
"The main area for improvement in Vanta is the user interface's refresh rate."
"Currently, Vanta's user access review module is still in development, and we've been giving them continuous feedback to help them improve that."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool is pretty expensive."
"Pricing is difficult because each license has its own metrics and cost."
"Microsoft's licensing and pricing are sometimes complicated. If someone is new to Microsoft's licensing, they might have difficulty with it."
"Defender's basic version is free, which is good. Many of our teams are evaluating the paid version against third-party products."
"Microsoft Defender for Cloud is pricey, especially for Kubernetes clusters."
"There are improvements that have to be made to the licensing. Currently, for servers, it has to be done by grouping the servers on a single subscription... We don't have an option whereby, if all those resources are in one subscription, we can have each of the individual servers subject to different planning."
"We only use the free tier, so we haven't faced any pricing, setup costs, or licensing challenges."
"The pricing and licensing of Microsoft Defender for Cloud have been good for us. We appreciate the licensing approach based on employee count rather than a big enterprise license."
"Vanta is expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
23%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
7%
Comms Service Provider
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

How is Prisma Cloud vs Azure Security Center for security?
Azure Security Center is very easy to use, integrates well, and gives very good visibility on what is happening across your ecosystem. It also has great remote workforce capabilities and supports a...
What do you like most about Microsoft Defender for Cloud?
The entire Defender Suite is tightly coupled, integrated, and collaborative.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Defender for Cloud?
Initially, the cost was reasonable, but additional services from Microsoft sometimes incur extra expenses that seem higher than expected.
What do you like most about Vanta?
The most valuable feature of Vanta is its prebuilt control frameworks.
What needs improvement with Vanta?
Every product has a lot of areas to improve. They have an AI generator for the system description for SOC 2, for example, however, the outline is a little sketchy. The system description has to hav...
What is your primary use case for Vanta?
We're trying to get SOC 2 compliance, and we're trying to get HIPAA compliance.
 

Also Known As

Microsoft Azure Security Center, Azure Security Center, Microsoft ASC, Azure Defender
No data available
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Defender for Cloud is trusted by companies such as ASOS, Vatenfall, SWC Technology Partners, and more.
Care Directives, Shortcut , Nayya, Heizenrader, Treasury Prime
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs. Vanta and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
848,989 professionals have used our research since 2012.