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Rapid7 Penetration Testing Services vs The NodeZero Platform by Horizon3.ai comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 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

Rapid7 Penetration Testing ...
Ranking in Penetration Testing Services
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
The NodeZero Platform by Ho...
Ranking in Penetration Testing Services
1st
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.7
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (9th), Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (13th), Breach and Attack Simulation (BAS) (2nd), Risk-Based Vulnerability Management (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Penetration Testing Services category, the mindshare of Rapid7 Penetration Testing Services is 2.1%, down from 2.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of The NodeZero Platform by Horizon3.ai is 11.5%, down from 14.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Penetration Testing Services Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
The NodeZero Platform by Horizon3.ai11.5%
Rapid7 Penetration Testing Services2.1%
Other86.4%
Penetration Testing Services
 

Featured Reviews

Gabriel Woolverton - PeerSpot reviewer
Penetration Tester at a tech consulting company with 1-10 employees
Wide range of coverage and free
A useful improvement would be to have white papers for specific vulnerabilities readily available. It seems like they are not always linked when you are looking for a vulnerability identifier in the database. It would be useful to ensure that that information is readily available. That way, if you need to dive deeper into a vulnerability, you would have the capability to do so basically right there on the website.
SH
Chief Information Officer at a construction company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Has unified our IT teams by providing clear visibility into network vulnerabilities and accelerated remediation with real-world attack testing
One of the things that we've shared with Horizon is just the reporting. They've made a lot of changes over time, but when examining computers, most average normal people don't look at a computer and identify it as 114.82.117.180. They identify it as 'the printer for accounting.' When many of the reports give the very detailed technical IP address or serial number, that's really not helpful for anyone other than the person, the hands-on person that's trying to remediate it. All the managers, all the leaders, having information in that format isn't helpful. Being able to have information about what those devices are would be very helpful. There's a technical reason they can't just have an easy button because some people have really complicated networks. When examining things for the average company, the average executive, that 114 number, there's only one of those. But if examining an AT&T or a Walmart, it isn't unique. They haven't solved that problem. But for the 90% of companies, being able to have just a human readable name for all devices on your network in all of the reports all of the time would be the most beneficial.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The initial setup is very straightforward. This is not a tool that you have to set up yourself. All you have to do is just access their web-based vulnerability database application, which is open source and available to pretty much anyone."
"The NodeZero Platform is amazing; what I love most about it is that it's automated and comparable to the manual pen testing we did with a third-party company, but with the added benefit of unlimited retesting to validate fixes."
"Overall, I'd rate NodeZero at nine to 9.5 out of ten."
"Penetration testing and scans are useful features."
"The NodeZero Platform's real attack capabilities help identify vulnerabilities on my on-premise systems by adding an element of validation and offensive security testing on top of known vulnerabilities. The feature that allows security teams to fix and retest vulnerabilities instantly is very useful, even though it may not happen literally 'instantly.' It's a necessary tool for any organization to understand whether vulnerabilities are genuinely exploitable by attackers. With its near-real-time testing capabilities, it's an essential part of any security portfolio."
"We experienced a threat that could have severely crippled us, but we were able to shut it down before it escalated, thanks to internal vulnerability testing and addressing critical vulnerabilities using their tool."
"My favorite feature about The NodeZero Platform is that it's autonomous, and it truly delivers on that promise—it can be set and forgotten while it performs its tasks, and it does exactly what it claims to do."
"After the third party conducts the pen test, The NodeZero Platform is run, and it finds the same things they found and sometimes a few other things that they did not even identify."
"Honestly, it's one of the most transformational technologies we've implemented in our company."
 

Cons

"A useful improvement would be to have white papers for specific vulnerabilities readily available. It seems like they are not always linked when you are looking for a vulnerability identifier in the database."
"The areas for improvement for The NodeZero Platform involve integration and automation. It would be beneficial if it could integrate directly with vulnerability management tools that would allow the platform to automatically import data, identify vulnerable systems, and test targets immediately, potentially even enabling automated feedback loops for rescanning since the process is currently manual."
"I think The NodeZero Platform could improve by leveraging GPUs for password cracking, which would be pretty good."
"You need to be cautious about what it scans, as it could potentially cause issues."
"The only issue we’ve encountered is that sometimes the scans take a long time to complete."
"I encountered challenges with patch management, as we struggled to test and implement patches due to time constraints. This led to our patch management process being ineffective."
"Sometimes even their support doesn't know why we're seeing certain issues."
"The speed of the scans takes some time, but in my opinion, it is not surprising for what it is doing."
"The reports are quite useless."
report
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
University
13%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Educational Organization
7%
Computer Software Company
10%
Educational Organization
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise4
 

Questions from the Community

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What do you like most about Horizon3.ai?
Penetration testing and scans are useful features.
What needs improvement with Horizon3.ai?
I think The NodeZero Platform could improve by leveraging GPUs for password cracking, which would be pretty good.
What is your primary use case for Horizon3.ai?
We use The NodeZero Platform for control validation and we are also looking for the likelihood of vulnerabilities.
 

Also Known As

No data available
Horizon3.ai
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Motorola, Liberty wines, Kaman Corporation
Government agencies, Defense Industrial Base organizations, and enterprises in regulated industries such as finance, healthcare, manufacturing, and criticalinfrastructure rely on NodeZero to meet rigorous security and compliance requirements with continuous, scheduled, and on-demand testing.
Find out what your peers are saying about Horizon3.ai, HackerOne, Bugcrowd and others in Penetration Testing Services. Updated: December 2025.
879,711 professionals have used our research since 2012.