Tenable versus Qualys

Four times as many customers choose Tenable over Qualys.1

Why? The company’s vision, product leadership, and technology roadmap. Tenable doesn’t just focus on software vulnerabilities impacting your IT assets. The Tenable One Exposure Management Platform extends into cloud misconfigurations, operational technology (OT), identity systems, AI models, and external assets.

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Why customers choose Tenable over Qualys

Coverage

Coverage and accuracy

As of March 2026, Tenable Research has published more than 319K+ plugins covering more than 116K CVEs. We update and publish vulnerability coverage and zero-day research at tenable.com/plugins.

"We compared [Tenable and Qualys], and we realized the results were different. Tenable would find critical vulnerabilities while Qualys wouldn't."

Network security engineer, Canadian retail company3

125K K

Vulnerabilities assessed with 338,000+ plugins

802

Vulnerabilities disclosed by Tenable Research

< 24 hrs

Median time for coverage of high-profile issues

Vision

Vision beyond vulnerability management

Tenable has broadened its traditional vulnerability management strengths, adding: external attack surface management (EASM), cloud security, industrial OT security, AI and identity systems/Active Directory (AD) security. Tenable has the best coverage across your entire attack surface.

Qualys' new ETM Identity is unproven with customers and more focused on inventory than stopping lateral movements.

Qualys lacks a true IT/OT convergence and offers OT passive discovery as a bolt-on to its VMDR module.

“When it came to operational technology … that's where Tenable won… When it comes to the cloud area, Tenable was by far the best solution of the finalists.”

Vulnerability management architect, German manufacturing company2

Innovation

Vulnerability management innovation

Introduced in 2024, Vulnerability Intelligence offers granular intelligence on vulnerabilities, including tracking vulnerability history to see changes over time.

Exposure Response enables customers to uniquely track risk remediation with SLAs, instead of relying on cumulative risk scores. Tenable provides a single end-to-end workflow and takes a risk-based approach regardless of patch availability.

Qualys Threat Protection and QFlow require a complex query language and manual setup to scope the work. Tenable Exposure Response is an end-to-end workflow to track remediation against SLAs out-of-the-box.4

View inside Tenable Exposure Response showing CISA known exploitable vulnerabilities on critical assets

Services

Professional services, customer success, and support

Tenable offers:

  • Expert professional services.
  • Dedicated customer success team for each customer.
  • Advanced levels of support to enterprises, including Premier and Elite support.

Some customers report longer wait times and slower issue resolution from Qualys support services.

Qualys does not offer professional services.

Qualys customers are left with limited support from their technical account manager (TAM) who often handles multiple customers stretching their resources and time thin.

Compliance

Leader in compliance

Tenable is the leader in compliance with 12% more CIS benchmarks covered than Qualys.

Tenable has hundreds of frameworks and directives to help your organization stay secure and in compliance.

The best part? There is no extra charge.

“When we go into policies for cloud systems, that's where Tenable definitely shined. Throughout [the POC], they [Tenable] were able to find 25% more [than Qualys].”

Vulnerability management architect at the German manufacturing company6

Qualys’s Policy Compliance module is a standalone module sold separately.5

167 K

total audit checks

42 K

unique audit checks

4,751

published audit checks

Compare Tenable to Qualys

Tenable
Qualys
Tenable
Wide variety of assets: endpoints, network devices, identity systems, cloud workloads, AI models, web apps
Overall asset coverage
Qualys
Lack of OT and mature identity exposure security capabilities
Tenable
Fully operational, industry-leading CIEM protecting customers today
Cloud security identity protection
Qualys
Sub-par CIEM, more focused on traditional CSPM
Tenable
Tenable One is an exposure management platform that combines integrated risk metrics across vulnerability management, web app security, cloud, identity, OT and attack surface management
Exposure management analytics
Qualys
Qualys TruRisk is often limited to module-specific views
Tenable
Ability to benchmark internally and against industry peers
Internal and peer benchmarking
Qualys
Not offered
Tenable
Provides rich vital context on any given vulnerability including exploitation likelihood and potential impact
Vulnerability intelligence
Qualys
Lacks a robust vulnerability database with enriched metadata and advanced search/filtering capabilities
Tenable
Fully-fledged patch management integrated with Tenable One Vulnerability Management, as well as integration with the leading third-party remediation tools
Patch management and remediation
Qualys
Partial patch management integrated with VMDR; no support for popular remediation tools like BigFix
Tenable
Partner-first with 180+ partners and 320+ pre-built integrations7
Partner ecosystem
Qualys
Channel partners contribute to 51% of Qualys revenue8
Tenable
Advanced levels of support, including Premier and Elite, as well as professional services
Professional services and support
Qualys
Does not offer professional services and limited support from an overstretched TAM
Tenable
Tenable One AI Exposure empowers your security teams to stop reacting to isolated symptoms and start managing your entire AI surface in one unified platform
AI capabilities
Qualys
Lacks this capability; primarily focuses on agentic AI and shadow AI available via a separate module
Tenable
Simplified asset-based pricing model aligned with customer maturity
Pricing model
Qualys
Often adds hidden costs for scanners, agents, APIs, and individual modules (e.g. Policy Audit)
1 - Tenable source, Qualys source 2 - Internal customer interview 3 - Internal customer interview 4 - Qualys Threat Protection Web page, Dashboards, Data Sheet 5 - Qualys Policy Compliance webpage 6 - Internal customer interview 7 - Tenable blog, Tenable technology partners page 8 - 2025 Financial results Q4, 2025
Q4 2025 Analyst Report

Tenable is a Leader in the 2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Exposure Assessment Platforms

Q3 2025 Analyst Report

Tenable named a leader in the IDC MarketScape Worldwide Exposure Management 2025 Vendor Assessment

Q3 2025 Analyst Report

Tenable named a leader in The Forrester Wave™: Unified Vulnerability Management Solutions, Q3 2025

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