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AWS Security Hub vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 8, 2026

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

Qualys TotalCloud
Sponsored
Ranking in Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
8th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
53
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (10th), Container Security (11th), Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (9th), SaaS Security Posture Management (SSPM) (2nd), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (7th)
AWS Security Hub
Ranking in Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
17th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
27
Ranking in other categories
Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) (7th)
Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Ranking in Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
89
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (9th), Container Management (8th), Container Security (4th), Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (1st), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (5th), Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (7th), Microsoft Security Suite (6th), Compliance Management (4th), Cloud Detection and Response (CDR) (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) category, the mindshare of Qualys TotalCloud is 2.0%, up from 1.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of AWS Security Hub is 2.5%, down from 4.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is 5.2%, down from 9.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Defender for Cloud5.2%
Qualys TotalCloud2.0%
AWS Security Hub2.5%
Other90.3%
Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2859021 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr Security Engineer at a tech vendor with 5,001-10,000 employees
Risk-based triage has transformed container security and now prioritizes high-impact threats
The best features Qualys TotalCloud offers currently include managing cloud infrastructure and container security while facing major challenges such as alert fatigue. Traditional vulnerability scanners flag hundreds of CVEs on short-lived Kubernetes containers, some of which have no internet exposure or are gone before we can even triage them. I leverage Qualys TotalCloud to move beyond static CVSS. I use it to implement runtime exposure, correlation risk reprioritization, and shift-left integration. This notifies developers to fix a base image upstream rather than patching live ephemeral instances. In my work with cloud and container security, the biggest operational hurdle was alert fatigue. I use Qualys to shift left from static CVSS severity to context-aware risk prioritization. I correlated raw vulnerability data with real-time risk factors such as public network exposure, active runtime execution, or overly permissive IAM roles. This allows us to immediately drop the priority of isolated containers and escalate lower-severity CVEs that sit on an exposed, high-risk path. We can map these findings directly back to our CI/CD pipelines so developers can patch the root base images upstream. We have drastically cut down the signal-to-noise ratio, saved a lot of manual hours doing triage work, and ensured engineering effort goes directly towards high-impact risk reduction.
Karthik Ekambaram - PeerSpot reviewer
Director at Scybers
Has helped identify misconfigurations and prioritize risks but lacks multi-cloud support and deeper integration features
AWS Security Hub cannot scale up to multiple different cloud environments; it only works for AWS. There are other products in the market for CSPM that can give you multi-cloud environment misconfigurations, even Microsoft for that matter. Regarding the integration of AWS Security Hub with third-party tools, I am not certain whether we can integrate them, but there is no need to do so. However, AWS Security Hub cannot integrate with other cloud providers, so it only supports the AWS environment. The compliance checks within AWS Security Hub are good, but we don't use them much. We utilize compliance frameworks such as CIS compliance frameworks and ISO 27017 framework, which are beneficial, but it can improve in other areas too, such as including NIST and other frameworks beyond just ISO and CIS. Improvements can be applicable for scalability, particularly on integration with multi-cloud environments, and compliance frameworks can be added for more variety as well. The unified dashboard in AWS Security Hub is adequate; I cannot say it is exceptional, but the content available in the dashboards is satisfactory for now.
RW
Head Of IT at Cirrus Response
Cloud security has cut investigation time and now reveals threats faster but needs simpler oversight
When deploying AI applications, my key security concerns with Microsoft Defender for Cloud are data loss, leakage of data, and guardrails around the actual AI, and I am hoping that this is going to help me put those guardrails in place and identify data exfiltration. Microsoft Defender for Cloud has not helped me manage and secure multi-cloud environments, as we are 100 percent Microsoft and have not really got it in any other environment at all. I am not yet using the unified AI-powered security feature offered by Microsoft Defender for Cloud, but that is coming. I am not yet using the integrated XDR feature of Microsoft Defender for Cloud, but that is coming. I am not yet utilizing the GenAI threat protection features of Microsoft Defender for Cloud. That is also coming and a lot of that will come from learning it here. I have enabled the agentless scanning in my cloud environment with Microsoft Defender for Cloud. Assessing the impact on my workload protection without needing to install agents with Microsoft Defender for Cloud makes it a lot easier, but it also identifies a lot more, which puts more load on me sometimes. I would advise another organization considering Microsoft Defender for Cloud that it is the most logical route to follow if their whole ecosystem is Microsoft. It is easy to implement and it is very self-explanatory when doing it, making sense to just follow the steps as it is too simple, really. I would rate this review a 7.5 out of 10.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"By integrating TotalCloud, we have significantly reduced vulnerabilities in our deployment pipeline."
"The most valuable feature is extensibility."
"Its excellent graphical interface makes the scanning process simple."
"One of Qualys' best features is its categorization, which allows us to see the types of assets, their security postures, and the AI-powered version of the tool."
"I would recommend Qualys TotalCloud to other users because it is cost-efficient and has a good return on investment."
"The ability to identify cloud misconfigurations, prioritize security risks, and monitor cloud resources from a single platform is quite valuable."
"In my opinion, this is the best tool."
"I would definitely recommend it because it is easy to handle any cloud resources."
"Within AWS Security Hub, there is a feature for aggregating and prioritizing security findings which allows for better risk prioritization based on misconfiguration, as they know AWS thoroughly."
"AWS Security Hub has very good integration features. It allows for AWS native services integration, and it helps us to integrate some of the services outside of AWS."
"Currently, our organization utilizes AWS for various purposes, including SaaS (Software as a Service), PaaS (Platform as a Service), and hosting applications in the cloud. We develop our applications and use AWS services as a platform for basic functions and secondary development needs. Additionally, we rely on PaaS for accounting services. Approximately, 50% of our applications are hosted in the cloud environment, making it a significant part of our current setup."
"The solution is very good at detection and providing real-time alerts."
"The best feature of AWS Security Hub is that you can get compliance or your cloud's current security posture."
"Though I'm still in the initial evaluation phase for AWS Security Hub, I would recommend it to others because it has good features."
"I find all of the features to be highly valuable."
"This solution is for security posture management for the cloud, showing the security posture of your cloud infrastructure and giving you good insight into whether your infrastructure is secure or not."
"Technical support is helpful."
"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."
"For organizations who have an on-prem environment and are planning to move to a cloud-based solution, Azure Security Center is definitely one of the best tools that they can use."
"Compared to other products, Azure Defender's main advantage is native integration with all Azure services."
"If you are a Microsoft organization and most of your organization uses Microsoft, Microsoft Defender for Cloud will be the best approach as it provides the easiest implementation to the most robust solution for a Microsoft suite."
"This solution is stable, it's 100% guaranteed and I've never had any problems with it other than some planned IT downtime."
"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."
"I find Microsoft Defender for Cloud's KQL very flexible and powerful. It's really easy to search through with KQL queries to find the security breaches and incidents and to track down the breach itself."
 

Cons

"The improvement needed in Qualys TotalCloud is mainly in the artificial intelligence automation agents, where we can customize and create what meets our needs, not necessarily having to use those provided in the tool."
"The downside is only in container security, but it has not been a long time since they introduced these models."
"The price is very expensive, actually."
"Regarding technical support from Qualys, they respond, but the response time can be too long. Sometimes we need to wait weeks for solutions to simple questions."
"We would like to see Windows-based sensors available in Qualys, as this would make the platform more versatile and support a broader range of environments."
"The cloud licensing unit system is unclear, especially since "units" aren't well-defined."
"One thing that could be improved is the user experience and navigation."
"TotalCloud could improve its scanning of niche devices like Wi-Fi dongles and USB modems because they are often untested. It covers everything else, like laptops, mobile devices, and Bluetooth IoT devices. They can improve on the small IoT devices because hackers and testers use these."
"The support must be quicker."
"The solution is not wholly self-sufficient."
"AWS Security Hub's configuration and integration are areas where it lacks and needs to improve."
"From an improvement perspective, there is a need to add more compliance since, right now, AWS Security Hub only provides four to five compliances to control the tool."
"The integration of AWS Security Hub has not helped much in maintaining my organization's security posture."
"Right now, there are some difficulties we're facing with AWS Security Hub, and we need our central team to mitigate the issues."
"We need more granular-level customizations to enable or disable the rules in AWS Security Hub."
"It's not user-friendly. Too much going on, too many unnecessary findings, not very visual. You can't do much compared to other similar tools that are cheaper and better."
"If they had an easier way to display all the vulnerabilities of the machines affected and remediation steps on one screen rather than having to dive deep into each of them, that would be a lot easier."
"If a customer is already using Okta as an SSO in its entire environment, they will want to continue with it. But Security Center doesn't understand that and keeps making recommendations. It would help if it let us resolve a recommendation, even if it is not implemented."
"Microsoft sources most of their threat intelligence internally, but I think they should open themselves up to bodies that provide feel intelligence to build a better engine. There may be threats out there that they don't report because their team is not doing anything on that and they don't have arrangements with another party that is involved in that research."
"Microsoft Graph needs improvement."
"Azure Security Center takes a long time to update, compared to the on-premises version of Microsoft Defender."
"For improvements, I'd like to see more use cases integrated with Microsoft Sentinel and support for multi-cloud environments beyond just Azure."
"We would like to have better transparency as to how the security score is calculated because as it is now, it is difficult to understand."
"Sometimes if you do not have the resources in-house, it can be difficult."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Qualys TotalCloud is expensive."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers competitive pricing given its comprehensive suite of features, including integration, assessment, remediation, and detection capabilities, all within a single platform."
"TotalCloud's price is about right where I would expect it to be."
"While Qualys TotalCloud's pricing is currently acceptable, it is becoming increasingly expensive and may soon be considered overpriced."
"The pricing is comparable. It is built into our other product, so I cannot piecemeal it. It is a part of our subscription."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers cost-effective licensing flexibility."
"Although Qualys TotalCloud is relatively expensive due to its unique automation features, its cost-effectiveness is rated an eight out of ten, with ten being the most costly."
"I am not sure about the pricing. From what I understand, it is a bit on the higher side, but I do not have the exact numbers."
"The pricing is fine. It is not an expensive tool."
"AWS Security Hub's pricing is pretty reasonable."
"There are multiple subscription models, like yearly, monthly, and packaged."
"The price of the solution is not very competitive but it is reasonable."
"The cost is based on the number of compliances, core checks, and services required, and for more than 10,000 recommendations, the charge is just one dollar."
"Security Hub is not an expensive solution."
"The price of AWS Security Hub is average compared to other solutions."
"AWS Security Hub is not an expensive tool. I would consider it to be a cheap solution. AWS Security Hub follows the PAYG pricing model, meaning you will have to pay for whatever you use."
"The price of the solution is good for the features we receive and there is an additional cost for Microsoft premier support. However, some of my potential customers have found it to be expensive and have gone on to choose another solution."
"Understanding the costs of cloud services can be complicated at first. As with a lot of things in the cloud, it can be quite hard to understand the end cost, but it becomes clearer over time. Early on, the lack of transparency is a challenge. Microsoft does not tell you the cost when they launch something. It is clever marketing, and there is room for improvement there. There should be clarity from the start."
"I'm not privy to that information, but I know it's probably close to a million dollars a year."
"I am not involved in this area. However, I believe its price is okay because even small customers are using Azure Security Center. I don't think it is very expensive."
"Microsoft's licensing and pricing are sometimes complicated. If someone is new to Microsoft's licensing, they might have difficulty with it."
"Security Center charges $15 per resource for any workload that you onboard into it. They charge per VM or per data-base server or per application. It's not like Microsoft 365 licensing, where there are levels like E3 and E5. Security Center is pretty straightforward."
"Microsoft Defender for Cloud is pricey, especially for Kubernetes clusters."
"There are two different plans. We're using the secure basic plan, but we have used the end security plan as well. There are additional costs, but it gives us more functionalities compared to the basic plan."
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Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) solutions are best for your needs.
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Comparison Review

it_user186927 - PeerSpot reviewer
Director of Operations at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Feb 16, 2015
Cybereason vs. Interset vs. SQRRL
Capture DB - they all use NoSQL db and hence solve the ad hoc query and 'go back in time' problem with current best of breed SIEM and DLP solutions that rely on real time analysis of incoming logs (and don't store them). This means deeper and quicker iterative threat analysis and assessment…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
18%
Outsourcing Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Computer Software Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise38
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise14
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business31
Midsize Enterprise12
Large Enterprise49
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Qualys TotalCloud?
I was not involved in pricing, setup cost, and licensing, but I can say that the setup was fast, within a quarter, an...
What needs improvement with Qualys TotalCloud?
In terms of improvements, the features we are using in Qualys TotalCloud are working in the best optimal way, and I d...
What is your primary use case for Qualys TotalCloud?
I have been using Qualys TotalCloud for the last eight months to scan the hardware and the virtual devices in our inf...
Which is better - Azure Sentinel or AWS Security Hub?
We like that Azure Sentinel does not require as much maintenance as legacy SIEMs that are on-premises. Azure Sentinel...
What needs improvement with AWS Security Hub?
I do not see any areas for improvement in AWS Security Hub itself, but the cost factor is something that is the main ...
What is your primary use case for AWS Security Hub?
AWS Security Hub is something I have used daily as it is a part of my job for cloud security purposes. If you are dea...
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 acros...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Defender for Cloud?
My experience with pricing, setup costs, and licensing was that the license cost was the only consideration. Setup an...
What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for Cloud?
To improve Microsoft Defender for Cloud, I think pricing-wise, the license price is a little bit higher from an inges...
 

Also Known As

Qualys TotalCloud with FlexScan
SQRRL
Microsoft Azure Security Center, Azure Security Center, Microsoft ASC, Azure Defender
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Edmunds, Frame.io, GoDaddy, Realtor.com
Microsoft Defender for Cloud is trusted by companies such as ASOS, Vatenfall, SWC Technology Partners, and more.
Find out what your peers are saying about AWS Security Hub vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
917,403 professionals have used our research since 2012.