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Checkmarx SAST vs GitLab comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Checkmarx SAST
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
21st
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.0
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
GitLab
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
92
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (8th), Build Automation (3rd), Release Automation (2nd), Rapid Application Development Software (12th), Software Composition Analysis (SCA) (4th), Enterprise Agile Planning Tools (2nd), Fuzz Testing Tools (2nd), DevSecOps (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Static Application Security Testing (SAST) category, the mindshare of Checkmarx SAST is 2.3%, up from 1.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of GitLab is 2.6%, up from 2.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Static Application Security Testing (SAST) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
GitLab2.6%
Checkmarx SAST2.3%
Other95.1%
Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
 

Featured Reviews

Tharindu Malwenna - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Application Security Engineer at a newspaper with 5,001-10,000 employees
Has supported early vulnerability detection but requires tuning to reduce false positives and scanning delays
When assessing the accuracy and efficiency of Checkmarx SAST scanning capabilities, they are currently recommending that doing the full scan is the main, correct way of scanning the repositories. However, based on the repository size we have, it sometimes takes more than 10 minutes for larger repositories, which is a downside. The accuracy of the results depends on various factors, as some of the test folders tend to give us false positives, which makes a huge impact on the vulnerabilities. Those are the major things that we have to fine-tune from our end. I would rate Checkmarx SAST around a seven, as it does have some false positives we have to work with, which are the major concerning things. The number of false positives is significant because we cannot implement policies because of this.
BasilJiji - PeerSpot reviewer
System engineer at a retailer with 10,001+ employees
Role-based workflows have transformed daily deployments and improve team collaboration
GitLab has role-based access control, so when a team member needs to make a code change, they cannot directly apply it to the environment but must put in a merge request. Once a senior reviews the code and approves it, then it is implemented across the environment, making it safer and allowing everyone to experience the process. The best features GitLab offers are version control and automation, which are the major things that stand out to me. When it comes to access, the login is very smooth, with just one login integrated with our Okta, allowing everyone to log in easily. Deployments become much easier, and that is how GitLab helps. The automation features make my work easier because we use a tool called AWX, which is connected to GitLab. Whenever we run a job on AWX, it directly checks the code and uses it. Since the code is not preserved locally but kept in the cloud, it is safe and nobody can tamper with it. When it comes to safety, that is a major thing. Automation features allow the code to be accessed from any tools we use, so the jobs we run are helping tremendously and doing their work perfectly. For pipeline tasks, we have created a significant amount of pipelines, which are all hosted in GitLab. Running the pipelines has become much easier, and they are doing a perfect job, helping tremendously in our day-to-day activities. GitLab has positively impacted my organization because previously we stored code locally on servers, leading to many risks. Since GitLab came into our environment, our integration and deployments became much easier, helping our work become much smoother. Improvements from GitLab have led to better team collaboration because when several people are working, they can all edit the code and submit it as a merge request, and once approved, it reflects directly to the main branch. Many can work at the same time. When it comes to deployments, deploying has become much faster since we started using GitLab, and even if errors occur, we can spot them easily and troubleshoot, which has helped tremendously.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The CX1 is a unified platform that covers all components such as SAST, SCA, DAST, container scanning, and infrastructure code, which is quite beneficial because some clients need one-stop solutions for all their needs."
"This helps us a lot in identifying vulnerabilities in early stages, and the integration within the IDEs helps developers get the results into their IDE itself, making it easier for them to fix vulnerabilities."
"The detailed reports from Checkmarx SAST help with our security process by showing details about which line is actually vulnerable, which is beneficial for the developers, and I do not have any suggestions or inputs on that area."
"The most important competitive advantage and benefit is the ability to identify vulnerabilities in the source code immediately without needing to complete the coding."
"The most important feature is that Checkmarx protects our company against attacks."
"I find the features and version control history to be most valuable for our development workflow. These aspects provide us with a clear view of changes and help us manage requests efficiently."
"The most valuable feature of GitLab is its security."
"It is a speedy platform compared to the others I have used, and I have also enjoyed using the platform as this solution offers a good user experience."
"I would definitely recommend the solution to other organizations."
"Key features allow creation of well-presented Wiki that includes ideas, development, and domains."
"Overall, this is a good product that has a lot of features."
"GitLab has positively impacted our organization by making our code very secure because GitLab prides itself on security."
"In our software development lifecycle, GitLab is used as a component for code repository management. We use GitLab for several projects to handle code repositories. For other software projects, we use Bitbucket, but the use case for both is very similar."
 

Cons

"The accuracy of the results depends on various factors, as some of the test folders tend to give us false positives, which makes a huge impact on the vulnerabilities."
"The main challenge with Checkmarx SAST is the price. The price is a challenge because Checkmarx SAST is a very big brand, and many mid-sized companies cannot afford it as they are very price-conscious."
"I believe that nothing in particular could be improved about Checkmarx SAST, only the turnaround time and the fact that technical account managers keep moving around, which leads to some lag in communication."
"The on-premises version is more expensive compared to the cloud version."
"We had some issues where Checkmarx did not recognize a vulnerability. We had to talk with the vendor, and they had to include an improvement in the tool to resolve this issue."
"GitLab could improve the patch repository. It does not have support for Conan patch version regions. Additionally, better support for Kubernetes deployment is needed as part of the package."
"We do face issues in our company when we run out of disk space."
"GitLab's Windows version is yet not available and having this would be an improvement."
"It would be really good if they integrated more features in application security."
"It would be better if there weren't any outages. There are occasions where we usually see a lot of outages using GitLab. It happens at least once a week or something like that. Whatever pipelines you're running, to check the logs, you need to have a different set of tools like Argus or something like that. If you have pipelines running on GitLab, you need a separate service deployed to view the logs, which is kind of a pain. If the logs can be used conveniently on GitLab, that would be definitely helpful. I'm not talking about the CI/CD pipelines but the back-end services and microservices deployed over GitLab. To view the logs for those microservices, you need to have separate log viewers, which is kind of a pain."
"I've noticed an area for improvement in GitLab, particularly needing to go through many steps to push the code to the repository. Resolving that issue would make the product better. My team quickly fixed it by writing a small script, then double-clicking or enabling the script to take care of the issue. However, that quick fix was from my team and not the GitLab team, so in the next release, if an automatic deployment feature would be available in GitLab, then that would be good because, in Visual Studio, you can do that with just one click of a button."
"The tool should include a feature that helps to edit the code directly."
"GitLab would be improved with the addition of templates for deployment on local PCs."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"The open-source version is very good and the commercial version is reasonably priced."
"There are different licensing options available, including a free limited-user license."
"It seems reasonable. Our IT team manages the licenses."
"The initial setup cost is excellent and you can add the premium features later."
"As I work in a vast enterprise, I'm unsure about the licensing cost for GitLab. It's the management team that takes care of that."
"In total, I believe we have more than 300 licenses spread over about 100 users, though I can't comment on the costs involved."
"Its price is fine. It is on the cheaper side and not expensive. You have to pay additionally for GitLab CI/CD minutes. Initially, we used the free version. When we ran out of GitLab minutes, we migrated to the paid version."
"It is very expensive. We can't bear it now, and we have to find another solution. We have a yearly subscription in which we can increase the number of licenses, but we have to pay at the end of the year."
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917,433 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
10%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business39
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise49
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Checkmarx SAST?
We were users in a small country, and we paid one consolidated bill for all the tools, so I don't know the specific amount for Checkmarx.
What needs improvement with Checkmarx SAST?
I believe that nothing in particular could be improved about Checkmarx SAST, only the turnaround time and the fact that technical account managers keep moving around, which leads to some lag in com...
What is your primary use case for Checkmarx SAST?
I manage the application security side of the products here, currently utilizing solutions such as Checkmarx, Akamai, Traceable, and Invicti, which are the security scanning tools that we use. In t...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for GitLab?
The setup cost for GitLab is minimal since the team has its own minimal resource balancing. The costing falls into an intermediate stage and is impactful across all results within the team. It allo...
What needs improvement with GitLab?
There are many improvements that GitLab can implement, such as addressing the issue of caching. Currently, when I have multiple tasks to merge or attempt multiple merges, the CI/CD and overall GitL...
What is your primary use case for GitLab?
My main use case for GitLab is as a version control system that we are using. Currently, I am working on an end-to-end AI pipeline, and I have deployed my whole code using GitLab so that all things...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

SAST
Fuzzit
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
1. NASA  2. IBM  3. Sony  4. Alibaba  5. CERN  6. Siemens  7. Volkswagen  8. ING  9. Ticketmaster  10. SpaceX  11. Adobe  12. Intuit  13. Autodesk  14. Rakuten  15. Unity Technologies  16. Pandora  17. Electronic Arts  18. Nordstrom  19. Verizon  20. Comcast  21. Philips  22. Deutsche Telekom  23. Orange  24. Fujitsu  25. Ericsson  26. Nokia  27. General Electric  28. Cisco  29. Accenture  30. Deloitte  31. PwC  32. KPMG
Find out what your peers are saying about Checkmarx SAST vs. GitLab and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
917,433 professionals have used our research since 2012.