SecurityScorecard: Top Competitors, Alternatives and Reviews
A side-by-side comparison of SecurityScorecard with its main competitors. Easily compare performance across multiple categories and understand what the market is saying with independent reviews.
A side-by-side comparison of SecurityScorecard with its main competitors. Easily compare performance across multiple categories and understand what the market is saying with independent reviews.
UpGuard manages cyber risk everywhere it lives: your vendors, your internet-facing attack surface, and your workforce. You get one platform that connects all three risk areas instead of separate tools and spreadsheets stitched together. A risk in one surfaces in the others automatically. A breached vendor flags your own exposure. A leaked employee credential links straight to the account and the vendor involved. AI handles the repetitive work of triaging alerts, reviewing vendor evidence, and completing questionnaires. That means lean security teams can run programs that would otherwise need much bigger teams. UpGuard fits mid-market teams, deploys quickly, and slots in without replacing what you already have.
SecurityScorecard is a cybersecurity ratings platform that monitors external-facing vendor networks. It aggregates risk signals from various sources to produce vendor security ratings. SecurityScorecard integrates with SIEM and GRC tools and provides insights that mitigate supply chain attacks. However, risk assessment workflows are managed separately via the Atlas module, which can lead to fragmented processes that could delay vendor assessment delivery and impact program efficiency.
Bitsight is a cybersecurity ratings platform that continuously monitors organizational and vendor security postures. It collects and analyzes data from multiple sources—including botnet and malware intelligence—to offer evidence-based risk insights. Bitsight also integrates with GRC and TPRM workflows, allowing teams to proactively mitigate threats across their extended supply chain. However, Bitsight's pricing structure can complicate scalability.
Black Kite is a third-party cyber risk management platform emphasizing external risk visibility, financial impact modeling, and compliance automation. Black Kite uses non-intrusive OSINT-based scans to discover assets and vulnerabilities, presenting findings as easy-to-read letter grades. However, by excluding critical TPRM workflows, Black Kite's potential for effective third-party risk management is significantly limited.
RiskRecon specializes in external security monitoring and asset attribution with strong accuracy and strong cloud scanning capabilities, which are particularly valuable for IT-centric organizations. Owned by Mastercard, RiskRecon has stable financial backing and solid scanning accuracy. However, it remains primarily focused on external scan strengths and takes a partnership-first approach to TPRM workflows.
Key strengths
UpGuard unifies vendor, attack surface, and workforce risk in one console. Customers describe finally seeing the whole picture, rather than paying for three tools that each cover only part of it. UpGuard also surfaces exposures that ratings tools and scanners miss, without the multi-week delay of a typical scan cycle. Lean teams can run the entire program without expanding headcount or adding a managed service.
SecurityScorecard covers an extensive range of cyber intelligence, drawing from open, proprietary, and dark web sources to identify vendor security risks and assess IP reputation risks. SecurityScorecard's well-known A-F letter grade system makes it approachable for executives and large enterprises.
In addition to risk monitoring, Bitsight employs analytical forecasting to estimate future security trajectories. It integrates with platforms like ServiceNow, JIRA, and PowerBI to suit more advanced workflows. This network of partnerships, coupled with strong institutional acceptance, reinforces Bitsight's profile with complex organizations.
Black Kite takes a diverse approach to cyber risk quantification with a methodology heavily based on the Open FAIR™ standard. This allows Black Kite to derive their varying cyber risk insights from a consistent quantification base.
RiskRecon provides a notably accurate external scanning solution and offers practical remediation guidance. It even prioritizes vulnerabilities by asset value for IT teams.
Key weaknesses
UpGuard focuses on managing live, connected risk, not heavy, standalone compliance software. Full governance features, including policy and controls management, arrive later this year. Teams that need a mature governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) system of record today can run UpGuard alongside one for now. UpGuard also doesn’t translate risk into dollar figures. If financial risk quantification is a must-have, factor that into your evaluation.
SecurityScorecard's staggered scan cycles disrupts real-time vendor security posture visibility. IP attribution issues are also cited as common scanning problems. Additionally, vendor monitoring and risk assessments are licensed separately, which may increase purchasing complexity and limit coverage of end-to-end visibility of supply chain vendors.
Bitsight's pricing structures can quickly escalate operational expenses for TPRM programs and create complicated decisions regarding the extent of risk visibility that can be deployed for vendors within a supply chain. Customers additionally cite attribution challenges for risks and assets within shared IP and cloud environments, which require support request submissions to address. Monitoring and assessment capabilities are also separately licensed, which may increase purchasing complexity and limit end-to-end coverage to several vendors within supply chains.
Black Kite does not offer vendor questionnaires or risk assessments as part of their solution offerings. While Black Kite's quantification-forward approach may be sufficient for some, customers with requirements for vendor security reviews and assurance documents for compliance needs will likely require an additional solution for this capability.
RiskRecon takes a partnership and integration-first approach to vendor assessment workflows. This necessitates the adoption of an additional solution provider to achieve an optimal assessment experience, as supported by the RiskRecon platform.
Usability and learning curve
Teams deploy quickly and get up and running without an extended onboarding period. New employees can learn the interface without lengthy training. A single console consolidates workflows that would otherwise require multiple tools, reducing the ongoing burden of learning and maintaining separate systems. Operating the platform doesn’t require a professional services engagement.
SecurityScorecard's dashboards and clear A-F grading help non-technical stakeholders quickly grasp vendor risk exposure. However, some users report multiple drill-down steps required to reach specific risk insights, which could lengthen new user learning curves.
Bitsight is generally intuitive for professionals familiar with security ratings, with an interface offering clear vendor risk summaries. However, some advanced features require more expertise and time to leverage effectively, particularly when deploying Bitsight's separate modules for monitoring and risk assessments.
Black Kite's interface is designed around letter-grade dashboards and detailed risk findings for its range of quantification options offered. However, insights for each focused rating are not clearly segmented by audience and often bleed across the entire platform. This can make the relevance of platform insights less consistent for specialized users, even within teams.
RiskRecon is focused on delivering clear, actionable findings for IT and SecOps-centric security teams with a clean interface for surfacing and remediating risks. While its limited scope of purely external scan data can simplify usage, complications can quickly arise for those integrating RiskRecon with a partner provider for assessment workflows.
Cyber risk data accuracy
UpGuard’s data remains current. Vendor postures refresh continuously, and users can initiate a scan on demand instead of waiting for a fixed cycle. UpGuard attributes findings accurately, so teams do not spend weeks correcting assets assigned to the wrong company, a common issue with ratings tools. Threat Monitoring scans the open, deep, and dark web, along with social media, for leaked data, exposed credentials, and brand impersonation. AI filters out noise so the alerts that reach your team are worth acting on.
SecurityScorecard offers extensive data collection across public-facing and dark web sources, though users occasionally report inaccurate attribution or misflagged IPs requiring support.
Bitsight is widely recognized for malware and botnet reporting, though attribution to hosting providers or shared IP ranges can lead to accuracy challenges requiring correction support.
The platform gathers data from a large set of OSINT feeds and uses standards-based scoring (MITRE, NIST, Open FAIR™) to reduce false positives. However, some users note occasional duplication or outdated issues that require manual dispute or re-validation.
RiskRecon is well regarded for accurate asset attribution, resulting in reliable and actionable insights.
Vendor risk management features
UpGuard runs the complete third-party risk management (TPRM) process in one platform: onboarding, assessing, remediating, monitoring, and reporting on vendors. Each vendor’s live external exposure and any linked leaked credentials appear directly within the vendor program, so teams can act on verified risk instead of relying on paperwork. AI-powered security questionnaires read vendor evidence and complete assessments automatically, cutting completion time by up to 95%. Instant risk assessments return a point-in-time report in under a minute, mapped to frameworks like ISO 27001 and NIST CSF 2.0.
SecurityScorecard's VRM workflow requires a separate module named Atlas for security questionnaire and risk assessment processes. This can introduce complexity into this process.
Bitsight supports third-party monitoring and risk workflows, including vendor onboarding, but relies on a separately licensed module for vendor risk assessments and workflows.
Although Black Kite offers document analysis features, the platform can be seen as primarily geared toward detecting and quantifying cyber risks rather than offering fully integrated VRM workflows.
RiskRecon focuses on external scanning to calculate vendor risk and relies on partner integrations to offer risk assessment workflows, resulting in additional costs.
Attack surface management features
UpGuard continuously monitors your internet-facing footprint. It maps assets, flags exposures such as misconfigurations, expired certificates, and open ports, and ranks remediation priorities. The UpGuard platform also detects typosquatting and lookalike domains set up to impersonate your brand before they’re used for phishing. Because attack surface monitoring runs alongside vendor and workforce risk, an exposed asset or leaked credential automatically links to the person and vendor involved. This gives teams visibility into both external exposure and vendor risk in a single view.
SecurityScorecard offers views into an organization's attack surface by leveraging IP scanning and attribution of identified domains and assets. The platform's approach helps users identify potential weaknesses in their digital footprint that an attacker might exploit.
Bitsight's External Attack Surface Management module is designed to discover hidden assets, provide detailed digital asset insights, and detect vulnerabilities such as unsupported product versions.
Black Kite uses OSINT data spanning domain records, subdomains, SSL certificates, and more to deliver visibility into a vendor's external footprint.
RiskRecon focuses on high-accuracy external scanning and asset discovery, offering precise identification of vulnerabilities.
Customer support
UpGuard supports every customer across all plan tiers, from the smallest plan to the largest. Support teams assist with both technical setup and larger program decisions. Customers frequently cite responsive, hands-on support as a reason they continue with UpGuard.
Generally supportive for enterprise levels, with a community of free users. However, customers at lower licensing tiers report slower responses and less personalized support.
Bitsight provides reputable support, particularly for large enterprises with dedicated account teams. Smaller organizations may experience less responsiveness and find self-service documentation limited.
Black Kite's users report mixed support experiences: some find support teams responsive with weekly check-ins, while others cite slower resolution times and inconsistent follow-up on false positives and duplicate findings.
RiskRecon offers stable support with detailed product documentation and guides available.
Workflow automation
Risk Automations turns a risk signal into action across the platform, with no code and no engineering ticket. On the vendor side, it automates onboarding from questionnaire data, triages vendor score drops, schedules recurring vendor reports, and opens remediation tickets in ServiceNow or Jira. On the threat side, a Breach Risk detection can trigger a workflow that alerts Teams or Slack and runs a system-level fix, like blocking a malicious IP or forcing a credential reset. This is the difference between a tool that reports on risk and one that resolves it.
SecurityScorecard's workflow automation features let users create rule-based triggers that automatically respond to security events, such as score drops, new high-severity issues, or breaches. Users can choose from a range of automated response actions, including alert activation, report sharing, and reassigning scorecards for further review
Bitsight integrates with SOAR platforms, allowing users to automate responses to newly discovered risks. However, advanced automation requirements, such as those addressing Vendor Risk Management workflows, require add-on services or third-party tools for complete automation.
Black Kite's Bridge™ module lets users automate vendor outreach and gather risk data during major security events, such as global-scale data breaches.
It primarily automates external scanning and asset discovery, generating action plans and prioritized remediations. However, it lacks built-in automation for the end-to-end assessment cycle, relying on integrations or manual processes.
Artificial intelligence features
UpGuard’s AI performs specific, defined tasks, rather than vague “AI-powered” work. The AI Threat Analyst sorts and scores incoming threats across your attack surface, the dark web, and social media. It clears out approximately 60% of alerts as noise, so your team only reviews what matters. The same triage logic extends to vendor and workforce signals as well. Every AI result carries a citation back to the source, so your team can verify it before acting.
SecurityScorecard offers a branded AI capability named HEID. HEID’s operational workflows are primarily geared toward SecurityScoreCard's MAX managed service offering, with claims that AI can generate automated remediation and questionnaire requests as risks arise. SecurityScorecard claims that HEID AI is available as a backend capability for customers with non-service plans, and it is used in its algorithms for risk scoring and classification of issue criticality.
Bitsight offers a branded AI capability named Groma. Groma is primarily built to support improved risk scoring, identification and attribution of digital assets, and enhanced criticality classification of risk findings. Bitsight is additionally investing in AI development for TPRM workflows and threat detection capabilities. However, whether this will add to their Groma-branded capability or be released as integrated, separate offerings is unclear.
Black Kite offers an AI-based document scanner aimed at reducing manual questionnaire reviews and accelerating compliance mapping of vendor security postures. However, connectivity to workflows supporting other assessment operations (such as requesting further evidence via questionnaires or other documentation) is not supported without integrating with a separately deployed TPRM solution.
Risk Recon uses AI to primarily support the detection of potential risks and vulnerabilities in supplier security postures. However, its use of AI to support vendor assessments highly depends on capabilities made available by partner providers.
API and integrations
A well-documented REST API and webhooks let teams pull risk data into their own tools and trigger actions programmatically, without waiting on engineering support. For no-code work, Risk Automations adds more than 100 native integrations, including Jira, ServiceNow, Microsoft Entra, Slack, and Cloudflare. A Universal API Connector Node extends its reach to any open API.
SecurityScoreCard offers an extensive marketplace of integrations with security, GRC, and workflow platforms. However, integrations tend to primarily focus on score visibility in other platforms rather than workflow extensibility. Offers integrations with several third-party platforms, such as RSA Archer, ServiceNow, and more.
Bitsight integrates with popular platforms like ServiceNow and Splunk, offering APIs for custom reporting and automation. Offers integrations with RSA Archer GRC, CyberGRX, OneTrust Vendorpedia, ProcessUnity, MetricStream, and more.
While no exhaustive list of native integrations is publicly available, Black Kite generally supports exporting scan results to external systems.
RiskRecon features basic integration options for exporting findings and connecting with ticketing systems or GRC solutions. Offers integrations with GRC platforms, such as RSA Archer, Sigma Ratings, Whistic, and more.
Purchasing & licensing transparency
UpGuard publishes its pricing rather than hiding it behind a sales call. A free tier lets teams monitor up to five vendors and use Trust Exchange, UpGuard’s AI-powered questionnaire tool, at no cost. Paid Vendor Risk plans start at USD 1,750 per month, billed annually. Teams can start with one product and add others as they scale. One license covers both monitoring and assessments, so pricing doesn’t fragment across separate products.
Public pricing information is not available. Offers a free plan and a 14-day free trial for paid plans.
Public pricing is not available. Does not publically offer a free trial.
Public pricing details are limited. Costs typically rise based on the number of monitored vendors, which can become significant for large supply chains. Some organizations report that the step up in licensing for “critical” vendors can be expensive.
Public pricing is not available. Does not publically offer a free trial.
Customers
UpGuard customers include Intercontinental Exchange (NYSE: ICE), Morningstar, TDK, PagerDuty, Hopin, and IAG. Read UpGuard’s customer stories to learn more.
Major customers include Hershey, Cleveland Clinic, Avangrid, and ADT.
Major customers include Optus / Singtel, The University of North Florida, Snam, and PROSA.
Major customers include Morgan Lewis, Healthfirst, Navy Federal, and Maersk.
Major customers include Informatica, Tufts Health Plan, the University of San Francisco, and Sentara.
G2 rating Accurate as of March 2025
More than 700 verified reviews give UpGuard a 4.5 out of 5 rating on G2. UpGuard also holds G2’s top ranking as the leader in Third-Party & Supplier Risk Management for 15 consecutive quarters. The 2026 G2 Best Software Awards recognized UpGuard as one of the Top 100 Global Software Companies. Among verified reviewers, 98% give UpGuard four- or five-star ratings, and 94% approve of its product direction.
SecurityScorecard’s pricing is structured into multiple tiers designed to serve a range of organizations—from those needing basic self‐monitoring to large enterprises requiring comprehensive third‐party risk and supply chain management.
SecurityScorecard does not publicly disclose its pricing. Prospects need to book a demo of the product and speak with a sales representative to receive a quote.
Here’s an overview of SecurityScorecard’s plans and services:
Free plan
Includes a 14-day trial of Business Plan features, real-time visibility into your organization’s internet-facing assets, and a basic security rating snapshot. Limited to self-monitoring with no vendor tracking.
Free trial
SecurityScorecard offers a 14-day free trial of its Business Plan features like monitoring up to 5 companies, daily alerts, and integrations. Converts to the limited Free Plan post-trial unless upgraded.
Business plan
Covers monitoring up to 5 companies (e.g., your organization plus four vendors), daily alerts, basic API access, and integrations (e.g., Slack, Jira). Aimed at small to mid-sized businesses with basic TPRM needs.
Enterprise plan
Includes a custom number of monitored scorecards (e.g., 50–200+ vendors), advanced features like automated compliance frameworks, proactive alerting, and a dedicated Customer Success Manager.
MAX
MAX is a premium, hands‑on offering where a dedicated team works closely with you and your vendors to monitor and actively remediate supply chain security risks. In addition to the Enterprise plan’s features, MAX includes comprehensive board‑level reporting and prioritized support from a dedicated customer success manager.
SSC’s MAX managed service packages are divided into three pricing tiers: MAX Siver, MAX Gold, and MAX Platnum. As with the Enterprise tier, MAX pricing is customized to your organization’s specific needs, and you must contact sales to obtain a quote.
Add-ons and additional costs
The following additional features and services could increase costs:
Additional Monitored Scorecards: Pricing scales with the number of entities (vendors, subsidiaries) monitored beyond the base package.
MAX Managed Service: A premium add-on for supply chain detection and response, including proactive threat hunting and vendor remediation support.
Advanced Analytics and Reporting: Features like Attack Surface Intelligence (ASI) for software-specific vulnerabilities or custom compliance mapping (e.g., NIST, GDPR) may be premium add-ons, especially in Enterprise plans.
API and Integrations: Additional fees could apply to advanced or high-volume API usage (e.g., for SIEM/SOAR integrations).
Threat Intelligence: Enhanced breach or threat data may add costs for non-enterprise users.
How does SecurityScorecard’s pricing compare to its competitors?
UpGuard
UpGuard’s pricing starts at USD 1,750 per month. ROI is maximized with natively integrated end-to-end TPRM workflows - a key differentiator that saves users from paying for additional tools to fill TPRM process gaps.
It also offers:
Free access to the platform for monitoring up to five vendors, where you also get access to risk ratings and assessment and remediation workflows.
Unlimited free access to its vendor questionnaire and trust management tool, Trust Exchange
Bitsight does not publicly disclose its pricing but is reportedly in the premium segment. Although a free trial is not offered, they offer a free security rating and industry benchmark report.
Third-party risk management enhancements—such as automated vendor remediation workflows or integrations with external platforms like ServiceNow or OneTrust—can elevate subscription costs. Additional costs are also tied to Bitsight’s managed service tiers (Low, Medium, or High Touch), each featuring different degrees of hands-on support.
RIskRecon does not publicly disclose its pricing. Costs are reportedly dependent on the number of vendors being monitored. The company offers a 30-day free trial that covers monitoring up to 50 vendors. Once the trial concludes, users are automatically upgraded to a 12-month paid subscription unless a written cancelation notice is provided at least 15 days prior to the trial’s end.
After the first year, RiskRecon’s annual fees can rise by the higher of 3% or the Consumer Price Index.
OneTrust does not publicly disclose its pricing. A free trial is not offered.
Add-ons, such as Vendorpedia (a third-party risk management module), Data Mapping Automation, or advanced Privacy Requests/DSAR Automation, can increase monthly fees. Specialized solutions—such as Mobile App Consent, OTT/CTV Consent, or AI Governance—may be sold separately and often priced according to usage volume (e.g., the number of data records or transactions).
OneTrust also reportedly charges an implementation fee.
Black Kite does not publically disclose any pricing information. Black Kite does not charge extra for essential services like onboarding, configuration, or additional user licenses. Instead, the pricing is customized based on an organization’s requirements, ensuring cost certainty without unexpected fees.
Upgrading to advanced threat intelligence feeds, adopting the Bridge™feature for deep-dive analytics, or leveraging specialized modules for supply chain risk can rapidly increase the subscription total. Similarly, if your vendor ecosystem expands, extra charges may apply.
Black Kite does not publically offer a free trial, but they do offer a free cyber risk assessment.
Vanta does not disclose any pricing information. A free plan and a free trial are not offered. TPRM programs needing to track compliance across multiple standards will need to pay for each additional framework beyond the basic offering of a single standard, such as ISO 27001. The platform does not natively support the entire TPRM lifecycle, so users will have to invest in additional tools to build an end-to-end TPRM workflow.
Gartner Peer Insights Overall ratings for the IT VRM Solutions market. Accurate as of January 2024
4.4, based on 160 reviews. Named a Representative Vendor in the 2022 Gartner Market Guide for IT VRM Solutions
4.5, based on 259 reviews.
4.5, based on 261 reviews
4.8, based on 159 reviews
4.2, based on 61 reviews
G2 rating Accurate as of March 2025
More than 700 verified reviews give UpGuard a 4.5 out of 5 rating on G2. UpGuard also holds G2’s top ranking as the leader in Third-Party & Supplier Risk Management for 15 consecutive quarters. The 2026 G2 Best Software Awards recognized UpGuard as one of the Top 100 Global Software Companies. Among verified reviewers, 98% give UpGuard four- or five-star ratings, and 94% approve of its product direction.
