Microsoft Defender XDR vs. Tenable Nessus

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Microsoft Defender XDR
Score 8.7 out of 10
N/A
Microsoft 365 Defender combines SIEM and XDR capabilities for Microsoft 365 environments, encompassing threat detection, post-breach detection, automated investigation, and response for endpoints. Additionally, it protects cloud apps, emails and documents, and employee identities.N/A
Tenable Nessus
Score 8.7 out of 10
N/A
Tenable headquartered in Columbia offers Nessus, a vulnerability scanning and security assessment solution used to analyze an entity's security posture, vulnerability testing, and provide configuration assessments.
$2,790
Pricing
Microsoft Defender XDRTenable Nessus
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
1 Year
$2,790.00
1 Year + Advanced Support
$3,190.00
2 Years
$5,440.00
2 Years + Advanced Support
$6,240.00
3 Years
$7,951.00
3 Years + Advanced Support
$9,151.00
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Microsoft Defender XDRTenable Nessus
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Microsoft Defender XDRTenable Nessus
Features
Microsoft Defender XDRTenable Nessus
Threat Intelligence
Comparison of Threat Intelligence features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft Defender XDR
-
Ratings
Tenable Nessus
6.2
4 Ratings
26% below category average
Network Analytics00 Ratings1.12 Ratings
Threat Recognition00 Ratings7.04 Ratings
Vulnerability Classification00 Ratings9.53 Ratings
Automated Alerts and Reporting00 Ratings10.03 Ratings
Threat Analysis00 Ratings5.53 Ratings
Threat Intelligence Reporting00 Ratings5.03 Ratings
Automated Threat Identification00 Ratings5.53 Ratings
Vulnerability Management Tools
Comparison of Vulnerability Management Tools features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft Defender XDR
-
Ratings
Tenable Nessus
7.5
4 Ratings
10% below category average
IT Asset Realization00 Ratings7.03 Ratings
Authentication00 Ratings7.53 Ratings
Configuration Monitoring00 Ratings8.04 Ratings
Web Scanning00 Ratings5.53 Ratings
Vulnerability Intelligence00 Ratings9.34 Ratings
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User Ratings
Microsoft Defender XDRTenable Nessus
Likelihood to Recommend
8.7
(83 ratings)
9.0
(9 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
7.7
(4 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Usability
9.0
(2 ratings)
8.0
(5 ratings)
Support Rating
9.0
(3 ratings)
7.1
(4 ratings)
In-Person Training
9.1
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Online Training
9.1
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Microsoft Defender XDRTenable Nessus
Likelihood to Recommend
Microsoft
Microsoft Defender XDR is well suited for organizations already invested in the Microsoft Ecosystem - including Microsoft 365, Azure Ad and INTune. For example, in scenarios where you need to correlament the fishing attacks with the closing point behavior and identity agreement, Microsoft Defender XDR does a big task of sewing the timeline of a full attack simultaneously and even automatically removing.
This hybrid function is also ideal for the environment, where safety visibility in distance tools, cloud apps and email is important. Microsoft Defender XDR provides centralized insight and response in all these domains without the requirement of many devices.
However, it is less suitable in the atmosphere with diverse or non-microsoft infrastructure, such as an organization running a mixture of Linux server, Google work area or third-party EDR tools. Cross-platform support is still developing, and integration of the microsoft ecosystem often requires additional configurations or third-party connectors. For companies of that situation, Microsoft Defender XDR cannot give its full value from the XDR box.
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Tenable
It is an excellent tool for scanning servers, workstations, and network devices to identify missing patches and misconfiguration; we regularly use it to confirm patch effectiveness after the update; it also helps us for preparing audits such as iso 27001, and regulatory requirements, it also helps us to identify open ports and services that violate security.
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Pros
Microsoft
  • The software uses advanced AI and machine learning algorithms to monitor activities and detect any anomalies immediately, protecting our financial data.
  • Automated responses to known threats reduce the impact of possible incidents and improve our security posture.
  • Microsoft 365 Defender easily combines with other Microsoft 365 services and external security solutions, providing a complete and unified security solution.
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Tenable
  • Nessus is best at performing vulnerability scans, in fact, it gives findings and moreover accurate findings of the assessments. It does not do penetration testing or exploit the vulnerabilities because it is concerned about scanning the systems/applications.
  • In fact, Nessus has multiple profiles/policies to perform different types of scans such as, scans oriented for PCI-DSS, malware scans, web application scans, bad shell shock detection scan to name a few.
  • Nessus has the ability to classify the vulnerabilities into risk-based categories from critical to even informational which I think is one of the things that separates Nessus from other vulnerability scanners.
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Cons
Microsoft
  • Enhanced False Positive Mitigation:
  • Improved algorithms to minimize false positives in threat detection, reducing the impact on security teams and preventing unnecessary investigations into non-threatening incidents.
  • Advanced User-Friendly Interface:
  • Streamlined and intuitive user interface for the centralized dashboard, making it more accessible for security professionals with varying levels of expertise.
  • Greater Third-Party Integration:
  • Increased compatibility and integration capabilities with a broader range of third-party security tools
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Tenable
  • The tool has lots of options for setting up before scanning any device, this methodology could be simplified further with default configuration for various devices predefined, anyhow we can use this technique by making use of policies.
  • For advanced users we cannot disable the plugins inside the plugin groups, we can enable the whole set of plugins at a time, for few hundreds its ok, but thousands of plugins are of waste of resource and time.
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Likelihood to Renew
Microsoft
We are likely to renew our used of Microsoft defender XDR due to its comprehensive security features, integration capabilities, and the proactive approach to threat detection and response it enables. It’s often seen as a valuable asset in maintaining robust cybersecurity defenses. The automated responses aids the IT team in our business to respond to threats as soon as they appear.
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Tenable
Nessus is best and easy to use application for Vulnerabilities finding and reporting, it has multiple platforms and wide scope covering almost all devices for security improvement so far, thus we are very likely to continue its services.
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Usability
Microsoft
integrated with windows OS, so pre installed and no mucking around afterwards
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Tenable
Tenable Nessus is a great product and provides a lot of value, but it is difficult to set up and use and the amount of data it generates can be overwhelming. It does help us prioritize based on the severity of the detection, however there are sometimes mitigating factors that we have implemented that Nessus does not account for, which causes lots of noise in the reports.
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Support Rating
Microsoft
Their support throughout our onboarding of the product was fabulous. They not only took the time to carefully explain to teams not as well equipped with the lingo but explained to the tech team how to teach the other teams to be successful. They never once seemed impatient or annoyed with basic questions and didn’t pretend to know something when they needed to research an answer
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Tenable
I haven't needed to contact support yet. But issues are easily solved with a quick internet search which means support and by extension, the larger community are involved and knowledgeable.
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In-Person Training
Microsoft
Good and hard to find someonme who can explain everything for you beside Microsoft they provide you everything you need.
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Tenable
No answers on this topic
Online Training
Microsoft
Microsoft Provides a good training for the Microsoft 365 Defender and has a good learning paths to learn and take the exams and get your Certifications.
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Tenable
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
Microsoft
seemless and almost transparent. can be deployed by script if needed so every endpoint on our system get's it. if you have intune it gets dumped on the the endpoint by policy so nothing escapes it
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Tenable
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
Microsoft
Our product in that area, for instance as a security platform and for us it is for the moment really bad point. We started to move in that direction that there is that disconnect from the client management. So if there is some action that needs to be executed detected by security team, there is not an easy way to make that available to the team that is responsible for managing the identities as users, as the devices
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Tenable
Sometimes when we identify a vulnerability with Nessus that has an exploit, we made a proof of concept with Metasploit in order to show to the IT managers the importance of the software/hardware hardening.
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Return on Investment
Microsoft
  • Security incident cannot be measured, once you down you down, hence the security applications like this is just a must have
  • The subscription model will be cheaper and can be a good point if you want to free resources within the IT Team
  • The SaaS model, if measured correctly can and will reduce long term cost in Infrastructure and Man Power
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Tenable
  • Nessus certainly has a positive impact while me while performing my job, either as security research, or performing vulnerability assessments for clients. It gives a lot of information about the system/application after performing scans. The number of false positives is also less compared to other vulnerability scanners.
  • The professional edition is very useful as policy templates available in this edition are very handy and useful even to perform compliance scan like PCI DSS scan.
  • Also, the ability to export the scan results into reports in formats like HTML, PDF is very useful which could be for performing system/application reviews.
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ScreenShots

Microsoft Defender XDR Screenshots

Screenshot of AH Advanced ModeScreenshot of AH Guided modeScreenshot of CD exampleScreenshot of CD Supported actions