Softwr

Cybersecurity · head to head

Milestone XProtect vs Qualys VMDR

Milestone XProtect logo

Milestone XProtect

Cybersecurity

Open platform video management software with perpetual per-device licences

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Qualys VMDR logo

Qualys VMDR

Cybersecurity

Cloud-delivered vulnerability management licensed per asset, using scanner appliances and a lightweight agent.

From
$3/month
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Milestone XProtect has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Milestone XProtect care Plus is presented as optional but is not in practice: without it, perpetual licences stop receiving version upgrades and eventually you cannot add a current camera because your frozen version does not support it.; Qualys VMDR licensing is per asset and each capability is its own subscription, so patch management, endpoint detection, web application scanning, container security and policy compliance are separate line items, and the platform demonstrated in a proof of concept is rarely the platform in the quote.
  • They diverge on capability: Milestone XProtect covers Open device support, Qualys VMDR covers Cloud Agent.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Milestone XProtect and Qualys VMDR actually diverge.

Attributes where Milestone XProtect and Qualys VMDR differ
AttributeMilestone XProtectQualys VMDR
Starting priceFree$3/month
Pricing modelOne-time purchase per device licence, plus annual Care Plussubscription
Free tierYesNo
PlatformsWindows, Web, iOS, AndroidWeb, Cloud, Api
FoundedUnknown1999

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated), category (Cybersecurity).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Milestone XProtect

  • Open device support
  • Perpetual device licences
  • Federated architecture
  • Failover recording
  • Evidence export
  • Smart Map
  • Integration platform
  • Video summarisation

Only in Qualys VMDR

  • Cloud Agent
  • Scanner appliances
  • Authenticated scanning
  • TruRisk scoring
  • Asset inventory
  • Patch Management
  • Cloud connectors
  • Container sensor

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Milestone XProtect

  • A city or transport operator running tens of thousands of cameras across federated sitesnot Qualys VMDR
  • An enterprise with mixed legacy camera brands that refuses to standardise on one manufacturernot Qualys VMDR
  • A critical infrastructure site needing failover recording servers and tamper-evident evidence exportnot Qualys VMDR
  • An integrator building a bespoke security application on top of an open VMS platformnot Qualys VMDR

Qualys VMDR

  • A hybrid workforce where scheduled network scans miss most laptops and continuous agent-based assessment is the only way to get real coveragenot Milestone XProtect
  • PCI DSS external scanning where an approved scanning vendor report is a contractual requirementnot Milestone XProtect
  • An estate spanning datacentre, multiple public clouds and endpoints that needs one vulnerability view rather than three toolsnot Milestone XProtect
  • Organisations replacing a manual patch-verification process with agent-reported evidence that a fix actually landednot Milestone XProtect

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Milestone XProtect

  • Care Plus is presented as optional but is not in practice: without it, perpetual licences stop receiving version upgrades and eventually you cannot add a current camera because your frozen version does not support it.
  • Per-device licensing means multi-sensor and multi-imager cameras consume several licences each, so a headline camera count badly understates the true licence cost of a modern design.
  • It is Windows only for servers and needs a properly designed server and storage architecture, so the software price is a fraction of a project that also needs recording servers, storage and an integrator.
  • Complexity requires trained staff or a certified integrator; organisations that install it without either end up running a large deployment on default settings and never using the features they paid for.
  • Milestone retired Kite from its portfolio in favour of Arcules from January 2025, which stranded buyers who had standardised on Kite and is a reminder that the cloud side of the portfolio has changed direction more than once.

Qualys VMDR

  • Licensing is per asset and each capability is its own subscription, so patch management, endpoint detection, web application scanning, container security and policy compliance are separate line items, and the platform demonstrated in a proof of concept is rarely the platform in the quote.
  • Ephemeral cloud instances consume asset entitlement until they age out of inventory, so an autoscaling group that creates and destroys hosts hourly can burn licence capacity on machines that existed for minutes, and controlling that means tuning purge policies rather than tuning the cloud.
  • Authenticated scanning produces materially better results than unauthenticated, but it requires storing and rotating privileged credentials for every target platform, which is a security project in its own right, and teams that skip it receive reports full of unconfirmed potential findings that nobody trusts.
  • The console is a set of modules with separate interfaces, search syntaxes and report engines, so an analyst moving between vulnerability management, policy compliance and web application scanning learns each one, and cross-module reporting usually ends in a spreadsheet or a script against the API.
  • The tool surfaces findings far faster than any organisation can remediate them, and it does not solve the ownership problem: without an agreed prioritisation policy and a named owner in IT operations, a first scan producing tens of thousands of findings becomes a dashboard that everyone learns to ignore.

Pricing, plan by plan

Milestone XProtect

Free
  • XProtect Essential+Free
    • Free for up to 8 cameras
    • No recording time limit
    • No vendor support included
  • XProtect Express+$109/one-time
    • Perpetual device licence, distributor list price
    • Single site, single server
    • Care Plus purchased separately per device per year
  • XProtect Professional+$177/one-time
    • Perpetual device licence, distributor list price
    • Multiple recording servers
    • Edge storage retrieval
  • XProtect Expert$282/one-time
    • Perpetual device licence, distributor list price
    • Failover recording servers
    • Advanced video wall and evidence handling

Qualys VMDR

$3/month
  • VMDR$3/month
    • Per asset
    • Vulnerability scanning
    • Detection
  • VMDR+$5/month
    • All VMDR features
    • Advanced analytics
    • Cloud integration
  • VMDR Complete$7/month
    • All VMDR+ features
    • Threat intel
    • Response automation

Which should you pick?

Choose Milestone XProtect if

  • You need open device support.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Windows, Web, iOS, Android.
  • You also want perpetual device licences.
Milestone XProtect review

Choose Qualys VMDR if

  • You need cloud agent.
  • You work on Web, Cloud, Api.
  • You also want scanner appliances.
Qualys VMDR review

Questions people ask

Is Milestone XProtect or Qualys VMDR better?
Neither clearly leads. Milestone XProtect starts at Free and Qualys VMDR at $3/month, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Milestone XProtect or Qualys VMDR?
Milestone XProtect has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Milestone XProtect and $3/month for Qualys VMDR.
Does Milestone XProtect or Qualys VMDR run on more platforms?
Milestone XProtect runs on Windows, Web, iOS, Android. Qualys VMDR runs on Web, Cloud, Api.
Can I use Milestone XProtect for free?
Yes. Milestone XProtect has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Qualys VMDR starts at $3/month.
What is Milestone XProtect best used for?
Milestone XProtect is most often used for a city or transport operator running tens of thousands of cameras across federated sites, an enterprise with mixed legacy camera brands that refuses to standardise on one manufacturer, a critical infrastructure site needing failover recording servers and tamper-evident evidence export, an integrator building a bespoke security application on top of an open vms platform. Of those, a city or transport operator running tens of thousands of cameras across federated sites and an enterprise with mixed legacy camera brands that refuses to standardise on one manufacturer are not what Qualys VMDR is typically brought in for.
What can Milestone XProtect do that Qualys VMDR cannot?
Milestone XProtect covers Open device support, Perpetual device licences, Federated architecture, Failover recording. Qualys VMDR covers Cloud Agent, Scanner appliances, Authenticated scanning, TruRisk scoring.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Milestone XProtect: Is XProtect really free for small sites?

Essential+ is free for up to eight cameras with no recording time limit, but it comes with no vendor support and no multi-server capability.

Qualys VMDR: Agent or scanner: which do I need?

Usually both. The agent covers endpoints and servers you control and gives continuous data; scanners cover devices you cannot install an agent on, such as network gear, printers and appliances, and provide the external perimeter view.

Milestone XProtect: Are licences perpetual or annual?

Device licences are perpetual. The annual cost is Care Plus, the support and software update contract, which you need to stay on current versions.

Qualys VMDR: Does it patch as well as detect?

Yes, through the Patch Management module, which is a separate subscription using the same agent. Core VMDR detects and prioritises but does not deploy fixes.

Milestone XProtect: What happens if I do not renew Care Plus?

The system keeps recording, but you stop getting version upgrades, and over a few years that blocks you from adding newer cameras.

Qualys VMDR: How are assets counted for licensing?

By the number of assets in inventory, which includes cloud instances and containers depending on the modules in use. Short-lived cloud assets count until they are purged, so purge settings directly affect what you consume.

Milestone XProtect: Who owns Milestone?

Canon. The portfolio also includes BriefCam analytics and Arcules cloud video, with Arcules replacing Milestone Kite from January 2025.

Qualys VMDR: Can I keep the data in a specific region?

Yes. Qualys operates several regional platform instances and you choose which one your subscription lives on. Moving between them later is not trivial, so decide before onboarding.

Qualys VMDR: Does it scan web applications?

Web Application Scanning is a separate module licensed per application, not part of core VMDR, and it is a dynamic scanner with the usual limits around authenticated flows in single-page applications.

Share

Related pages

More on Milestone XProtect

More on Qualys VMDR

Keep looking

Other head to heads