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Cybersecurity · head to head

Ory vs Qualys VMDR

Ory logo

Ory

Cybersecurity

Open-source identity, authentication, and permissions infrastructure

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 Ory has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Ory production and Growth plans are billed annually ($770/year and $9,350/year), which is a larger upfront commitment than monthly-only competitors.; 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: Ory covers Authentication APIs, Qualys VMDR covers Cloud Agent.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 30 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Ory and Qualys VMDR actually diverge.

Attributes where Ory and Qualys VMDR differ
AttributeOryQualys VMDR
Starting priceFree$3/month
Pricing modelusage-basedsubscription
Free tierYesNo
Platformsweb, apiWeb, 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 Ory

  • Authentication APIs
  • Permissions engine
  • Machine-to-machine tokens
  • B2B organizations
  • SAML SSO
  • Multi-region deployments

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.

Ory

  • Adding self-hosted or cloud identity to a new productnot Qualys VMDR
  • Implementing fine-grained permission checksnot Qualys VMDR
  • Supporting B2B organizations and multi-tenancynot Qualys VMDR
  • Building machine-to-machine authentication for microservicesnot 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 Ory
  • PCI DSS external scanning where an approved scanning vendor report is a contractual requirementnot Ory
  • An estate spanning datacentre, multiple public clouds and endpoints that needs one vulnerability view rather than three toolsnot Ory
  • Organisations replacing a manual patch-verification process with agent-reported evidence that a fix actually landednot Ory

Where each one falls short

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

Ory

  • Production and Growth plans are billed annually ($770/year and $9,350/year), which is a larger upfront commitment than monthly-only competitors.
  • SAML SSO and multi-region deployments are reserved for the custom-priced Enterprise tier.
  • Usage-based pricing across aDAU, M2M tokens, and permission checks makes cost estimation more complex than flat per-MAU billing.

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

Ory

Free
  • DeveloperFree
    • Community support
    • No production environments
  • Production$64/month
    • $21 monthly credit included
    • 1 production environment
    • 3 staging environments
  • Growth$779/month
    • $255 monthly credit included
    • 2 production environments
    • B2B organizations (max 3)

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 Ory if

  • You need authentication apis.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on web, api.
  • You also want permissions engine.
Ory 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 Ory or Qualys VMDR better?
Neither clearly leads. Ory 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, Ory or Qualys VMDR?
Ory has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Ory and $3/month for Qualys VMDR.
Does Ory or Qualys VMDR run on more platforms?
Ory runs on web, api. Qualys VMDR runs on Web, Cloud, Api.
Can I use Ory for free?
Yes. Ory has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Qualys VMDR starts at $3/month.
What is Ory best used for?
Ory is most often used for adding self-hosted or cloud identity to a new product, implementing fine-grained permission checks, supporting b2b organizations and multi-tenancy, building machine-to-machine authentication for microservices. Of those, adding self-hosted or cloud identity to a new product and implementing fine-grained permission checks are not what Qualys VMDR is typically brought in for.
What can Ory do that Qualys VMDR cannot?
Ory covers Authentication APIs, Permissions engine, Machine-to-machine tokens, B2B organizations. Qualys VMDR covers Cloud Agent, Scanner appliances, Authenticated scanning, TruRisk scoring.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Ory: What does Ory cost?

Ory has a free Developer tier, a Production plan at $770/year including a $21 monthly credit, a Growth plan at $9,350/year including a $255 monthly credit, and custom Enterprise pricing.

Source
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.

Ory: How is usage metered?

Beyond the included credit, Ory charges per average daily active user (aDAU), per machine-to-machine token, and per permission check, with lower per-unit rates on the Growth plan.

Source
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.

Ory: What payment methods are supported?

Ory accepts credit cards (Visa, MasterCard, Amex) and bank transfer, processed via Stripe.

Source
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.

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.

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