Secureframe vs Vanta vs Drata: Core Differences (& Who Comes Out on Top)

If you're evaluating Secureframe vs Vanta, you're already on the right path and recognize that manual compliance isn’t built to scale. But choosing the wrong compliance software can be just as expensive. Whether you're a CTO building trust to close enterprise deals or a Head of GRC scaling a global compliance program, the stakes are high: audit delays, lost revenue, security gaps, and frustrated teams.

Secureframe and Vanta both offer simplified paths to compliance, but Drata was built for teams that demand more—more precision, more speed, and more control over their security posture.

This guide breaks down the core differences between Drata, Vanta, and Secureframe. We show you where each platform stands on the features that matter most, including automation, frameworks, integrations, and audit experience. 

If you're looking for a solution that will not only get you audit-ready but also keep you there with minimal manual work, this side-by-side comparison will help you choose the right partner.

Meet the Contenders

Before we proceed with feature-by-feature comparisons, let’s define each platform's strengths and focus. While all three aim to simplify compliance, their approaches and ideal users differ.

Vanta

Vanta is known for its fast setup and ease of use. It’s often the first choice for early-stage startups pursuing SOC 2 for the first time. With a broad library of integrations and a polished UI, Vanta helps companies move quickly toward initial audit readiness. 

Secureframe

Secureframe emphasizes white-glove support and hands-on guidance. Its onboarding team often manages much of the initial setup, which appeals to companies that want help setting up their program quickly. It also offers a range of frameworks beyond SOC 2. 

Drata

Drata is a full-scale Trust Management platform that combines the best of both worlds: enterprise-grade automation with startup-friendly speed. Drata automates everything from evidence collection to access reviews to risk mapping, backed by deep integrations and Compliance as Code. It's ideal for companies that want to move fast and scale efficiently, with a single platform that grows alongside them.

Framework Support

Your compliance platform should scale with your business. Whether you're pursuing SOC 2 today or expanding into ISO 27001, HIPAA, or FedRAMP tomorrow, framework flexibility matters. 

Here's how Drata, Vanta, and Secureframe compare in terms of supported compliance frameworks. The more comprehensive and future-ready the list, the fewer vendor changes and manual rebuilds you’ll face as your scope expands.

Control Monitoring

Control monitoring is what keeps compliance from becoming a once-a-year fire drill. The right platform gives you visibility into control and compliance status at all times, not just during audit season.

Vanta

Vanta runs hourly automated tests across connected systems, offering teams timely alerts when controls fall out of compliance. It also features pre-built controls, and the option to bring your own (AI maps custom controls to Vanta's library of automated tests). For many startups and mid-sized companies, this is enough to maintain a strong security posture. That said, some users note gaps in coverage and customization. 

One review highlighted that “during SOC 2, some controls were missing linked automated tests and documents,” while another noted missing ISO 27701 controls during an internal audit. As teams grow or pursue additional frameworks, limited test coverage and inflexible workflows can introduce friction.

Secureframe

Secureframe provides automated monitoring through integrations with major cloud services and business tools. Users are notified when controls fall out of alignment. Through the platform, you can map controls and tests to frameworks like SOC 2 and ISO 27001, and either create your own controls or use Secureframe’s control library for pre-built options.

Feedback points to some inconsistencies in the agent’s performance and reporting speed. One user noted that the Secureframe agent occasionally marks controls as failing even when they’re correctly configured. Another mentioned delays in control status updates, saying, “It takes a few hours for the test to show up as passed after uploading documentation.” These delays aren’t deal-breakers, but they can create confusion if your team relies on real-time validation. 

Drata 

Drata delivers real-time, continuous control monitoring (CCM) across your entire tech stack. It automatically tests controls daily, updates statuses instantly, and alerts teams when anything falls out of compliance. You can even map your own custom controls and build adaptive, logic-based tests. 

Combined with Compliance as Code, Drata goes upstream to monitor risks before they reach production, giving engineering teams direct visibility and control without leaving their workflow.

Audit and Evidence Collection

How your platform handles audits says everything about how much time your team will spend managing them. Strong evidence collection and auditor workflows save you hundreds of hours, not just on the audit itself, but in prepping for it.

Vanta

Vanta does a good job of simplifying audit prep. Automated testing, linked documentation, and broad integrations help you reduce the manual lift, especially if you’re tackling SOC 2 for the first time. The overall sentiment around Vanta’s audit-readiness features is positive, and their bundled auditor relationships offer a one-stop path from readiness to reporting. 

That said, some users have run into friction, mainly when third-party auditors aren’t fully aligned on how Vanta structures evidence or tracks control changes. Others have flagged pricing transparency as a gap, especially when it comes to how fees are split between the platform and audit services.

Secureframe

Secureframe offers guided audit support and access to a network of audit firms, which is very helpful if your org is navigating its first compliance cycle. The platform handles evidence collection through integrations and structured workflows, simplifying early-stage audit prep. 

However, as teams grow or pursue multiple frameworks, users might find that Secureframe's audit workflows rely more on support than in-platform flexibility, which makes it less ideal for organizations looking to scale quickly or manage more complex environments independently.

Drata

Drata was built in close collaboration with auditors, and it shows. The platform collects evidence, organizes and presents it through Audit Hub, a shared workspace where your team and your auditor can collaborate in real time. No email chains. No lost screenshots. Every control, document, and request lives in one secure, centralized interface. 

Through the Auditor Alliance, Drata works directly with dozens of top audit firms which commit to a Drata’s Auditor Code of Ethics, which ensures auditors remain independent and commit to the highest standard of professionalism. That means better outcomes, faster turnaround, fewer surprises, and a better experience for everyone involved. Auditors know how to use Drata, what to look for, and where to find it, accelerating reviews and reducing the chance of rework or missed context.

Support and Expertise

More than just software, compliance is about guidance, relationships, and knowing what to do when the unexpected happens. A strong support ecosystem can mean the difference between a smooth audit and a painful one.

Vanta

Vanta provides solid documentation, generally reliable customer support, and has relationships with partners that span consultants, pen testers, and auditors. Reviewers happily share their positive experiences with the customer service team. 

That said, users occasionally report slower-than-expected response times and note that more personalized guidance would be helpful, especially for companies new to compliance or dealing with unique environments.

Secureframe

Secureframe is consistently praised for its white-glove service and responsive support team. Users appreciate the hands-on help, particularly in the early stages of onboarding. They also have relationships with service, technology, and audit partners.

Still, a few have pointed out that some task instructions could be clearer and more comprehensive, in a bid for less back-and-forth. Others noted that getting started felt a bit nebulous, and there’s limited direction on where to focus first. 

Drata

Drata takes a broader approach to customer success. The platform is backed by an entire ecosystem of compliance experts, including dedicated success managers, on-demand GRC advisors, and solution architects who understand the unique pressures of technical and regulated teams. Through the Compliance Accelerator Program, customers get upfront support on everything from policy setup to system configuration. And when it’s time for the audit, Drata’s team shepherds you through it with auditor-aligned documentation, preparation milestones, and real-time audit collaboration.

Just as important, Drata’s Auditor Alliance and partner ecosystem bring in additional layers of guidance, audit prep expertise, and industry-specific knowledge. It’s a network built to help you succeed long-term, not just pass an audit.

Integrations

The depth, reliability, and flexibility of integrations define how automated your compliance program truly is.

Vanta

Vanta offers a broad catalog of integrations across cloud providers, HR systems, identity platforms, and development tools. For many teams, this coverage makes it easy to get started quickly. 

However, users note that some integrations can be unpredictable or limited in functionality. In certain cases, automating scoping decisions—like excluding specific assets—requires manual intervention. Others mention that integrations occasionally behave unexpectedly, which can introduce friction when teams are relying on automation to stay audit-ready.

Secureframe

Secureframe supports a wide range (130+) of integrations with common cloud and security tools and provides guided workflows for setting them up. 

Complaints on this front do abound, though, with users flagging limitations, especially when they work with custom applications or need more detailed input to pass specific control tests. Some integrations don’t deliver clear value upfront, and users have reported unexplained errors during setup or syncing. 

Drata

With hundreds of native connections across infrastructure, identity, code, and collaboration tools, Drata’s integrations are as broad as they are deep. Evidence collection, control testing, access reviews, and policy validation all run through your existing systems without added friction. 

If your team uses tools that aren’t supported out-of-the-box, Drata’s Open API and custom connections and tests capability empowers you to build API-driven integrations and includes a builder that lets you tailor connections and logic to match your exact security posture.

Risk Management

Risk management is the basis for long-term security. All of the compliance platforms we’re comparing help you identify, assess, and manage risk across your business, just with varying degrees of success.

Vanta

Vanta has been hard at work expanding its risk and vendor management offerings, recently adding tools for risk registers and vendor assessments. These additions provide value that users praise, particularly teams who are starting to formalize their risk programs. Vanta also offers predefined risk questionnaires and guidance to help customers get up and running quickly. 

However, users note that automation is limited, particularly when it comes to vendor security questionnaires. There’s also some friction when managing non-SaaS vendors, with out-of-the-box templates that don’t always fit. Some users also mention that features like third-party risk management are treated as paid add-ons, which can slow adoption or require teams to evaluate vendors alongside Vanta's offering.

Secureframe

Secureframe provides a library that includes NIST risk scenarios you can track through the risk register, and helps you monitor your progress over time with visualizations like heat maps and summary tables. You’re also able to adjust risk score groups, and use custom tags to categorize risks.

Still, users highlight that some features (like the risk questionnaire and automated vendor reviews) could use refinement. The UX, in particular, has been described as clunky when configuring ML-based questionnaire support. Additionally, some of the more advanced capabilities are gated behind higher pricing tiers, which can limit value for smaller teams. 

Drata

Drata makes risk management proactive, not reactive. Through continuous risk monitoring, a pre-mapped library of 150+ risks, and automated testing aligned with frameworks like NIST SP 800-30 and ISO 27005, Drata turns risk into a living part of your compliance program. 

You can build your own risks, score and categorize them, assign owners, and track treatment plans from inside the platform. Vendor risk management is also deeply integrated: you can send security questionnaires, evaluate responses with AI-powered summaries, and log vendor performance and certifications all in one place.

And because Drata ties risk to control health, personnel, vendors, and audit status, you’re managing risk where it matters: everywhere.

User Access Reviews

Access reviews are an essential part of modern compliance management. Whether you’re proving least privilege, enforcing MFA, or preparing for ISO or SOC 2, reviewing who has access to what (and why) can’t be a spreadsheet-driven task.

Vanta

Vanta offers automated user access reviews that many reviewers describe as intuitive and time-saving. This functionality is a highlight for teams that have previously run manual reviews, in particular when paired with core identity providers like Okta or Google Workspace. 

However, access reviews are treated as a paid add-on, which catches some teams off guard. Reviewers frequently mention frustration around pricing transparency, noting that essential features like this one are gated behind separate subscription tiers.

Secureframe

Secureframe's personnel management module provides solid access management capabilities. It integrates with HRIS and identity providers like Okta and Google Workspace to help teams assign access, track onboarding and offboarding, and manage policy acknowledgments. You can view access at a user level and assign role-based permissions, which adds structure to an essential part of compliance. 

It’s worth noting that Secureframe doesn’t currently offer continuous monitoring of access changes or automation around access-based alerts. Both are features that become ever more important as teams scale or operate across multiple environments.

Drata

Drata brings access reviews into the flow of your compliance engine. Reviews are automated, customizable, and fully integrated into your control monitoring and audit workflows. You can pull access data from every connected system, assign reviewers, and track decisions, all within the platform. 

Plus, because access review data links directly to relevant controls, policies, and evidence requirements, Drata eliminates the manual handoff between your audit prep and your access reviews. 

Secureframe vs. Vanta vs. Drata: Table Comparison

Want to easily compare Drata, Vanta, and Secureframe? Below, we break down the differences across product capabilities, support, and ideal use cases so you can quickly decide which platform best suits your needs.

Why Drata Comes Out on Top

We won’t pretend to be unbiased (we did write this guide, after all). Still, there’s a reason we put this comparison together: we’ve seen what happens when fast-moving teams outgrow platforms that weren’t built to scale. And we’ve seen what happens when they switch to Drata.

We help fast-growing startups get audit-ready fast. Mid-market and enterprise teams use Drata to centralize risk, automate evidence collection, and streamline third-party reviews. And we help every one of our clients build the kind of security and compliance programs that win deals, speed up audits, and scale without the growing pains.

What sets Drata apart isn’t just automation. It’s everything that supports it:

• A dedicated customer success team that guides you through every step of your compliance journey

• A partner ecosystem and Auditor Alliance that helps you avoid exceptions and move faster

• A Compliance Accelerator Program that lays the foundation for long-term GRC maturity, pronto

From the first framework to IPO, Drata gives you the people, the platform, and the processes to turn compliance into a competitive edge.

Thousands of companies trust Drata to build security programs that scale, pass audits without drama, and unlock revenue faster. We’d love to add you to the roster.