Top 5 Burp Suite Alternatives in 2026

Burp Suite has been the go-to web application security testing platform for years, and for good reason—it’s powerful and comprehensive. But as development practices have evolved, some of its architectural decisions create friction for modern workflows and make alternative tools appealing. The steep learning curve, resource-intensive performance, and manual configuration that worked well for quarterly releases present challenges when teams deploy multiple times daily.

The complaints from teams trying to use Burp Suite in fast-moving environments are consistent: memory consumption that hits 3500+ MB while idle, Java-based bottlenecks that slow down scans, and testing cycles that can stretch into full days for complex applications. The specialized security expertise required also means developers often can’t run tests themselves.

These challenges have become more pronounced in 2026. AI-assisted development tools let developers generate complete APIs in minutes and deploy multiple times daily. When code velocity increases this dramatically, the weeks needed to configure Burp Suite for new services and the day-long scan times create bottlenecks that modern teams struggle to work around.

Understanding Burp Suite’s Key Challenges

Burp Suite offers powerful features that AppSec professionals rely on. However, several architectural limitations consistently lead teams to explore alternatives:

Performance and Resource Management Issues

Burp Suite’s Java-based architecture can create performance challenges at scale. Users report memory management issues that impact system responsiveness during active scanning sessions, with enterprise deployments typically requiring 16-17GB of RAM for normal operations. Memory leaks can necessitate periodic application restarts, interrupting workflows and creating operational overhead.

Learning Curve and User Experience Barriers

The learning curve presents real adoption challenges across organizations. Security professionals describe the interface as “intimidating at first, especially without a theoretical pentesting background.” QA teams note difficulty “training new roles in security areas.” The tab-heavy interface design can overwhelm new users who “get lost in deeply nested features.” 

Training programs range from one-day introductory courses to five-day advanced certifications, representing a significant time investment before teams achieve operational effectiveness.

DevSecOps Integration Constraints

While Burp Suite offers CI/CD integration capabilities, the platform’s architecture predates modern DevSecOps workflows. The integrations can “lack reporting visibility fed back into CICD systems,” creating friction where developers need to step outside their familiar workflows to view findings. Results often appear in external interfaces rather than within the development pipeline itself, meaning developers might not see new vulnerabilities for days or weeks.

For teams practicing shift-left security, these workflow gaps can make real-time remediation challenging.

Modern Architecture Support Gaps

Burp Suite was designed when monolithic web applications were the norm. While it has evolved, certain modern architectural patterns—single-page applications, microservices, and cloud-native deployments—can expose limitations in its approach. The CI/CD integrations require developers to access separate systems to view findings rather than seeing results natively within their existing tools.

For teams building with contemporary architectures, these workflow mismatches require workarounds that add friction to the development process.

Shadow API Discovery Limitations

Burp Suite’s configuration-based approach requires explicitly defining what to test. If an API endpoint isn’t in your configuration or discoverable through crawling public-facing pages, the scanner won’t find it. 

This creates a significant challenge: shadow APIs—undocumented endpoints, internal microservices, and deprecated-but-still-live interfaces—remain invisible to configuration-based scanners. Teams can receive a clean scan report while substantial portions of their actual attack surface go untested simply because those endpoints weren’t in the manual configuration.

Undiscovered APIs represent a significant portion of actual attack surface, creating risk that traditional manual configuration approaches struggle to address systematically.

Why Teams Opt for Burp Suite Alternatives

Modern alternatives solve the problems that make Burp Suite impractical for fast-moving development teams:

• Faster setup and scans – Configuration takes minutes instead of weeks, with scans completing in 3-10 minutes rather than hours or days. No more security bottlenecks delaying releases.
• Built for developers, not just security teams – Results appear in PR comments, Slack, and JIRA where developers already work. Findings include fix guidance and code locations, eliminating the back-and-forth with security specialists.
• Automated API discovery – Tools discover your complete attack surface from source code, including shadow APIs and deprecated endpoints that manual configuration misses. No more blind spots.
• Accuracy that eliminates noise – Proof-based scanning, AI-powered prioritization, and SAST correlation verify real vulnerabilities, so teams focus on fixing actual issues instead of triaging false positives.

Top Alternatives

The right Burp Suite alternative should solve the problems that legacy DAST creates: configuration overhead that can’t keep up with development velocity, scan times that bottleneck releases, and blind spots around undocumented APIs. Look for tools that offer automated discovery instead of manual configuration, developer-friendly results instead of security-team-only dashboards, and native CI/CD integration instead of external scanning processes. The best fit depends on your team’s specific pain points and development practices.

1. StackHawk: Developer-First DAST Built for Modern Workflows

As a leading Burp Suite alternative, StackHawk represents a fundamental rearchitecting of DAST for the AI-development era. Unlike legacy DAST tools that require weeks of manual configuration and operate outside developer workflows, StackHawk discovers APIs directly from source code repositories—including shadow APIs, internal microservices, and deprecated endpoints—and delivers security findings where developers already work: in PR comments, Slack notifications, and JIRA tickets. The platform achieves 20-minute setup from signup to first CI/CD scan, with scans completing in 3-10 minutes versus Burp Suite’s hours-to-days scanning times.

Key Features:

• Developer empowerment drives every design decision, from results delivered in native development tools to cURL generation for easy reproduction
• GitHub Code Scanning integration for DAST enables real-time continuous scanning and vulnerability alerts in pull requests
• API Discovery automatically identifies all APIs within minutes, with unlimited scans across all applications
• Simple YAML configuration eliminates complex setup procedures typical of traditional DAST tools

2. Zed Attack Proxy (ZAP): The Community’s Answer to Commercial DAST

OWASP ZAP (now maintained by Checkmarx) is a free, open-source alternative that provides an automated scanner, spider, and fuzzer for comprehensive web application security testing, with a large community of users and contributors. The platform detects over 1,000 security issues, including the OWASP Top 10, with passive and active scanning modes.

Key Features:

• Completely free under Apache License 2.0 with no restrictions on scans, targets, or users
• API testing prowess matches commercial solutions with support for REST, SOAP, and GraphQL APIs
• 100+ free add-ons extend functionality with an active community, ensuring rapid development
• Automation framework uses YAML-based configuration for seamless CI/CD integration

3. Acunetix: Web Application Security Testing Platform

Acunetix (by Invicti) is a web application security testing platform that detects various vulnerabilities, including SQL injection and cross-site scripting (XSS), with automated scanning and reporting. Aimed at smaller organizations and mid-market companies, Acunetix offers a more streamlined, hands-on approach compared to the full Invicti enterprise platform (discussed further below).

Key Features:

• Uses Invicti’s Proof-Based Scanning technology to auto-verify vulnerabilities with 99.98% accuracy
• C++-based scanning engine detects over 7,000 vulnerabilities with SmartScan technology 
• Multi-format API support includes OpenAPI3, Swagger2, RAML, and Postman collections 
• Predictive Risk Scoring uses AI to prioritize testing based on 220+ parameters

4. APIsec: Complete API Security Testing Platform

APIsec is a complete API security testing platform that offers a user-friendly interface, automated scanning, and vulnerability detection, tailored for API testing and security. The platform specializes in comprehensive API security testing with advanced automation capabilities designed specifically for modern API-first architectures.

Key Features:

• Purpose-built for API security testing with comprehensive REST, GraphQL, and SOAP support
• Automated vulnerability detection specifically targeting API-related security issues
• User-friendly interface designed to reduce complexity for development teams
• Continuous testing capabilities that integrate with modern CI/CD pipelines

5. Invicti: DAST-First Platform Built for Enterprise Automation

Invicti (formerly Netsparker) claims the title of “industry’s only DAST-first AppSec platform” with 15+ years of specialization. Its Proof-Based Scanning technology auto-verifies vulnerabilities with 99.98% accuracy, virtually eliminating false positives for direct-impact vulnerabilities.

Key Features:

• Distributed scanning architecture with unlimited users and role-based access
• Multi-layer API discovery through API gateway integrations and network traffic analysis
• Predictive risk scoring using AI analysis of 220+ data points
• Industry-leading crawler that maps complex single-page applications effectively

How to Choose Your Alternative Tool

The best fit depends on where Burp Suite is actually failing you:

Bottlenecking releases? Prioritize speed. Look for sub-10-minute scans and instant setup. StackHawk excels here with automated configuration that gets you scanning in 20 minutes and scan times of 3-10 minutes, purpose-built for CI/CD velocity. Acunetix also offers fast scanning if you need a more traditional DAST approach.

Developers bypassing security? Choose tools that integrate natively into their workflow with results in PRs, Slack, and JIRA. StackHawk was built specifically for this problem, delivering findings where developers already work and eliminating the separate-dashboard friction entirely. This native integration is what makes security testing self-service rather than gated by security teams.

Missing APIs and endpoints? You need automated discovery from source code, not manual configuration. StackHawk’s API discovery finds shadow APIs, internal microservices, and deprecated endpoints automatically as code gets committed—making undocumented APIs impossible rather than inevitable. Invicti offers multi-layer discovery through gateway integrations if you need enterprise-scale coverage across complex environments.

Drowning in false positives? Prioritization is non-negotiable. StackHawk correlates DAST findings with SAST tools like Semgrep, Snyk, and GitHub Advanced Security to eliminate duplicate alerts and provide exploitability context that helps teams focus on real runtime risks rather than theoretical vulnerabilities. If you prefer pure proof-based scanning, Invicti and Acunetix both offer 99.98% accuracy through automated vulnerability verification.

Budget constraints? Open-source options like ZAP work if you have the technical expertise to configure and operate them. Just understand the trade-off between no licensing costs and the significant time investment required for setup and maintenance.

Enterprise scalability needs? If you require distributed scanning architecture with unlimited users and complex role-based access control, Invicti provides enterprise-grade capabilities designed for large organizations with extensive governance requirements.

Find the Right Burp Suite Alternative for Modern AppSec

Burp Suite served its purpose when applications deployed quarterly and security teams had weeks to configure scans. That world doesn’t exist anymore. Development teams using AI coding assistants can generate complete APIs in minutes and deploy multiple times daily, creating endpoints faster than manual tools can discover them.

The alternatives in this guide represent different approaches to the same fundamental problem: security testing must work at the speed of modern development without becoming a bottleneck. Whether you choose StackHawk’s developer-first automation with source code API discovery, ZAP’s open-source flexibility, or an enterprise platform like Invicti with proof-based ASPM, the goal is the same: shift security left without slowing down releases.

The right choice depends on your specific pain points. If Burp Suite’s configuration overhead is blocking your CI/CD pipeline, if developers are bypassing security because tools are too complex, or if you’re discovering APIs in production that should’ve been tested pre-deployment, modern alternatives solve these problems by design rather than as afterthoughts.

Ready to see how automated API security testing works in practice? Start your free 14-day StackHawk trial to experience developer-first DAST, or schedule a demo to see the platform tackle your specific use case.