We typically wouldn’t comment on reports about a competitor. But at the core of a past Peel Hunt report and recent QCM findings are two points that are super relevant to anyone looking for a Darktrace alternative:
- Darktrace is a sales and marketing engine, not a technology innovator
- 91% of customers who consider both Darktrace and Vectra AI choose Vectra AI
The two themes are directly related. You can’t pick up The Economist, go to a security event, or watch an F1 race without seeing Darktrace. The company spent an astounding 87% of revenue on sales and marketing in FY21 — when the reports first started circulating — and a paltry 10% on R&D. For reference, publicly traded cybersecurity companies known for innovation, such as CrowdStrike and Palo Alto Networks, spend north of 25% on R&D.
If the latest user reviews are any indication, it appears many customers still aren’t getting what they need from Darktrace. One IT director describes his Darktrace vs Vectra AI experience this way:
“Previously, we used Darktrace. Though it is a good platform, because there were so many false positives coming through, we found that we were neglecting it and not investigating the alerts.”
Some security architects and analysts and have become so frustrated with the Darktrace experience that they’ve taken to online discussion platforms like Reddit to warn others:
“We started with Darktrace and while I was excited about what we would find running on the network, I very quickly became tired of all of the noise.”
What makes Vectra AI a top Darktrace competitor?
The answer can be summed up in a word: Innovation. Vectra AI has consistently spent more than 40% of revenue on R&D. Our top priority is technology advancement, not sales and marketing. Innovation is in our DNA, and we know that innovation requires sustained investment in our AI and platform.
Here’s what our security customers get as a result:
1. An AI platform built from the ground up.
Our security researchers, Ph.D. data scientists, engineers and product teams have been developing Vectra AI for over a decade. The result is the industry’s only advanced Attack Signal Intelligence that sees through encryption to stop attacks fast. It means a platform powered with precisely the right data it needs to run advanced AI at the speed and scale enterprises demand.
2. An AI-driven solution that constantly pushes the boundaries of what’s possible.
Instead of over-investing in a sales and marketing engine, we’ve prioritized investments in the innovative spirit of people to ensure they have the tools, resources, and methodology they need to fully unleash their skills. It’s why Vectra AI holds 12 patents in AI and is the most referenced vendor in the MITRE D3FEND framework. (Darktrace has 0. Yes, we’re counting.)
3. A UX that makes life easier for SOC analysts.
Yes, our demo may be less flashy than Darktrace’s. (No spinning globes here!) But that’s because Vectra AI prioritizes workflow over wonderment. The user experience we focus on delivering aims to empower security analysts to do what they do best — hunt, investigate and stop attacks from becoming breaches.
We have a mantra inside the Vectra AI product team: The analyst experience should focus on attackers, not admin. Those same IT director, security architects and analysts mentioned above put it best when they compared Vectra AI to Darktrace in their reviews:
“After less than a year of using Vectra AI, we've managed to tailor our dashboards to a point where we just see the high-volume or high-risk alerts coming through, and we act on those on an instant basis. Vectra AI has helped me get my time back.”
“A short time later we brought Vectra AI into the network, turned off [Darktrace]. The UI is so much easier to understand and follow.”
And one security engineer sums up Vectra AI in a way that makes us proud of what we do:
“Vectra AI is one of those rare products that works the way it’s supposed to. The technology and science behind Vectra complement each other in one incredible solution that ensures your investment is well spent.”’
How do users rate Vectra AI as a Darktrace alternative?
It bears repeating: When faced with the choice of Darktrace vs Vectra AI, 91% chose Vectra AI.
All it often takes is one Blue Team workshop or Red Team exercise to see how well the Vectra AI platform works. Our AI-driven detection covers more than 90% of MITRE ATT&CK techniques, and AI-driven triage reduces alert noise 80% or more.
But what truly separates us from Darktrace (or any other vendor, for that matter) is our AI-driven prioritization — our Attack Signal Intelligence.
Only Vectra AI’s unique Attack Signal Intelligence focuses on entities (hosts and accounts) — not events. It thinks like an attacker and knows what’s security relevant, important and malicious. So security analysts can focus on what’s most urgent to their organization — what requires their critical thinking, talent and time.
In fact, it’s impossible to peruse Darktrace competitors on Gartner Peer Insights without coming across Vectra AI comments like this:
"Honestly the best NDR I have ever used — I see nothing coming close. I have deployed Vectra AI multiple times, and the support has been amazing. The architecture is shockingly simple for what it does, and produces a lack of noise compared to other leaders in this field."
And this:
“Vectra has helped our organization find the threats that all of our security vendor products combined could not.”
And this:
“Often with these types of services we are overwhelmed with information. Vectra AI on the other hand offers a clean dashboard that gives at a glance information that is easy to understand and follow.”
Explore more Darktrace vs Vectra AI resources
Listen, Darktrace’s marketing is great. No doubt. We admit we sometimes envy their advertising prowess. But let’s pierce through that façade to get to the reality.
We believe you deserve to know exactly what you’re getting from any vendor you choose to protect your organization from attackers. And as you make the choice, you’ll consider which attributes matter to you:
- Technology innovation, or marketing muscle?
- User experience and productivity, or flashy dashboards and demos?
- AI-driven Attack Signal Intelligence, or F1 sponsorships?
To help in your decision making, we interviewed several Vectra customers to better understand why they chose Vectra AI over Darktrace. You can read those stories here:
- Private health fund replaces Darktrace with Vectra
- Global financial services firm chooses Darktrace over Vectra
- Telematics company says Darktrace is no match to Vectra AI
At the end of the day, it all comes down to empowering your SOC analysts to move at the speed of attackers. The only way to achieve that is with less alert noise, fewer false positives and more attack signal fidelity. In workshop after workshop, Vectra AI wins in all these areas.
But above all, we win because of our people.
Yes, you have a choice to make when it comes to investing in technology, but you are also investing in people. I hope I’ve convinced you that Vectra AI innovation is all about investing in yours.
P.S. Ready to see what your people can do with 4x more innovation? We’d love to personally show you what makes Vectra AI so special.
Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in October 2021 and updated in May 2023 for comprehensiveness.