Top 10+ SAST Tools Based on Insights from 500+ Users in 2024

SAST tools can enable issues in mobile and web applications to be detected earlier and therefore fixed with minimal effort. With numerous tools in the market making similar claims, it is important to focus on the right solutions for your project which can depend on programming language coverage, pricing or integrations to your favorite IDE.

* Reviews were sourced from the B2B review website G2.com

Products were ranked according to number of reviews except for sponsors which are placed at the top of the list with their links.

Key features of SAST software

Verifiable features

These features can be verified by using the SAST tools. AIMultiple’s table above includes these features.

Supported languages: Even a great SAST tool would be useless to your project if it does not support your project’s programming language.

Integration capabilities enable developers to use SAST tools seamlessly during the software development life cycle. Key integrations include:

• Integrated Development Environments (IDEs) like Eclipse
• Version control systems like Git
• Other tools in the continuous integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD) pipeline

Other features

These features are more subjective. For example, success rate in detection of security vulnerabilities is the most important capability of SAST solutions. However, while a solution may detect all capabilities in a project, it may miss vulnerabilities in others. Therefore, it is best to test these features by running tests on your projects:

• Success rate in security vulnerability detection
• False positive rate: If issues are buried among numerous false positives, developer productivity would suffer.
• Issue prioritization: Any large code base will have numerous issues of varying severity. Effective prioritization is key for minimizing customer impact of these issues.
• Accuracy of remediation suggestions
• Code review and collaboration features (e.g. shared views, commenting capabilities, integrations with project management tools) are valuable for coordinating issue remediation.
• Speed & resource consumption: Lean software development life cycle promotes frequent releases to enable learning from market data. SAST tools can only be integrated in such a cycle if they can rapidly finish scans.
• Scalability: As source code grow, the increase in testing time should remain limited
• Reporting to track progress in source code quality and reduction in security vulnerabilities. Custom reporting capabilities may facilitate reporting requirements in regulated industries, enterprises or their supplier.
• Support can be important for enterprise buyers that want to focus their efforts on software development.

How to choose your SAST tool?

The right SAST tool has a key role in securing the software development lifecycle (SDLC).

• Identify your team’s requirements:
  • Programming languages used or planned to be used by your team
  • IDE and CI/CD pipeline integrations necessary to operationalize the new SAST tool.
  • Pick one of your team’s largest and most complex projects to test the SAST solution
  • Budget range: For example, if you are not going to get any budget, focus only on open source or community editions.
• Prepare a shortlist. You can use the table above to filter for integrations and support for programming languages.
• Test tools to reduce your shortlist to 1-2 candidates: While open source projects are easy to access, vendors which use proprietary-code can also share free trials. Test for
  • Time to analyze the source code
  • Comprehensiveness of findings
  • False positive rate
  • Featured in the other features section in AIMultiple’s feature set.
• Negotiate commercials if necessary and implement the tool

Finally, SAST must be viewed as part of the application security tech stack and needs to be complemented with DAST tools and IAST tools.

How to use SAST tooling?

• Conduct an initial scan: First scan of any project can reveal many issues from serious security vulnerabilities to source code smells. The development team should fix critical issues and align on how to treat less urgent issues.
• Use the learnings from initial scan to configure the tool to
  • reduce falso positives
  • improve prioritization
• Automate Scans: Connect the SAST tool to your IDE and CI/CD pipeline for automatic scanning on source code commits.
• Complement your SAST tool with DAST and IAST tools to better identify vulnerabilities.
• Regularly review SAST practices and identify improvement areas

How do SAST tools work?

Static Application Security Testing (SAST) tools analyze source code to find security vulnerabilities without executing the program. These tools:

• Parse code: SAST tools read and parse code to identify its structure and syntax.
• Simulate execution: Execution is simulated to trace the code that could be run.
• Analyze paths: Source code execution paths are analyzed for patterns that indicate potential vulnerabilities.
• Identify issues: Common issues identified include SQL injections, cross-site scripting, and buffer overflows.
• Report findings by providing prioritized reports, detailing vulnerabilities with severity ratings and remediation advice.

How is SAST different from DAST?

While SAST works based on the source code, DAST tools work like attackers, without peering into the code, to find security vulnerabilities. For more: DAST vs SAST.

SAST vs. other AppSec tools

Relevant tools are:

• Interactive application security testing (IAST) tools which combine SAST and DAST capabilities to confirm vulnerabilities found by SAST via DAST.
• Software Composition Analysis (SCA) tools are focused on third-party components and libraries, especially, open source components. They:
  • Ensure license compliance: Without license compliance, teams may need to carry out costly refactoring to remove components which don’t have compliant licenses.
  • Track Vulnerabilities by monitoring known vulnerabilities in used components.

Most modern application security testing suites combine SAST, DAST, IAST and SCA capabilities, offering a one-stop solution for buyers.

What problems does SAST solve?

Static Application Security Testing (SAST) addresses these issues thanks to its early issue detection capabilities:

• Code Quality: Enhances overall source code quality by enforcing coding standards and practices.
• Compliance & security: Ensures compliance with security regulations and standards
• Developer education: Consistent feedback informs junior developers about coding and security best practices.

What vulnerabilities can SAST tools find?

Static application security testing (SAST) tools can identify a range of code vulnerabilities:

• Injection flaws including SQL, NoSQL, OS command, and LDAP injection vulnerabilities.
• Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities (i.e. where applications might be vulnerable to scripting attacks.)
• Buffer overflows
• Authentication issues like weak authentication and session management practices.
• Misconfigurations such as improper security configurations and defaults.
• Access control problems like restricting access to functions and data.
• Data exposure issues which can lead to data leaks and improper exposure of sensitive information.
• Use of known vulnerable components such as open source libraries
• Insecure deserialization which can enable to remote code execution, replay attacks, or injection attacks.
• Source code quality issues (i.e. poor coding practices that may lead to security vulnerabilities)

Why is SAST an important security activity?

SAST, also called static code analysis, helps early detection of software defects.

Early detection of defects is key to quality. This is not just for software development but for almost any activity that involves building or manufacturing. Toyota Production System used the same approach to reduce defects and increase productivity. Any worker had the authority to stop the line to fix root causes for issues they identified.

While SAST can no replace code reviews, it can help speed them up since a SAST tool identifies vulnerabilities that would normally be identified during manual code analysis.