"Not stated" means we couldn't find it on the vendor's site on 2026-09-26. It doesn't mean the tool can't do it. If you're a vendor and a cell is wrong, email contact@barrion.io with a link and we'll fix it.
1. Barrion
Barrion's AI agents run full pentests of web apps and APIs at five levels, from Light (400 credits, 3 agents) to Maximum (20,000 credits, 100 agents). Coverage spans 8 testing areas and all 97 OWASP WSTG v4.2 test cases.
You can put a pentest on a schedule: daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, every six months, yearly, or a custom rhythm. Each schedule has its own scope and depth, and you choose whether it runs every time or only when the app has changed. You can also trigger runs from your CI/CD pipeline via the Barrion API. Every run labels its findings new, still open, resolved or regressed.
Every finding is checked against your live app before it's reported. Confirmed findings come with the request and response that prove them. Anything we couldn't confirm is clearly marked and capped in severity. From Standard up, a security engineer reviews the findings. Deeper tests come with a report signed off by that engineer, which you can offer an auditor or an enterprise customer as your yearly test. Whether it counts is their call.
Once you've fixed something, retesting it is free. A retest reuses the original scope and stored credentials, checks each finding again and holds no credits.
Where others are stronger: we don't test internal networks, Active Directory, mobile apps, physical security or social engineering, and we don't do TLPT. Our change detection compares a snapshot of the start page's links and scripts, so a backend-only release can slip past it. Keep an every-time schedule on a slower rhythm too. Expert review is a check of the findings, not a human tester doing the work. For that, look at Cobalt, Synack or Terra.
You can start a single pentest self-serve. Scheduled pentests come with the Business plan, which you set up through sales. Continuous programs are scoped to your apps, cadence and depth, so talk to us and we'll price it for your setup. Single runs are priced on the pricing page.
2. Aikido
Aikido sells a developer security suite, and its AI pentest is one part of it. Aikido Infinite runs a pentest when new code lands, "analysing the diff and targeting changed code and affected surfaces", then proposes a patch and retests it. Aikido says separate agents re-exploit each finding to confirm it before you see it.
Stronger than Barrion at: testing Android apps, generating fix PRs, and a wider list of API protocols (REST, GraphQL, gRPC, SOAP). You can start free without a card.
Watch for: a diff-targeted run is cheaper per deploy but doesn't retest the rest of the app, so a regression somewhere the diff didn't touch needs a full run to catch. Public prices on 2026-09-26: $4,000 for a typical fixed-scope pentest, $10 per agent on Infinite (agents run for up to 30 minutes), and custom pricing for the Continuous tier.
3. Escape
Escape runs attack surface management, a business-logic-aware DAST and a multi-agent AI pentesting engine as one continuous program. It says it tests "as multiple users at once", handles OAuth, SSO and multi-tenant apps, and turns every proven finding into per-build regression coverage.
Stronger than Barrion at: GraphQL, attack surface discovery across external assets, and testing in the pipeline on every push.
Watch for: no public pricing and no self-serve start. Getting in means a demo.
4. Equixly
Equixly is built around APIs. Its agents test "APIs and applications" continuously, look for business-logic flaws and cross-service chains, and ground findings in demonstrated exploitability.
Stronger than Barrion at: API depth for teams whose product is mostly services talking to services.
Watch for: continuous testing is on the custom-priced platform plan. The public price, €4,999, buys a single penetration test with results in two days, which isn't continuous.
5. XBOW
XBOW's agents test web apps and APIs, chain issues into working exploits, and only report a finding with an exploit that proves it. It sells continuous and on-demand testing on usage-based pricing, including through AWS, Google Cloud, Oracle and Microsoft marketplaces.
Stronger than Barrion at: scale. It's built to go from one app to thousands.
Watch for: no public price, and the pages we checked don't mention human review or authenticated testing.
6. Invicti (agentic pentest)
Invicti added an agentic pentest ("Octo") on top of its DAST. Specialist agents target separate exploit classes, findings go through Invicti's proof-based validation, and a report arrives within 24 hours for at most $500 per assessment.
Stronger than Barrion at: a mature DAST engine underneath, and a full application security suite (SAST, SCA, IaC, secrets, containers) if you want one vendor.
Watch for: it's run on demand. We couldn't find a schedule or change trigger for the agentic pentest itself, and access is through a demo.
7. Intruder
Intruder is mainly a vulnerability scanning platform, covering infrastructure, cloud and web apps, with continuous DAST included. Its AI pentest is a same-day, white-box web application test at $3,500 per test, or $12,000 for four.
Stronger than Barrion at: infrastructure and cloud coverage in the same product, and a 14-day free trial of the platform.
Watch for: the continuous part is scanning, which flags rather than exploits. The pentest is priced per test, so testing every release adds up fast.
8. Terra Security
Terra pairs swarms of AI agents with human pentesters and describes its testing as "always-on" and "aligned to code change". Since May 2026 it covers internal and external networks as well as web apps and AI systems.
Stronger than Barrion at: human pentesters in the loop, reports signed by certified pentesters, and network coverage.
Watch for: no public pricing and no self-serve start.
9. Cobalt
Cobalt is the best-known PTaaS: a platform plus a bench of 500+ vetted pentesters (Cobalt Core) across web, API, network, cloud and AI targets. It has since added Autonomous Pentest, an AI-run web app test with findings in 24 hours, proof of exploit, and a Cobalt Core pentester directing every engagement. It's offered at $3,500 per test.
Stronger than Barrion at: human testers, breadth of asset types, and reports built for compliance. Credit contracts include unlimited retesting.
Watch for: everything goes through a quote, and the AI test is priced per test rather than as a schedule.
10. Synack
Synack combines an AI agent (Sara) with the Synack Red Team, 1,500+ vetted researchers. Public starting prices: $4,181 for one Sara AI pentest, $10,283 for a standard human pentest, and $27,120 for Synack14, part of its continuous Synack14/365 offer.
Stronger than Barrion at: a large human researcher network, mobile and host testing, and a track record with enterprise and public-sector buyers.
Watch for: it's sales-led and the entry price is high for a small team.
Pentera and NodeZero run continuous, automated pentests too, but of a different surface. They go after internal networks, Active Directory and cloud identities. If that's what your auditor or your risk register is asking about, a web app tool (ours included) won't answer it.
Many teams run one of these for the network and a web app tool for the product. They don't overlap much.
We left StackHawk out of the table because it isn't a pentest tool. It's a DAST that runs inside the coding loop, including with AI coding agents like Claude Code and Cursor, and tests the running app before a pull request is opened. It's good at that job, starts at $10 per user per month with a 14-day trial, and pairs well with a continuous pentest on the deployed app. The difference is explained in pentest vs vulnerability scan.
How often should you test your app?
Daily for the app surface, if you ship often, with the annual pentest that compliance asks for on top.
The evidence for testing more often is about how fast known bugs get used:
- Mandiant's M-Trends 2026 (published 2026-03-23) puts the mean time to exploit at an estimated minus 7 days, meaning exploitation routinely starts before a patch exists. Exploits were the most common way in for the sixth year running, at 32% of intrusions.
- VulnCheck's State of Exploitation 1H-2026 (published 2026-07-28) found that 23.43% of the 495 vulnerabilities added to its known-exploited list in the first half of 2026 were exploited on or before the day their CVE was published.
- Google's Threat Intelligence Group reported on 2026-05-11 that attackers now use AI models as "expert-level force multipliers" for vulnerability research and exploit development. It also found the first zero-day it believes was developed with AI, a 2FA bypass rooted in the app's own logic.
The same VulnCheck report found AI-discovered vulnerabilities weren't exploited more often than others (14 of 1,061, or 1.3%). So this isn't about AI. The window between a flaw going live and someone using it was already short.
Those figures are about published CVEs. A bug in your own code never gets one, so nobody warns you. You only know it's there if you test after the release that introduced it. That's our inference from the data, not a figure from these reports.
A setup we'd suggest for a SaaS team: a Light run every day that only fires when the app has changed, a Deep run every month that always runs, and a human pentest once a year for the paths that need judgement and for auditors who ask for one.
How to choose
You're a SaaS team shipping daily. You want a full rerun on a schedule, a change trigger and run-over-run labels so regressions stand out. Barrion and Escape fit. Aikido fits if you want the run tied to each deploy and you're happy with diff-targeted runs.
Your product is mostly APIs. Look at Equixly first, then Escape if you use GraphQL. Check that the tool tests as several users, because broken object-level authorization is the classic API bug and it needs two accounts to find.
You need internal network or Active Directory coverage. Pentera or NodeZero, next to a web app tool. Terra also covers internal networks now, with humans in the loop.
You need reports for auditors or enterprise customers. Cobalt or Synack for a PTaaS contract with a named, formally scoped test, or Terra for AI plus human sign-off. Barrion's deeper tests come with a report signed off by a security engineer, which you can offer as your yearly test (whether it counts is your auditor's call), and from Standard up an engineer reviews every set of findings. Run a continuous tool between those tests so the months after the report aren't blind. The trade-offs are laid out in PTaaS vs continuous AI pentesting.
You want to try before talking to sales. Barrion, Aikido and Intruder let you start yourself. NodeZero does too for network testing.