The comparison hub

Modeled exposure alone is a guess.
‍Observed exposure is evidence.

Every tool below scores your risk from a database. Spektion observes how software actually behaves at runtime. Five categories, one underlying difference, find the one that's in your stack.

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Find your comparison

Start with what's in your stack

Two questions sort all five: are you choosing between this tool and Spektion, or running both?
The split below tells you which.

vs

Choosing between them and Spektion

Spektion replaces or sharpens these

Vulnerability scanners

Traditional vulnerability scanners

Best for programs that run a scanner, need better prioritization, and want vulnerability response shifted left of CVE disclosure.

e.g. Qualys · Tenable · Rapid7

Compare →

Exposure management

CTEM / exposure management

Best for programs evaluating attack-path modeling that want real conditions, not theoretical ones.

e.g. Zafran · XM Cyber

Compare →

Prioritization

RBVM / prioritization tools

Best for programs that want their risk-based prioritization to factor in runtime context and cover vulnerabilities outside the CVE catalog.

e.g. Nucleus Security · Brinqa

Coming soon

&

You keep both

Spektion runs alongside these

Endpoint security

EDR / XDR

Best for programs that want detection and response coverage for everything exploitable on the endpoint, not just no-context CVEs.

e.g. CrowdStrike · Defender · SentinelOne

Coming soon

AI security

AI agent security / AIDR

Best for programs evaluating tools that govern AI agents and MCP servers.

e.g. Zenity · Onyx · Singulr

Coming soon

Why every one of these comes down to the same thing

Scanners, RBVM, and CTEM all model exposure. However sophisticated the math, the inputs are external or static: CVE records, global exploit data, installed inventory. None of them watch software run. EDR already proved that watching behavior beats matching signatures, but it watches for attacks in progress, and AI agent security governs agent permissions; neither answers what's exploitable. Spektion observes runtime to answer exactly that, and one source delivers what models can't: coverage past the CVE catalog (pre-CVE weaknesses, component weaknesses, stored secrets, insecure agentic workloads), context that determines both exploitability and impact (privilege, network behavior, usage patterns, blast radius), and intelligence generated inside your environment rather than inferred from someone else's data.

Scanners, RBVM, and CTEM model exposure from external data. Spektion observes it from runtime behavior.

Proof

Measured in real environments

of applications with exploitable flaws had no CVE assigned (Spektion Research)

60–80

reduction in critical CVEs pushed to IT, validated in proof-of-value

CPU overhead, with zero measurable performance impact

215

previously unknown vulnerable tools surfaced in one customer environment executing across thousands of assets

Spektion provided us with unprecedented visibility into our software landscape. We leveraged their real-time vulnerability insights to implement a risk-based approach to managing our software inventory, allowing us to focus remediation efforts where they matter most.

— Lenny Maly, CISO, Granicus

FAQ

Questions teams ask

What is Runtime Exposure Management?

An approach to identifying security risk by observing how software behaves at runtime on endpoints and servers, rather than comparing installed versions against the CVE catalog. It extends beyond CVE-based vulnerability management to pre-CVE weaknesses, stored credentials, and AI agent activity. Spektion defines and delivers this category.

Does Spektion replace my existing tools?

It depends on which tool. For scanners, RBVM, and CTEM, Spektion can replace the endpoint scanning and prioritization layers or sharpen them with runtime evidence. For EDR and AI agent security, it runs alongside, covering exposure that those tools don't. The grid above sorts each comparison by which case applies.

Which comparison should I start with?

Start with the tool already in your stack that you're being asked to justify or expand. If you run a scanner and can't defend its prioritization, start there. If you're weighing an EDR vulnerability add-on, start with EDR. Each page goes deep on one category.

Is this the same as CTEM?

No. CTEM is a Gartner framework for continuously assessing attack surface. Runtime Exposure Management feeds a CTEM program the runtime behavioral evidence it needs but can't generate on its own. See the CTEM comparison for details.

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See what's exploitable in your environment, not just what's vulnerable.

Bring a slice of your environment to a demo and watch the queue reprioritize against runtime evidence, with a lightweight sensor that runs alongside your existing stack.

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