Drata
Compliance automation tool that continuously watches a company's real systems and pulls the evidence a security auditor needs automatically, instead of a team assembling it by hand before every audit.
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Description
Passing a security certification audit (SOC 2, ISO 27001) usually means a compliance team spends weeks gathering proof that the right controls are actually in place — screenshots, logs, policy documents — and repeating that scramble every renewal cycle. Drata automates that evidence-gathering continuously: it connects to a company's real infrastructure and tools, checks that controls are actually being followed, and keeps the proof ready at all times rather than assembled in a rush before each audit. Drata covers automated control mapping across multiple compliance frameworks (SOC 2, ISO 27001, and others), continuous real-time evidence collection, an AI-powered Trust Center for showing customers a company's compliance status, agentic assistance for drafting responses to security questionnaires, autonomous third-party vendor risk assessment, and a newer "agent governance" feature specifically for monitoring AI agents operating inside an enterprise. It reports 8,500+ global customers including Brex and Okta.
💬 Our review
The short version: Drata and Vanta compete directly in the same space — continuous, automated compliance evidence collection — and the practical choice between them often comes down to which specific frameworks, integrations and pricing quote fit your company best, since both cover the same core problem well.
Drata's "agent governance" feature — extending compliance monitoring specifically to AI agents operating inside an enterprise — is a genuinely forward-looking addition that addresses a newly real concern: as companies deploy more autonomous AI agents with real system access, those agents themselves become something a compliance and security team needs visibility into, not just human employees and traditional software. Autonomous vendor risk assessment (rather than a manual questionnaire-review process) is a meaningful time-saver for companies with many third-party vendors to evaluate. The honest caveat: like Vanta, Drata's pricing is entirely custom and undisclosed, and its 8,500+ customer figure, while sizable, is smaller than Vanta's reported 16,000+ — worth getting quotes and reference checks from both directly rather than assuming one is definitively better, since the right choice often comes down to specific framework support and integration fit for your company's exact stack.
💰 Pricing
📊 Global score
🤖 AI-enriched data
Pros
Continuous, automated evidence collection across multiple compliance frameworks
"Agent governance" feature extends compliance monitoring to AI agents specifically
Autonomous third-party vendor risk assessment
8,500+ global customers including recognizable brands (Brex, Okta)
Cons
No public pricing, requires a sales conversation to compare
Smaller reported customer base than its closest competitor, Vanta
Core value proposition overlaps significantly with Vanta — choice often comes down to specific fit
❓ Frequently asked questions
- How is Drata different from Vanta?
- Both automate continuous compliance evidence collection across frameworks like SOC 2 and ISO 27001 in a very similar way — the practical difference often comes down to specific framework support, integrations, and pricing for your company, worth comparing directly via quotes from both.
- What is 'agent governance'?
- A feature specifically for monitoring AI agents operating inside an enterprise for compliance purposes — a forward-looking addition addressing the newer reality that autonomous AI agents themselves need governance oversight, not just human employees.
- Does it help with vendor risk management too?
- Yes — it includes autonomous third-party vendor risk assessment, reducing the manual work of reviewing vendor security questionnaires one by one.
- Is it worth the money compared to alternatives?
- The value case is similar to Vanta's — continuous compliance automation genuinely saves recurring manual effort versus a once-a-year scramble. Get quotes from both Drata and Vanta and compare based on which frameworks and integrations best match your specific stack.
- Which tool should you pick for your case?
- Specifically interested in AI-agent governance alongside standard compliance automation: Drata. Want the option with the larger reported customer base and an independent Forrester Leader ranking: Vanta — get quotes from both before deciding.