Top 5 Website Vulnerability Scanners: Tried and Tested

Vulnerabilities are the main cause of many website hacks.

That’s why it is so important to update vulnerable site software promptly. Doing this goes a long way in protecting your website from attacks.

If you think a plugin or theme has an issue, scan your site for vulnerabilities immediately.

You may be wondering which scanner will work the best. With numerous options available, finding the right one can be tricky.

That’s where our detailed testing comes to your rescue.

TL;DR: Scanning for vulnerabilities on your site is a cinch with MalCare. MalCare has a comprehensive vulnerability database, which is updated regularly. As soon as a vulnerability is discovered on your website, you can use the update feature to deal with it safely. It is a win-win-win-win situation.

What is a website vulnerability scanner?

A website vulnerability scanner checks for known issues in your site’s core, plugins, or themes. These issues, known as vulnerabilities, are coding errors that hackers can exploit, like SQL injection or XSS vulnerabilities.

To be clear, we’re not talking about weak passwords, or non-issues like not renaming the login page.

How does a vulnerability scanner work?

It starts with a security researcher.

1. A security researchers explores code to find weaknesses.
2. If they find one, they inform the developer first, giving them time to fix it.
3. After the patch is available, the researcher reports their findings, which include details like version and severity, to vulnerability databases.
4. Scanners then use these databases to detect vulnerabilities on a site.

Scanners only alert you about vulnerabilities that researchers have discovered and reported. If hackers find a vulnerability first, they may already be exploiting sites.

While having a vulnerability scanner is useful, it won’t fully protect your site. You’ll also need a website firewall to stop exploits, even if they’re not yet listed in any scanner database.

1. MalCare

Test results: Great
Vulnerabilities detected: 10
Vulnerabilities not detected: 0
Price: Free

MalCare excelled in our tests, detecting various vulnerabilities from SQLi to XSS across all plugins and themes, regardless of size or popularity. Even a theme still unpatched was flagged by MalCare, while others missed it.

It is clear that MalCare’s extensive vulnerability database draws from many sources, including security researchers and developers. Therefore, MalCare is noted for identifying issues in premium themes and plugins and stopping exploits effectively.

In addition to this robust feature, MalCare focuses on securing sites proactively with its Atomic Security firewall. Among the tools we tested, MalCare stands out with this innovative approach to website security.

2. Patchstack

Test results: Great
Vulnerabilities detected: 10
Vulnerabilities not detected: 0
Price: Free

Patchstack is effective at identifying vulnerabilities and educating admins. It categorises them by CVSS score for severity, and has an indicator for update priorities. (In our opinion, any update patching a vulnerability is high priority.)

If a particular plugin or theme has more than one vulnerability, the dashboard lists each issue separately. We found this a little confusing, to be honest.

What we liked is that Patchstack shows if a fix is available. The only other places we saw this was in MalCare and WPScan. This info, along with severity scores, helps in deciding on alternatives—if necessary.

The setup requires account registration, and you’re prompted to try a paid plan, which feels misleading since vulnerability scanning is free.

Overall, Patchstack is a reliable vulnerability scanner.

3. WPScan

Test results: Great
Vulnerabilities detected: 10
Vulnerabilities not detected: 0
Price: Free for 25 scans a day

WPScan is a comprehensive vulnerability scanner for websites, using crowd-sourced data to identify vulnerabilities effectively. It flagged all vulnerabilities on our test site, which is impressive.

However, WPScan isn’t a typical security plugin. It lacks a firewall and malware scanner. While most on this list offer free vulnerability scanning as a bonus, WPScan focuses solely on this, using a freemium model. You can scan up to 25 themes and plugins daily for free.

While the limit might seem restrictive, if you have more add-ons, you can rotate them daily. This process requires manual effort, affecting automation.

WPScan is available as a plugin and CLI, both offering the same functions with different installation methods. It’s also a database source for many other security plugins, like Jetpack.

4. Wordfence

Test results: Very good
Vulnerabilities detected: 9
Vulnerabilities not detected: 1
Price: Free

Wordfence effectively identified most vulnerabilities on our test site, flagging both plugins and themes accurately—except for one fairly obscure theme.

However, it missed an unpatched theme that MalCare had identified as vulnerable. This oversight was surprising, as site owners need to know about vulnerabilities even without fixes.

Wordfence is a major player in security and is often regarded as one of the best security plugins. Nevertheless, its vulnerability scanner isn’t flawless and can sometimes fall short.

5. Sucuri

Test results: Bad
Vulnerabilities detected: 0
Vulnerabilities not detected: 10
Price: Free

We weren’t entirely shocked by Sucuri’s lackluster performance in this area of website security, but it was still very disappointing. Despite high expectations for such a well-known security plugin, Sucuri fell flat.

Sucuri lacks a built-in vulnerability scanner, only providing a list of available updates in their Settings’ Post-hack tab. This information is already accessible on the wp-admin dashboard.

A key feature of a vulnerability scanner is to flag vulnerabilities with urgency. Sucuri does offer a vulnerability disclosure newsletter, which shows they invest in security research. However, figuring out which vulnerabilities affect your site from these emails is left to the site owner.

This approach demands manual effort, something that could be easily handled by a free plugin. It’s particularly daunting for admins managing multiple sites.

Factors to consider when choosing a website vulnerability scanner

When searching for a vulnerability scanner for your website, there are a few factors that you need to consider. They make the difference between a reliable vulnerability check—and one that is completely unreliable.

What to do when a vulnerability is flagged on your website

If a vulnerability is detected on your website, act quickly.

Update your site right away. If it’s a smaller plugin or theme, you can update directly from your dashboard.

But if the vulnerability is in a larger plugin like a page builder, it’s better to test updates in a staging environment first.

This gives you a safe place to check that the update won’t cause any problems before going live with it.

How we tested the vulnerability scanners

To thoroughly test vulnerability scanners, we set up detailed tests.

We filled test sites with various vulnerable themes and plugins. (Please send thoughts and prayers for our much-abused test sites.)

Then, we determined a rubric. A good vulnerability scanner should span a wide spectrum of vulnerabilities, which were:

We also wanted to test premium themes and plugins, but couldn’t since they weren’t available in the WordPress repository. We’ll see if these extensions reveal vulnerabilities in the future.

Note: Some of the scanners used WPScan or Patchstack databases. So, in our tests, we left out any that were using third-party databases.

Conclusion

Vulnerabilities are the biggest cause of hacks, so updating plugins and themes quickly is critical. A good vulnerability scanner helps with this.

However, scanners rely entirely on their databases, which depend on security researchers. This makes them unpredictable, as vulnerabilities might remain hidden for years. Worse, hackers might find and exploit them without detection.

While vulnerability scanners are useful, they aren’t enough for complete security.

We suggest using MalCare, Atomic Security. Atomic Security is a strong firewall, which combines a vulnerability and malware scanner for good measure. This way, you get vulnerability scanning as a bonus, and the firewall blocks most threats regardless of site vulnerabilities.

FAQs

What is a website vulnerability scanner?

A website vulnerability scanner checks your site for security weaknesses that hackers can exploit.

Which website vulnerability scanner is good for websites?

MalCare is a popular choice due to its comprehensive scanning and strong security features.

Do I need a website vulnerability scanner?

Yes, it’s important for identifying and addressing potential security threats on your site.