Nessus ends at the scan report. That is where WASViking starts.
Nessus is the scanner many security teams learned on, and it earned that place. WASViking scans the network with the same rigor, then keeps going: agents that assess every server continuously, patches deployed under approval, web applications and APIs tested in depth, and a verified result at the end instead of another report to forward.
- Missing cumulative update found by credentialed scan
- Agent enrolled, job approved for the Sunday window
- 212 vulnerabilities closed, 3 listed in CISA KEV
Where the difference shows up in daily work.
Both find vulnerabilities on your network. The question is what your team does with the report on Monday morning, and how many other tools it takes to finish the job.
Agents without a second platform
The Sentinel Host agent comes with Infrastructure Defense and is managed from the same console as the network scans. Laptops that leave the office and servers that block scanners stay assessed.
The fix, not just the finding
Missing patches become jobs your team approves, deployed through the native update mechanism of each platform inside a maintenance window, with rollback tied to the original job.
Web apps tested for real
Authenticated DAST for web applications and APIs, with blind-class detection through our own out-of-band collaborator and a raw HTTP transcript on every finding. Each target is tested as deep as its scan profile allows.
Proof that it worked
After each job the agent reassesses the host and records which vulnerabilities closed and how far the score dropped. The next scan confirms it instead of being the first place anyone finds out.
A scanner covers the first two steps. The work lives in the other three.
With a standalone scanner, prioritizing, patching and proving happen in spreadsheets, tickets and other products. WASViking runs all five steps on the same inventory.
Discover
Hosts, ports and services on the network through the Sentinel Probe, plus public subdomains and certificates from the outside.
Assess
Unauthenticated and credentialed scans over SSH and WinRM, agents on every enrolled server, DAST on web apps and APIs.
Prioritize
Viking Exposure Score with CISA KEV, EPSS, business context, proven internet exposure and live attack traffic at the edge.
Fix
Patch jobs under approval, hardening fixes from the failing control, two-way Jira and ServiceNow for the rest.
Prove
Reassessment after every job, PCI DSS 11.3.1 scan evidence, Evidence Bundles and Posture Shares for auditors and customers.
Dark steps: what a standalone network scanner covers. The rest runs in the same WASViking console, on the same assets.
Every asset assessed by the method that fits it.
Servers get an agent, network gear gets a credentialed scan, devices you cannot touch get an unauthenticated one, and web applications get a real application test. One inventory holds all of it.
ACME assets, by how they are assessed
269 assets in one inventory
Devices found by the Sentinel Probe are inventoried and assessed without counting toward the host license.
Credentialed where it matters
The Sentinel Probe logs in over SSH and WinRM with credentials stored encrypted, reads the real package and build state, and maps Windows hosts to the cumulative update they are missing.
Agents where scans cannot reach
Hosts that roam, sit behind strict firewalls or cannot take scanner traffic report through the agent over outbound mutual TLS, with CPU limits you set per policy.
Unmanaged gets a name
Every internet-facing asset is labeled fully managed, partially managed, unmanaged or unknown, and the ones nothing is watching trigger an alert with the next step.
Twelve weeks of critical vulnerabilities going down, and staying down.
A scanner shows the same critical list every quarter until someone else fixes it. WASViking shows the list shrinking, the jobs that shrank it, and what each Patch Tuesday put back.
ACME open critical vulnerabilities
Weekly, across servers and network devices. Lower is better.
Patch Tuesday, absorbed
The small bumps are new Microsoft releases landing on the fleet. They get scored, approved and deployed within the same window cycle instead of waiting for the next quarterly scan.
Residual risk explained
When a vulnerability has no vendor fix yet, the job says so and the score keeps it visible, so nobody mistakes a finished job for a clean host.
Illustrative data from the ACME demonstration tenant
The Command Center your team opens every morning.
Fleet risk, the trend, the projected score after the fixes available today, and the assets to fix first with the reason and the next step for each.
Capability by capability, what each product delivers.
The Nessus column covers Nessus Professional and Nessus Expert as sold on their own. Where both products do the job well, we say so.
| Capability | Tenable Nessus | WASViking® |
|---|---|---|
| Network scanningNessus · Sentinel Probe | ||
| Discovery and unauthenticated scanning | Host discovery, port and service scanning, unlimited IPs per scanner | Sentinel Probe discovery of hosts, ports and services, vendor identified from the network address, SNMP and UDP checks On par |
| Credentialed scanning | SSH and Windows credentialed checks | SSH and WinRM with encrypted credentials, Windows assessed by build against Microsoft security updates On par |
| PCI DSS internal scan evidence | Scan policies and exportable reports | Quarterly cadence and evidence packages for PCI DSS 11.3.1, internal and credentialed, kept with the assets they cover On par |
| HostsNessus · Infrastructure Defense | ||
| Agent-based assessment | Agents require Tenable Vulnerability Management or Nessus Manager | Sentinel Host agent for Windows, Linux and macOS, included with Infrastructure Defense and managed in the same console Goes further |
| Configuration audits | Compliance audit files, including CIS benchmarks | CIS-aligned controls with expected against actual, exceptions with approval and expiry, and Apply fix for supported hardening items Goes further |
| Missing patches | Patch report and checks against patch management systems | Resolve deploys approved patches on Windows and Linux inside maintenance windows, verifies by reassessment and rolls back through a linked job Goes further |
| Applications and attack surface | ||
| Web application scanning | In Nessus Expert, five web application URLs per 90 days in the base subscription | Authenticated DAST for web apps and APIs: REST, GraphQL, SOAP and WebSocket, blind classes through our own OAST collaborator Goes further |
| External attack surface | In Nessus Expert, five domains per 90 days in the base subscription | Subdomain discovery from certificate transparency and passive DNS, certificate monitoring and sensitive port monitoring, with limits by plan On par |
| From finding to fix | ||
| Prioritization | CVSS and the Vulnerability Priority Rating | Viking Exposure Score with CISA KEV, EPSS, end of life and business context, plus internet exposure proven by discovery and live attack traffic at your edge Goes further |
| Ticketing | Through the wider Tenable platform | Two-way sync with Jira and ServiceNow included: card and finding close together on a verified fix and reopen together on a regression Goes further |
| Reporting and evidence | Scan reports in HTML, PDF and CSV | Branded PDF, risk trend over time, Evidence Bundles and Posture Shares mapped to PCI DSS, ISO 27001, LGPD, GDPR and BACEN Goes further |
Built by people who run patch windows.
Finding the vulnerability was never the hard part. These are the details that make fixing it routine.
Approvals an auditor recognizes
Approval by environment, a quorum when you want one, and a tested-first rule that holds production until the same patch succeeds on a test group. Every decision lands in the audit trail.
Restarts handled with manners
Automatic reboot stays off by default. Users get a prompt with deferrals, a pending restart holds the next job instead of failing it, and the boot time proves the restart happened.
A job that tells you where it is
Waiting for the window, held for a restart with the exact reason, running with live progress, or confirming the result. If the host goes offline, the team hears about it.
Keep your scan schedule. Add what happens after it.
Run the evaluation on the same subnets and servers you scan today, so the comparison uses your own network.
Point the probe at a subnet
Install the Sentinel Probe on a Linux host in the segment you scan today and add the same SSH and WinRM credentials.
Enroll a pilot group
Push the signed MSI through your deployment tool or run one command on Linux. Scores arrive within minutes.
Compare the findings
Put both reports for the same hosts side by side and look at what each one ranks first and why.
Run the first patch window
Approve jobs for the pilot group in a normal window and read the verified result the next morning. That is the part a scanner cannot show you.
Frequently asked questions
Can WASViking replace Nessus?
For teams that use Nessus to assess servers, network devices and web applications, yes: the Sentinel Probe covers network and credentialed scanning, Infrastructure Defense adds agents and patching, and DAST covers web apps and APIs. Pentesters who use Nessus as a hands-on tool during engagements may keep it for that work.
Do we have to install agents everywhere?
No. Use agents where they add value, such as servers and laptops, and the Sentinel Probe for everything else. Both feed the same inventory and the same score.
Can WASViking patch what it finds?
Yes, on hosts with the Sentinel Host agent. Resolve deploys operating system updates on Windows and Linux, and third-party Windows applications through the package manager, always under the approval rules your team sets.
Can we run both during the evaluation?
Yes. Schedule the probe outside the window your current scanner uses so the two do not scan the same segment at the same time.
How is it licensed?
Infrastructure Defense is licensed per monitored host, with the Sentinel Probe, patch execution and configuration hardening included, and devices found by the probe do not count. Web application testing is licensed by plan and number of scan targets. Our team prepares a quote from your real inventory.
Tenable and Nessus are trademarks of Tenable, Inc. WASViking LLC is not affiliated with or endorsed by Tenable, Inc.
The Nessus column reflects publicly available product documentation for Nessus Professional and Nessus Expert reviewed in September 2026. Features, editions and licensing terms vary by contract and change over time, so validate each row in your own evaluation. ACME figures on this page are illustrative data from a demonstration tenant, not customer results.