Drata vs. Vanta vs. SmartSuite: Which One Is Better For GRC? (2026)

With Drata and Vanta leading the compliance automation market, each offering unique strengths in continuous monitoring, audit readiness, and framework coverage, I know making the right choice isn’t easy.

In this detailed comparison, I’ll break down the key features, integrations, pricing, and customer feedback for both platforms to help you make an informed decision.

➡️ I’ll also introduce you to a third option that blends flexibility and affordability with built-in collaboration: SmartSuite (that’s us).

How do Drata, Vanta and SmartSuite compare on GRC features?

Key takeaways

• Drata delivers enterprise-grade compliance automation with continuous monitoring, automated evidence collection, and multi-framework support. Its strength lies in helping compliance teams stay audit-ready year-round.
• Vanta focuses on ease of use and speed, offering continuous monitoring, AI-driven automation, and broad integration coverage. It’s known for helping companies achieve certifications like SOC 2, ISO 27001, and HIPAA.
• SmartSuite offers the best alternative to both with its all-in-one compliance hub, no-code automation builder, and ready-to-use GRC templates.

Let’s go over the 3 tools’ features, starting with SmartSuite: 👇

SmartSuite’s GRC Features

SmartSuite’s GRC solution helps you reduce fragmentation: policies, control definitions, assessment results, incident records and related evidence live together, not scattered across email threads and ad-hoc spreadsheets.

💡 We have recently partnered with the Cyber Risk Institute to deliver a CRI profile for U.S. Banks' compliance needs.

All-In-One Compliance Management

We believe that compliance should be simple, automated, and accessible to all financial institutions, regardless of their size.

With our no-code, easy-to-use solution, organizations can automate all compliance processes with a start date next week and not next year.

SmartSuite helps you achieve and maintain compliance without the expense and complexity of adapting legacy GRC solutions to accommodate new compliance requirements.

Here are the use cases that you’ll get with SmartSuite:

• Create reports and dynamic dashboards: You can monitor executive views into your organization's overall risk profile with charting and metrics widgets. 

• Collaborate and respond to risks in real-time: Engage key stakeholders in a real-time discussion of potential threats or vulnerabilities.

Our tool will also provide you with instant updates when critical information becomes available.

• Automate policy creation, real-time approval, and control assessments: Streamline risk management by building an integrated program on a single platform.
• Keep risk and compliance data secure: Define your teams and manage access to information across all GRC practice areas.

• Integrate with your existing systems and data to consolidate and centralize your data. 

• Automate for accuracy and efficiency to remove inefficiencies and the chance for human error by automating repeatable workflows.

SmartSuite's no-code automation builder provides you with a visual interface that makes it easy to respond to events and take action. 

That means your compliance team can customize your GRC workflows without technical resources.

• Monitor, measure and score: Create risk calculations and metrics to evaluate every aspect of risk.

• Policy management: It’s possible to establish a strong foundation from the get-go with streamlined and flexible policy management.

Your team will be able to assign ownership, manage revisions, and ensure your policies consistently align with key business initiatives and regulatory requirements.

• PSTOS Compliance Tracker: Designed for regulatory compliance and built on SmartSuite.

This solution focuses on data security as the core of compliance frameworks with services such as compliance readiness, virtual CISO, and IT security implementation.

Learn more about it from this webinar that we did on the topic:

Effectively Prioritize & Mitigate Risks

With SmartSuite, you can create a centralized risk register to effectively identify potential risks to your organization.

You will be able to properly assess threats and establish risk mitigation strategies inside SmartSuite.

Your team can ensure that the appropriate controls are in place and measure their effectiveness by evaluating risk indicators and displaying results in SmartSuite’s rollup reports and dashboards.

💡 Pro Tip: Teams that use our platform use automation to move tasks through defined workflow stages that comply with their policies and procedures.

We understand how crucial threat management is and the need to respond quickly to incidents.

SmartSuite lets you centralize incident response and threat mitigation by linking incidents to assets and organizational data to offer context during your investigations.

Your compliance team can also set up automation with our no-code automation builder to escalate critical events to make sure that your team is aware of active risks to your organization.

Ready-To-Use Compliance Templates

We have a few compliance templates that your team can get started with right away, instead of building everything from scratch.

Our general risk management template includes:

• Risk register, where your team can break down the risks, the risk owner, the annual loss expectancy, risk event category, risk type, volatility, and status.

• Issue assessments, where you’ll be able to see a comprehensive breakdown of each risk.

• Action plans, where you can describe the actions (best practices) to mitigate the risks.

• A separate tab for control standards, your findings, exception requests, risk assessment by type, and risk assessment issues.

You can customize our risk management template here.

Alternatively, your team can check out and customize our 14 other risk management templates for various use cases, such as contract management, policy management, and incident management.

Drata’s GRC Features

Continuous Compliance & Automated Evidence Collection

Drata continuously monitors your systems and security controls, linking with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP), identity providers (Okta, Azure AD), and core business tools to automatically collect audit evidence. 

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As controls run, the platform provides real-time alerts for any violations or configuration changes, so compliance issues are caught immediately. 

➡️ This continuous monitoring can help you reduce the manual work of audit preparation by keeping evidence up-to-date at all times. 

Risk & Vendor Risk Management

Drata comes with a built-in risk management module and third-party risk tools that help you centralize and score internal and external risks.

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Here, you’d be able to maintain a risk register, perform risk assessments, and track remediation tasks for both your organization and your vendors. 

➡️ The reason why I like this feature is that it helps compliance teams get visibility into all risk domains (e.g. technical, people, process) in one place. 

Multi-Framework Support & Policy Automation

Drata supports ~20 major compliance standards (SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA, GDPR, DORA, NIS2, etc.) out of the box. 

The platform also lets you define custom frameworks and map controls across them.

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Drata’s Policy Center helps you centralize policy documents (with over 20 templates available) and can automatically schedule regular reviews. 

Task ownership and deadlines are then enforced via the platform, so your team can stay on top of training, access reviews, and policy attestation without someone having to manually check every time.

Audit Readiness & AI-Powered Assurance

Lastly, what stood out to me about Drata is that it offers tools to streamline the audit process. 

Its Audit Hub lets your internal team and external auditors collaborate in real-time to track progress and share control evidence interactively. 

➡️ The tool also uses automation (and some AI-driven features) to accelerate questionnaires and controls.

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For example, Drata can auto-answer many standard audit questions and suggest documentation to reduce reviewer effort. 

Vanta’s GRC Features

Continuous Monitoring & Automated Testing

Vanta continuously scans your environment and runs hundreds of automated compliance tests per hour to ensure controls remain in place. 

➡️ In fact, Vanta can execute up to ~1,200 checks per hour, flagging any failed controls or unexpected changes immediately.

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The platform stood out to me, as it can monitor things like firewall rules, user access privileges, MFA status, and more. 

💡 The result is a live dashboard showing which controls are passing or failing, so your team can fix issues before an audit. 

AI-Powered Automation & Questionnaire Handling

Vanta uses automation heavily to simplify compliance. 

It can auto-fill or suggest answers for many security questionnaires (such as security due diligence forms), and it provides smart templates for policies. 

➡️ When I looked at user reviews, I saw that some customers report that Vanta’s automation features “make compliance much less overwhelming.”

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For example, Vanta’s AI can generate policy drafts or risk assessments, and its workflow engine routes tasks (like evidence collection or certificate renewals) to the right person. 

Broad Framework Coverage

Vanta comes with templates and controls for 35+ compliance standards (SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA, GDPR, CMMC, FedRAMP, and more). 

Your organization can onboard multiple frameworks within the same account and reuse controls where possible.

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➡️ The platform’s Trust Center also lets you publish your audit reports and certifications to customers as proof of compliance. 

Vendor Risk & Internal Risk Management

Vanta includes tools for assessing and tracking risk. 

Through its Vendor Risk Management module, your organization can continually monitor third-party security (e.g. vendors’ SOC 2 or ISO status) and score vendor risks.

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While this risk functionality is somewhat less customizable than Drata’s, it centralizes key risk information so that nothing falls through the cracks. 

➡️ In practice, Vanta users are happy to have a one-stop platform for both compliance controls and basic risk oversight.

Integrations: Drata vs. Vanta vs. SmartSuite

SmartSuite’s Integrations

SmartSuite integrates with leading GRC and risk intelligence platforms to centralize compliance, risk, and vendor assessments. 

Notable integrations include:

• Ascent: Automates regulatory obligations and keeps them updated.
• Bitsight: Provides daily security ratings for third-party risk and benchmarking.
• Black Kite: Delivers cyber risk scores, ransomware indices, and compliance reports.
• NetSkope: Secures remote access with ZTNA, CASB, and DLP capabilities.
• RapidRatings: Analyzes financial health of vendors in 140+ countries.
• Regology: Tracks global regulatory changes across 4,000+ sources.
• RiskRecon: Prioritizes cyber risks with actionable assessments.
• Secure Controls Framework (SCF): Offers a mapped library of regulatory controls.
• SecurityScorecard: Provides instant vendor risk ratings and security insights.

Our platform aims to help compliance teams combine regulatory intelligence, cyber risk ratings, and financial assessments directly into their GRC workflows.

Drata’s Integrations

Drata comes with 200+ built-in connectors, focusing on key security and IT systems. 

It’s possible to link Drata to:

• Cloud providers, such as AWS, Azure, and GCP.
• Identity and access management tools, such as Okta, Azure AD, and Google Workspace.
• HR and device tools, such as Workday, Jamf, and Kandji.
• Developer platforms, such as GitHub, Jira, and Bitbucket.

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These integrations enable end-to-end compliance data sync.

For example, you can automatically pull Okta user logins or AWS firewall configurations as evidence. 

Vanta’s Integrations

Vanta offers the widest native integration network with its 400+ pre-built integrations. 

The platform connects to virtually any SaaS your company uses: 

• Major cloud platforms, such as AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud.
• Productivity suites, such as Google Workspace and Microsoft 365.
• Collaboration tools, such as Slack, Zoom, GitHub, Jira, and Confluence.
• Helpdesks and CRMs, and many more. 

Vanta’s integrations automatically sync configuration and access data (e.g. Okta groups, AWS IAM policies, GitHub repos) into its compliance checks. 

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Because of its breadth, the platform can automate over 90% of control monitoring via these connectors to help you streamline evidence collection for audits.

Pricing: Drata vs. Vanta vs. SmartSuite

SmartSuite’s Pricing

SmartSuite offers a 14-day free trial of its Professional plan (no credit card required), with automations, team collaboration, multi-dashboard views, and more.

There are three per-seat plans plus a per-solution Signature plan, all available through the 14-day free trial:

• Team: $15/user/month billed annually ($20 billed monthly, minimum 3 users), including 5,000 records per solution, 50GB of file storage, and 25,000 automation runs and API calls per month.
• Professional: $32/user/month billed annually ($36 billed monthly, minimum 5 users), adding 100,000 records per solution, 100GB of file storage, two-factor authentication, and Gmail & Outlook integrations.
• Enterprise: Custom pricing with no seat minimum, adding 400,000 records per solution, 500GB of file storage, audit logs, data loss prevention, SSO, and SCIM provisioning.
• Signature: A custom plan tailored to your needs and team size with no predefined limits.

Drata’s Pricing

Drata’s pricing is custom, but it has 6 GRC plans that you can choose from to get a quote:

• Drata Foundation (Custom pricing): Up to 50 full-time employees (FTE) for one pre-mapped framework (SOC 2, ISO 27001, Cyber Essentials, HIPAA, or GDPR).
• Drata Advanced (Custom pricing): One additional framework (pre-mapped or fully custom) with custom API connections and automated tests.
• Drata Enterprise (Custom pricing): Risk Management Pro for advanced risk workflows and access to Compliance as Code Pro for policy-as-code automation.

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• SafeBase Foundation (Custom pricing): Trust Center Standard package with up to 25 approved domains.
• SafeBase Advanced (Custom pricing): Trust Center Pro package for richer customization with continued AIQA Standard support for ongoing questionnaires.
• SafeBase Enterprise (Custom pricing): Trust Center Premier package with white-label portals & SLAs and AIQA Pro package for unlimited questionnaire handling.

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➡️ Each plan also has paid add-ons, such as extra frameworks, user access reviews, adaptive automation tests, approved domains, questionnaires, and published product portals.

How Much Does Drata Really Cost?

Based on a range of publicly reported benchmarks, here’s what organizations can typically expect to pay for Drata’s GRC platform:

• Foundation Plan (Entry Tier): Starts around $7,000–$7,500 per year. Ideal for startups and small teams looking to automate a single framework like SOC 2 or ISO 27001.
• Advanced Plan (Mid Tier): Typically costs around $15,000 per year. Designed for growing companies that need multiple frameworks, advanced integrations, or risk features.

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• Enterprise Plan (Top Tier): Generally $25,000–$50,000+ per year, depending on modules selected. This tier includes advanced GRC functions, Trust Center, Vendor Risk Pro, and audit support.

Some larger enterprises report paying $75,000 to $100,000+ per year, especially when onboarding multiple frameworks, multiple locations, or layered vendor and risk programs.

➡️ SMBs typically spend around $7.5K–$15K/year, depending on compliance goals.

➡️ Mid-market and enterprise organizations often pay between $25K–$50K+ annually, with higher quotes for expansive security, governance, or audit management requirements.

According to Vendr, the median buyer pays about $25,000/year, with reported pricing ranging from $10,250/year to $42,750/year.

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Vanta’s Pricing

There are 4 plans available in Vanta’s pricing model:

• Essentials: Custom pricing, which gives you access to one compliance framework with agentic policy generator, access to its Vanta AI Agent, automated evidence collection, and more.
• Plus: Custom pricing, which adds expanded Vanta AI Agent features, 25 AI-powered questionnaire automations per year, and access management.
• Professional: Custom pricing, which adds up to 144 AI-powered questionnaire automations per year, risk management with customization, dashboard, and reporting, access to its Advanced Trust Center, custom monitoring tests and automation, and more.
• Enterprise: Custom pricing, which provides you with a fully customizable package for your advanced GRC needs.

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How Does Vanta Calculate Its Pricing?

Vanta’s GRC pricing model is built around a modular, organization-specific structure that adapts to your organization’s size, complexity, and compliance needs.

Instead of a flat rate or per-user pricing like SmartSuite, Vanta accounts for the number of employees (or devices), selected compliance frameworks, and any additional modules such as Vendor Risk or Trust Center.

Key aspects of its pricing include:

• Company size, compliance scope, and selected modules.
• Each added compliance framework (e.g., SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA) typically increases the cost by a set amount.
• Add-ons like Vendor Risk Management and Trust Center are billed separately from the core package.

How Much Does Vanta Really Cost?

Based on publicly reported data and documented price quotes, here’s a general breakdown of what organizations can expect to pay for Vanta’s GRC offerings:

Small Companies (1–20 employees):

• Core Package: Starts at around $7,500–$11,500/year, typically including one framework (e.g., SOC 2), policy templates, and basic monitoring, according to AWS.
• Add-ons: Trust Center starts around $6,000/year, Vendor Risk Management around $11,200/year.

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Mid-Sized Businesses (21–100 employees):

• Growth Tier: Typically ranges between $15,000–$25,000/year, with additional cost per framework (~$5,000 each, according to insiders).

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• Popular bundles often total between $20,000–$30,000/year, depending on the number of frameworks and modules.

Large Organizations & Enterprise:

• Scale & Enterprise Plans: Often priced between $30,000–$80,000/year, depending on the number of users, frameworks, and advanced capabilities.
• Median deal size reported at around $19,000/year, with upper-tier contracts going for $49,000/year.

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➡️ SMEs should plan for a budget in the $15K–$30K/year range for standard use with one or two GRC frameworks.

➡️ Enterprises adopting multiple frameworks and modules should expect to invest $40K–$50K+ per year to get all the bells and whistles, especially when including custom features, AI automation, or multiple workspaces.

What are customers saying about Drata, Vanta, & SmartSuite?

Key takeaways:

• Drata users value its intuitive interface, strong automation for evidence collection, and continuous monitoring, making audits far less manual. However, some note that integrations are limited compared to competitors and that setup can be complex for smaller teams.
• Vanta customers highlight its ease of use, fast onboarding, and wide range of integrations that simplify achieving SOC 2, ISO 27001, and HIPAA certifications. Complaints center on its higher pricing and less advanced risk management features for enterprises.
• SmartSuite customers appreciate its user-friendly design, built-in communication tools, customization options, and strong value for money. That said, some reviewers feel its native integrations are more limited and that the platform is still maturing compared to long-standing GRC solutions.

Drata Reviews

G2 Rating: 4.8/5.

What users love:

• Users praise Drata’s intuitive, well-designed interface and excellent customer support.
• Many note that Drata centralizes all compliance tasks and provides great visibility into controls.
• Most users appreciate how Drata automates tedious GRC processes.

‘’Drata has provided a great platform to begin our ISO 27001 journey. There are so many aspects of this certification, and Drata has simplified it in many ways. We had so many questions regarding the policies, etc., and Drata has helped us enormously.’’ – G2 Review.

Common complaints:

• Some users report limited integrations with certain tools. 
• Others mention missing features (e.g. extra frameworks or device-security checks).
• Occasional UX confusion in the UI. 
• A few users mention that the initial setup is complex.

‘’The platform wasn’t as intuitive as we had hoped, and we often found it difficult to understand what was included or required at each step. We relied heavily on support from a third-party implementation partner and our auditor to interpret and navigate the system effectively. Without that external guidance, getting through the process would have been significantly more difficult.’’ – G2 Review.

Vanta Reviews

G2 Rating: 4.6/5.

What users love:

• Reviewers highlight Vanta’s ease of use and breadth of features, saying it “makes compliance easier to understand” and that it handles so much of the work automatically.
• They value the platform’s simple navigation, automated alerts, and the fact that “it exceeds expectations” in combining many tasks into one tool.
• Vanta’s integrations and automation of compliance checks are frequently cited as time-savers.

‘’One eco-system to manage compliance frameworks, especially where technical elements are involved. The integrations are powerful, and the platform is regularly updated with new features. The support for the product is excellent, and even though we’ve only been a customer for a short period of time, we’ve been given access to BETA areas of the system and given the opportunity to shape how the product is designed going forward.’’ - G2 Review.

Common complaints:

• Users are wary of the pricing; many report that costs are high, especially for additional features and for smaller companies. 
• Some reviewers note gaps in integrations (certain apps aren’t supported), requiring manual workarounds. 
• Others mention missing advanced features (like more sophisticated vendor-risk tools). 

‘’Some modules are a bit pricey and should ideally be included in the plans by default, but other than that, no additional concerns so far.’’ – G2 Review.

SmartSuite Reviews

G2 Rating: 4.8/5.

What users love:

• Customers love SmartSuite’s intuitive interface and quick setup. It’s described as highly flexible, enabling teams to build internal tools and workflows rapidly. 
• Users frequently praise its built-in communication features (comments, @mentions, documents) and rich customization options. 
• Many note that SmartSuite offers great value for money compared to alternatives.

‘’I love how intuitive SmartSuite is from the moment you log in. It's easy to navigate, and the templates really made it simple to quickly realize all the potential ways to utilize the software. I love how easy it is to see progress on a project at any point, and how all files, communication and calendar are tied in within the task. So insanely simple, but there is so much you can do.’’ - Capterra Review.

Common complaints:

• Some users point out limited native integrations relative to bigger competitors.
• Others say certain advanced functions are still maturing (because the product is newer). 
• A few mention the community is smaller than for more established platforms, which means fewer people to ask about solution building.

‘’While SmartSuite offers a good range of automation tools, we find that some essential automation features are not yet available. Enhancements such as more customizable workflow automation and integration with other automation platforms would be beneficial. These additions would reduce the need for manual interventions and increase efficiency across our operations.’’ – G2 Review.

Which platform should you choose for GRC?

If you’ve read through the article so far and you’re still unsure, here’s a quick use case summary to help you see the 3 tools from a bird’s eye view: ⬇️

SmartSuite is the right choice if you:

✅ Want an all-in-one GRC solution that eliminates scattered spreadsheets and email threads by centralizing policies, controls, incidents, and evidence in one place.

✅ Need a user-friendly, no-code platform where compliance teams can automate workflows, build dashboards, and customize processes without technical resources.

✅ Value affordability and speed, with compliance programs that can be deployed in weeks instead of months with our ready-to-use compliance templates.

✅ Are looking for real-time collaboration in risk and incident management, with automated alerts, dynamic dashboards, and role-based access control.

SmartSuite isn’t the best option if you:

❌ Require specialized continuous compliance monitoring across cloud infrastructure, devices, and identity providers (Drata and Vanta excel here).

❌ Depend on hundreds of out-of-the-box security integrations with IT and DevOps systems. Our platform may integrate well with business apps, but it lacks the deep technical connectors that Drata and Vanta provide.

Drata is the ideal choice if you:

✅ Need a dedicated GRC solution for enterprise compliance, as the platform covers multiple standards (SOC 2, ISO, HIPAA, etc.).

✅ Require continuous monitoring and automated evidence collection.

✅ Want a risk management framework that includes vendor risk tools, which are integrated with your compliance workflows.

✅ Value strong audit support, such as a real-time audit hub.

Drata isn’t the best option if you:

❌ Are a startup or a tight-budget team seeking a lightweight compliance tool. Drata is expensive, which is why some teams look for Drata alternatives.

❌ Primarily need a general project platform or very basic GRC tracking, as Drata is specialized for security/compliance use cases.

Vanta is the ideal choice if you:

✅ Want fast, automated SOC 2/HIPAA/ISO compliance with minimal manual setup.

✅ Prefer AI-assisted workflows and broad out-of-the-box support.

✅ Are a small to mid-market company that needs a user-friendly interface and extensive integrations (Vanta supports 400+ integrations).

✅ Need to consolidate vendor security reviews and internal controls monitoring in one place.

Vanta isn’t the best option if you:

❌ Require heavy customization of compliance workflows or unusual controls, which is why some people have been looking for Vanta alternatives.

❌ Have a very limited budget, as some users find Vanta’s pricing high for smaller teams.

Next Steps For Compliance Teams: Get Started With SmartSuite & Our Templates For Free

If you’re a compliance leader looking to build compliance workflows and effectively prioritize and mitigate risks, give SmartSuite a chance with our 14-day free trial and ready-to-use GRC templates.

SmartSuite’s GRC solution offers just the right customization, native collaboration capabilities and a library of 200+ project management templates to help compliance teams create and maintain a project management workflow.

Here’s what's in it for your team when you try SmartSuite:

• A 14-day free trial of the Professional plan with multi-board views (Kanban, Chart, Map, Timeline, Card, and Calendar), automations, and 40+ field types, including formula and linked record fields.
• No-code automation builder to set up to 500,000 trigger/action workflows.
• Built-in productivity tools, including time tracking, status tracking, and checklists.
• Team collaboration and planning tools such as whiteboards and SmartSuite docs.
• Resource management across projects and teams.
• 40+ field types, including the option to add your custom fields.

Start a 14-day free trial to explore all its features.

Or, if you’d like to talk to our team of experts, schedule a demo.

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