10 best container scanning tools for 2025

Key takeaways

• Container scanning tools are essential for modern DevSecOps, helping teams catch vulnerabilities before they impact production.
  
• The best tools in 2025 balance accuracy, automation, and integration with CI/CD pipelines.
  
• Open source container scanners are still popular, but for enterprises, commercial solutions with compliance and runtime protection features built in are often the better choice.
  
• Choosing the right tool depends on your team’s maturity, compliance requirements, and how much automation you need.
  
• To get clean container scans, it’s best to pair your tools with enterprise-grade secure base images like echo that eliminate vulnerabilities at the source.

Why container scanning tools matter more than ever

Containers have become the default unit of software delivery. They make applications portable across environments, but that same consistency comes with a hidden trade-off: if a vulnerability exists in a container image, it can spread everywhere the image runs.

The real risk isn’t portability itself – it’s reusability and immutability. Base images are reused across dozens, if not hundreds or even thousands, of services. Once built, those images remain unchanged until they’re explicitly rebuilt. This means that if a CVE is discovered in an underlying package, every image built on top of it carries the same vulnerability until it gets patched, which translates to serious potential risk. 

That’s why container scanning tools have become essential – they’re used to identify known vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, and outdated packages. They give teams the visibility needed to block vulnerable images before they’re deployed, reducing remediation costs and minimizing the risk of exposure in production. 

Also, for organizations that need to comply with regulatory frameworks like FedRAMP, HIPAA, or SOC 2, scanners play a critical role in proving security posture. Paired with SBOM generation, they give teams the visibility and documentation auditors increasingly expect.

What to look for in a container scanning tool

Each container scanner offers its own unique approach and value. So, when evaluating the vulnerability scanning tools for containers, here’s what you should consider:

• Accuracy: Does the scanner minimize false positives and identify vulnerabilities across different registries and languages?
  
• Coverage: Can it scan both images and runtime environments? Does it account for OS packages, dependencies, and misconfigurations?
  
• Database quality: How often are CVE feeds updated, and does it support multiple vulnerability databases?
  
• CI/CD integration: Can it plug into CI/CD pipelines, registries, and orchestrators like Kubernetes?
  
• Policy enforcement: Does the tool support blocking builds that contain critical vulnerabilities?
  
• Runtime scanning: Beyond images, can it monitor containers in production for new CVEs or exploits?
  
• Developer experience: Is it easy for engineers to use without slowing down shipping velocity?
  
• Open source vs. enterprise: Open source container scanners can be flexible and cost-effective, but enterprise tools often offer scalability, compliance, and support. So, do you need a free solution or a commercial tool with compliance reporting and enterprise-grade SLAs?‍
• Remediation support: Beyond detection, does the tool provide actionable guidance or automated fixes? Automated vulnerability remediation has become a growing differentiator.
  

These factors are all really worth considering as you choose the right solution in real-world environments.

Top 10 container scanning tools for 2025

The following is a roundup of the best container scanning tools of the year, along with their key features to help you decide which ones fit your team’s needs.

1. Trivy

Maintained by Aqua Security, Trivy has become the most widely adopted open source container scanner on the market. It’s especially known for its speed, accuracy, and broad community support.

Key features

• Scans OS packages, dependencies, and Infrastructure-as-Code files
  
• Supports CI/CD integration and Kubernetes security checks
  
• Large and active community keeps it up to date
  

2. Snyk Container

Snyk Container has strong developer adoption, making it one of the most common tools for integrating container scanning directly into development workflows.

Key features

• Detects vulnerabilities and misconfigurations in images
  
• Provides fix recommendations with developer context
  
• Strong CI/CD and GitHub/GitLab integration
  

3. Aqua Trivy Enterprise

Aqua Trivy Enterprise elevates the success of Trivy with an enterprise-grade version, which provides everything the open source scanner has to offer, as well as enhanced coverage and high-level compliance features.

Key features

• Enhanced vulnerability intelligence and zero-day coverage
  
• Compliance reporting for enterprise environments
  
• Integrated runtime protection
  

4. Wiz

Wiz is one of the fastest-growing cloud security platforms, extending its cloud-native capabilities deeply into container scanning. Its risk-based prioritization gives enterprises the necessary context and helps them focus on the vulnerabilities that matter most. 

Key features

• Scans containers alongside VMs, serverless, and other cloud resources for a unified view
  
• Contextual risk prioritization tied to runtime exposure
  
• Enterprise-scale compliance reporting and governance tools
  

5. Prisma Cloud (by Palo Alto Networks)

Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks offers a comprehensive CNAPP platform, with container scanning as one of its most widely used capabilities. 

Key features

• Unified vulnerability scanning and runtime protection
  
• Integration across multi-cloud and hybrid environments
  
• Compliance and governance dashboards
  

6. Sysdig Secure

Sysdig is a particularly popular scanner for teams that want runtime visibility in addition to scanning. Its open source Falco integration has boosted adoption in Kubernetes-heavy environments.

Key features

• Combines image scanning with runtime security
  
• Open source Falco integration for threat detection
  
• Compliance mapping for frameworks like PCI and NIST
  

7. JFrog Xray

Xray is widely adopted by teams already using JFrog Artifactory, extending artifact management into vulnerability scanning.

Key features

• Deep scanning of container images and packages stored in Artifactory
  
• Dependency mapping and impact analysis
  
• CI/CD pipeline integration
  

8. Anchore Enterprise

Anchore provides policy-driven container security, with adoption strongest in industries that require strict compliance.

Key features

• Deep integration with CI/CD and registries
• Enterprise-grade policy enforcement for compliance
• Centralized reporting and team management
  

9. Grype

Grype, also developed by Anchore, is another popular open source scanner with growing developer adoption.

Key features

• Lightweight and fast command-line scanning
  
• Integrates with Syft for software bill of materials (SBOM) generation
  
• Ideal for developers needing quick checks
  

10. Qualys Container Security

Qualys has strong brand recognition and is trusted by enterprises, though it tends to be less widely used day-to-day compared to developer-first scanners.

Key features

• Continuous discovery and scanning of container environments
  
• Integration with Qualys’ broader vulnerability management platform
  
• Policy-based controls for compliance

It’s important to note that choosing the right scanner is critical, but it’s only one piece of the puzzle. These tools are essential to identifying vulnerabilities in your software, but they don’t solve the root of the problem for you.

Many organizations are now pairing scanners with CVE-free container base images from echo to deliver quieter scans with more actionable results. By starting with a clean foundation, scanners can focus on vulnerabilities in your application layer, the ones your team can actually fix, while echo removes the constant noise of base image CVEs. This approach lightens the remediation burden and gives security teams confidence that their foundation is secure by design.

Comparison table

Here’s a simplified comparison of the top tools across major categories:

How to choose the right container scanning tool for your stack

It’s important to recognize that there’s no “best” scanner. Choosing the one that’s right for you really depends on your team and what exactly you’re trying to achieve. With that said, here’s some helpful guidance for selecting the container scanning tool that’ll best fit your requirements: 

• Early-stage teams: If you’re just getting started, open source container scanners like Trivy or Grype can provide immediate coverage without hurting your wallet.
  
• Enterprise compliance: If you need to give your auditors evidence, enterprise-ready options like Wiz, Prisma Cloud, Qualys, or Aqua are best suited, with full visibility and clarity.
  
• Developer-first organizations: If you’re focused on shift-left tools, Snyk or JFrog Xray are ideal because they integrate directly with developer workflows.
  
• Runtime-sensitive environments: If runtime monitoring and forensics are critical,  Sysdig Secure and Prisma Cloud especially shine.

It’s also important to remember that scanners don’t eliminate vulnerabilities. Pairing scanning with slim containers and automated vulnerability remediation are common practices to reduce them. But in order to remove the risk of CVEs in your container images, it’s worth exploring solutions like echo, which provides AI-powered, completely CVE-free base images. By starting with a clean foundation, scanners can focus on what matters with less noisy triage and wasted remediation cycles. This combination of secure-by-design images plus a scanner that validates them gives organizations the confidence they need without slowing down development.

FAQs

What is a container scanning tool?

A container scanning tool is a specific type of vulnerability scanning tool designed to identify security flaws, outdated packages, and misconfigurations inside container images. They are designed to give teams the visibility they need to ensure secure software delivery by catching issues before deployment.

Do I need both image scanning and runtime scanning?

Yes! Image scanning is a key tool for preventing vulnerabilities from entering production, while runtime scanning catches threats that emerge during execution. Both layers complement each other and are absolutely critical to effective container security. Additionally, it’s worth noting that even if you’re always on top of your scanning, you may still have critical container blind spots. 

That’s why it’s important to understand every element that could lead to exposure. Starting with CVE-free base images (like those from echo) lets you hand off the scanning burden and ensure known vulnerabilities don’t make it into production in the first place.

Are open source scanners reliable?

Open source container scanners like Trivy and Grype are certainly reliable and widely adopted. Especially for early-stage startups, they are an extremely effective scanning tool to get critical visibility into your container images. That said, open source scanners typically lack more advanced compliance features, enterprise support, or runtime protections. Thus, for larger organizations, it’s recommended to incorporate a commercial scanner into your workflow.

Can I automate container vulnerability scans in CI/CD?

Yes! This is highly recommended. Most container security tools integrate with CI/CD pipelines, automatically scanning images before they’re deployed. This enables shift-left security and lowers the cost of remediating vulnerabilities later on within the lifecycle. Learn more about container scanning best practices to ensure you’re doing it all right. 

Do container scanners fix vulnerabilities automatically?

No! Scanners surface vulnerabilities, but they don’t fix them. Remediation is still up to your team, whether that means patching dependencies, updating base images, or rebuilding containers. This often creates significant overhead, especially when the same CVEs appear repeatedly across environments. That’s why, to reduce the burden, many teams adopt CVE-free base images from echo, which eliminate vulnerabilities at the source and enable scanners to confirm a clean foundation from the start.