CYBR vs. QLYS: Which Cybersecurity Stock is the Better Buy Now?

CyberArk CYBR and Qualys QLYS are two cybersecurity giants playing critical roles in securing enterprise environments, but in very different ways. While CyberArk primarily specializes in privileged access management and identity security, Qualys serves a niche space involving vulnerability management and compliance monitoring.

Both CyberArk and Qualys are capitalizing on the massive growth of the cybersecurity market, which is projected to witness a CAGR of 12.63% from 2025 to 2030, per a report by Mordor Intelligence.

With this robust industry growth forecast, the question remains: Which stock has more upside potential? Let’s break down their fundamentals, growth prospects, market challenges and valuation to determine which offers a more compelling investment case.

The Case for CyberArk Stock

CyberArk is experiencing traction in its identity security offerings due to the momentum in machine identities outnumbering human identities, which now stands at more than 80 to 1, up from a 45 to 1 ratio just a year ago. The traction in machine identities will keep growing as automated systems, AI agents, and workload-based architectures gain adoption.

CYBR is also innovating by implementing AI-based products like Secure AI Agents and CORA AI. While CYBR’s Secure AI Agent solution is designed to protect the AI Agents deployed by CyberArk’s enterprise customers from prompt injection, credential leakage, and permission abuse, CORA AI serves as the intelligence engine embedded inside the Secure AI Agent solution.

However, CYBR’s near-term prospects are hurt by changing customer spending behavior. Companies seeking cybersecurity solutions are breaking their cybersecurity investment plans into phases and implementing the same over longer periods of time instead of making a single large investment. This makes investors slightly cautious about CyberArk’s near-term growth prospects.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for CYBR’s 2025 and 2026 revenue growth rate indicates 32.3% and 18.8% rise, respectively. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for CYBR’s bottom line suggests growth rates of 27.4% and 25%, respectively.

The Case for Qualys Stock

Qualys is one of the leading providers of Vulnerability Management, Detection and Response (VMDR) solutions. Its VMDR capabilities are driving growth by offering organizations a comprehensive solution to proactively identify, prioritize and remediate security vulnerabilities across their IT infrastructure.

Qualys boasts a growing customer base, a key driver fueling its revenue growth. The company's ability to attract new customers and retain existing ones underscores its strong market positioning and value proposition. Currently, it has more than 10,000 customers across 130 countries, including a majority of Forbes Global 100. In the second quarter of 2025, the net dollar expansion rate was 104%.

QLYS has increased the depth of its portfolio with multiple product launches and enhancements, including the industry’s first Risk Operations Center with Enterprise TruRisk Management. The company also launched Qualys TotalAI to de-risk generative AI and large language model applications from cyber breaches.

With all these factors at play, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for QLYS’ 2025 and 2026 revenues are expected to grow 8% and 6.5%, respectively. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Qualys’ 2025 and 2026 earnings are projected to grow 3.6% and 5.5%, respectively.

CYBR vs. QLYS: Price Performance & Valuation

Year to date, shares of CyberArk have jumped 30.6% while Qualys shares have declined 4.6%.

CyberArk is trading at a forward sales multiple of 14.7X, higher than Qualys’ 7.09X. CyberArk does seem pricey compared with Qualys.

Conclusion: Buy Qualys Stock Right Now

Both Qualys and CyberArk are key players in the cybersecurity space, but CyberArk is facing near-term challenges and delayed orders. In contrast, Qualys is delivering robust growth, expanding through a robust customer acquisition and retention strategy.

Currently, Qualys flaunts a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), making the stock a stronger pick compared with CyberArk, which has a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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