Snyk and StackAttest answer different questions about the same codebase
Snyk is a strong product and this page is not going to pretend otherwise. It answers a developer's question, inside a developer's workflow, and it answers it well. StackAttest answers a different question for a different reader. The two overlap on dependencies, and the honest thing is to say exactly where.
Which one fits your situation
Snyk may be the better fit when the question is what is wrong in this code and these dependencies, and how do I fix it without leaving my editor. Its documentation describes findings in the IDE, checks on pull requests, its own vulnerability database, licence policies, and fix and upgrade pull requests raised for you. A team that wants vulnerability management to live in the development workflow is well served by it.
StackAttest may be the better fit when the question is whether this application is ready for production and whether somebody outside the team can read the answer: security, dependencies, runtime behaviour and operational readiness, each control graded by how strongly it was established, ending in a Passport you can send rather than a queue of issues you have to summarise.
The same questions, asked of both
Each row is one question put to both products. The Snyk column is drawn from Snyk's own documentation, and where their documentation does not say something, neither does this page.
What it is for
Finding and fixing vulnerabilities in code and open source dependencies, inside the workflow of the people who wrote them.
Establishing whether an application is production ready, and recording the evidence in a form a reader outside the team can check.
Who it is built for
Developers, and the security teams standardising practice across their repositories.
Founders, and the investors, accelerators and buyers asking them for a technical answer.
Scope
Snyk's documentation describes Snyk Open Source for dependencies and licences, Snyk Code for first-party source, Snyk Container, Snyk IaC for infrastructure as code, and Snyk API & Web for running web applications and APIs.
Thirteen controls across application security, dependencies, runtime behaviour and operational readiness, mapped to OWASP ASVS 5, NIST SSDF, CWE, OWASP API Security Top 10, WSTG, SLSA.
Source analysis
Snyk Code is described as a developer-first static application security testing product with a semantic, AI-based analysis engine, running in the editor, in the CLI, on pull requests and in CI.
A read-only repository validation feeding named controls: where credential material lives, whether authorisation is enforced server side, whether data access is injection safe, and what the dependency graph carries. Findings cite the file they came from.
Runtime testing
Snyk API & Web is described as a dynamic application security testing product that scans running web applications and APIs.
Runtime validation builds and runs the application in an isolated environment and probes it, including whether the deployed system refuses a read of another account's data.
What a result looks like
An issue with a severity and a priority, the dependency path or code location that produced it, and remediation advice.
A control outcome with an evidence grade from E0 unknown to E5 independently reproduced, and the controls a run could not reach listed as uncovered rather than passed.
Remediation
Snyk's documentation describes fix pull requests, and automatic upgrade pull requests for supported package managers on GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket and Azure Repos.
A fix plan is proposed against a finding, and nothing reaches your repository until a person approves that plan. There is no automatic upgrade pull request when a new version of a package is published.
Repeatability
Continuous by design: in the editor as code is written, on each pull request, in CI, and on monitored projects as new advisories are published.
The same control pack on every run, so two validations are comparable and a change in the product is visible as a change in the result.
What you have at the end
A prioritised set of issues to work through, and reporting across projects for the people who own that work.
A founder-controlled Passport: control results, evidence grades, what stayed uncovered, and a signed technical attestation.
Where it stops
It reports on what it scanned. Questions outside a scan surface, such as whether a rollback path exists or whether a backup has ever been restored, are not what a code, dependency or application scanner sets out to answer.
It is not vulnerability management. There is no editor plugin, and it is not the place a team triages and tracks a backlog of findings over time.
Statements about Snyk on this page are drawn from Snyk's own public product documentation at docs.snyk.io, read on 31 August 2026. Their products change. Where this page and their documentation disagree, theirs is right.
Dependency scanning is the overlap, and it is a real one
Both products look at your dependency graph for packages carrying known vulnerabilities, and on that ground they are doing the same work. Snyk goes deeper: its documentation describes its own vulnerability database, licence policies, dependency paths through indirect dependencies, and fix and upgrade pull requests raised into your repository. The StackAttest dependency check exists to settle one control of thirteen and to record it at a stated evidence grade inside a report someone else can read. If you already run Snyk on your dependencies, that control will usually agree with it, and what StackAttest adds there is not a better advisory feed. It is the report around it.
What Snyk is good at
Snyk is a developer security platform, and its own documentation is the best statement of what it covers: software composition analysis for open source dependencies and licences, static analysis of first-party code, container and infrastructure-as-code scanning, and dynamic testing of running web applications and APIs. It runs where developers already are, in the editor, the command line, the pull request and CI, and it can raise the upgrade for you. If your problem is a backlog of vulnerabilities that needs to become a shorter backlog without your team leaving their workflow, that is the problem it was built for.
What StackAttest is for
StackAttest is not aimed at the person writing the code. It is aimed at the moment somebody outside the team asks whether the application is ready: an investor in diligence, an accelerator with a portfolio to compare, a first enterprise customer with a security questionnaire. It runs thirteen controls, records how strongly each one was established, names what it could not reach, and publishes the result as a Passport the founder controls.
The distinction is scope and audience, not quality
This is not a page arguing that one tool finds more than the other. They are pointed at different questions. What vulnerabilities are in my code and my dependencies is a question about work to be done. Is this application production ready, and can somebody outside the team read the answer, is a question about a decision somebody else is making. A tool built for the first is not deficient for declining to answer the second.
An issue queue and an artifact are different outputs
A finding is an instruction to a developer. It has a severity, a location and a fix, and it stops being interesting the moment it is closed. A Passport is a statement to a reader, and its most important property is that it is checkable: every control result carries the grade of the evidence behind it, and the controls nobody could establish are listed rather than quietly dropped. Neither output substitutes for the other. A screenshot of a clean scan is not evidence for somebody in diligence, and a Passport will not do the ten upgrades sitting in your backlog.
Readiness is wider than vulnerabilities
Several of the thirteen controls are not vulnerability questions at all: whether a rollback path exists, whether backups have ever been restored, whether the deployed system refuses a request for another account's data. Those are settled from a runtime probe or from an operator attestation, and the report says which. No code scanner claims to answer them, and reading a clean scan as though it did is the mistake this page exists to prevent.
Using both
Nothing here argues against running both, and plenty of teams should. Snyk keeps dependency and code findings moving inside the workflow. A validation answers the outside question when it is asked, and cites the state of your dependencies as one control among thirteen. If you can only do one thing this month, do the one that matches whoever is currently asking you for something.
What this page is not claiming
- This is not a claim that StackAttest finds more than Snyk. It is a different scope for a different reader, and on the ground they share, Snyk's dependency and code coverage goes deeper than one control among thirteen.
- No price for Snyk appears here. Their plans are published on their own site, and a number copied onto this page would go stale without either of us noticing.
- It is not a penetration test, and running it more often does not make it one. Deterministic checks and bounded runtime probes are not a person hunting for the failure nobody anticipated.
- Thirteen controls is a defined floor, not a complete security review. A clean result means the controls that were tested held at the evidence strength recorded, mapped to OWASP ASVS 5, NIST SSDF, CWE, OWASP API Security Top 10, WSTG, SLSA, and nothing wider than that.
- It is not SOC 2 and does not replace it. SOC 2 attests to organisational controls over a period; this validates technical controls in the software. They answer different questions for different buyers.
- It does not replace human due diligence. It gives a reviewer repeatable evidence to start from, which is a different job from being the reviewer.
- Controls a run could not reach are reported as uncovered rather than passed. A result you did not earn is worse than no result.
Questions
Is StackAttest a Snyk alternative?
For part of what Snyk does, and not for the rest. If you want something to replace dependency and code scanning inside your development workflow, Snyk does that job more thoroughly than one control among thirteen. If what you need is a readable answer to whether the application is ready for production, that is a different instrument, and this is one.
What does Snyk do that StackAttest does not?
Snyk's documentation describes editor plugins, checks on pull requests, its own vulnerability database, licence policies, container and infrastructure-as-code scanning, and fix and upgrade pull requests raised into your repository. StackAttest does none of those.
What does StackAttest do that a code scanner does not?
It grades the evidence behind each result, tests the running application for behaviour that source cannot settle, covers operational controls such as backups and a rollback path, names the controls it could not reach, and ends in a Passport a founder can publish and a reader outside the team can check.
Do the dependency results overlap?
Yes, and the page says so above rather than pretending otherwise. Both look for packages carrying known advisories. Snyk reports that in far more depth; StackAttest records it as one control among thirteen, at a stated evidence grade, inside a report addressed to someone outside the team.
Can I use both?
Yes, and many teams should. They sit at different points: Snyk inside the development loop, a validation at the moment somebody outside the team asks a question. Neither one blocks the other.
Does StackAttest open pull requests to fix things?
A fix plan is proposed against a finding, and nothing reaches your repository until a person has approved that plan. There is no automatic upgrade pull request raised when a new version of a package is published.
Related
Find out where your application actually stands
Start with the layer you can run today. The result says which layers ran and what they could not reach, so it is honest about its own limits.