Best Penetration Testing Tools for Windows of 2025

Invicti (formerly Netsparker) dramatically reduces your risk of being attacked. Automated application security testing that scales like none other. Your team's security problems grow faster than your staff. Security testing automation should be integrated into every step in your SDLC. Automate security tasks to save your team hundreds of hours every month. Identify the critical vulnerabilities and then assign them to remediation. Whether you are running an AppSec, DevOps or DevSecOps program, help security and development teams to get ahead of their workloads. It's difficult to prove that you are doing everything possible to reduce your company's risk without full visibility into your apps, vulnerabilities and remediation efforts. You can find all web assets, even those that have been forgotten or stolen. Our unique dynamic + interactive (DAST+ IAST) scanning method allows you to scan the corners of your apps in a way that other tools cannot.

Nessus is recognized by over 30,000 organizations globally, establishing itself as a leading security technology and the benchmark for vulnerability assessments. Since its inception, we have collaborated closely with the security community, ensuring that Nessus is continuously refined based on user feedback, making it the most precise and thorough solution available. After two decades, our commitment to community-driven enhancements and innovation remains steadfast, allowing us to deliver the most reliable and comprehensive vulnerability data, ensuring that critical vulnerabilities that could jeopardize your organization are never overlooked. As we move forward, our dedication to improving security practices continues to be our top priority, reinforcing Nessus's position as a trusted tool in the fight against cyber threats.

As the top choice for automated web application security testing, Acunetix by Invicti stands out as the preferred security solution among Fortune 500 firms. DevSecOps teams can efficiently navigate through complexities to identify hidden risks and address serious vulnerabilities, allowing for comprehensive detection and reporting on various security flaws. Featuring a state-of-the-art crawler that adeptly handles HTML5, JavaScript, and single-page applications, Acunetix facilitates the thorough examination of intricate, authenticated applications, providing a clearer understanding of an organization's risk profile. Its status as a leader in the field is well-deserved, as the technology behind Acunetix is the only one available that can autonomously identify out-of-band vulnerabilities, thus ensuring complete management, prioritization, and oversight of vulnerability threats based on their severity. Additionally, Acunetix is offered in both online and on-premise versions, seamlessly integrating with popular issue trackers and web application firewalls, which allows DevSecOps teams to maintain momentum while developing cutting-edge applications. This unique combination of features not only enhances security but also streamlines the workflow for teams dedicated to keeping their applications secure.

Security Reporter serves as a comprehensive platform for pentest reporting and collaboration, streamlining every phase of the pentesting process. By automating essential components, it enables security teams to boost their productivity and deliver actionable insights. The platform is equipped with an array of features such as customizable reports, assessments, in-depth analytics, and smooth integrations with various tools. This capability allows for a consolidated source of truth, which accelerates remediation efforts and enhances the effectiveness of security services and strategies. Reduce the time spent on research and the repetitive tasks related to security assessments and reporting by utilizing Security Reporter. You can swiftly document findings through templates or by referencing previous discoveries. Engaging with clients is a breeze, as users can comment on findings, organize retests, and facilitate discussions with ease. With integrations surpassing 140 tools, users can take advantage of unique analytics and a multilingual feature, enabling the generation of reports in multiple languages. This versatility ensures that communication remains clear and effective across diverse teams and stakeholders.

Modern software development must be as fast as the business. The modern AppSec toolbox lacks integration, which creates complexity that slows down software development life cycles. Contrast reduces the complexity that hinders today's development teams. Legacy AppSec uses a single-size-fits all approach to vulnerability detection and remediation that is inefficient, costly, and expensive. Contrast automatically applies the most efficient analysis and remediation technique, greatly improving efficiency and effectiveness. Separate AppSec tools can create silos that hinder the collection of actionable intelligence across an application attack surface. Contrast provides centralized observability, which is crucial for managing risks and capitalizing upon operational efficiencies. This is both for security and development teams. Contrast Scan is a pipeline native product that delivers the speed, accuracy and integration required for modern software development.

This integrated solution can perform active, passive, and agent-based assessments. It also allows for flexibility in evaluating risk according to each business. SAINT's remarkable, flexible, and scalable scanning capabilities make it stand out from other solutions in this market. SAINT has partnered up with AWS to allow its customers to benefit from AWS's efficient scanning. SAINT also offers Windows scanning agents for subscribers. Security teams can easily schedule scans, configure them with a lot of flexibility, and fine-tune their settings with advanced options.

Caido is an advanced web security toolkit for pentesters and bug bounty hunters. It's also a great solution for security teams that need a flexible and efficient way to test web applications. Caido includes a powerful interceptor proxy for capturing HTTP requests and manipulating them, replay functionality to test endpoints and automation tools to handle large-scale workflows. Its sitemap visualisation provides a clear picture of web application structures and helps users map and navigate complicated targets. HTTPQL allows users to filter and analyze traffic efficiently, while a no-code workflow and a plugin system allow for easy customizations to meet specific testing needs. Caido is built on a flexible Client/Server architecture that allows seamless access from anywhere. Its project-management system makes it easy to switch between targets, and eliminates the need to manually handle files. This keeps workflows organized.

Black Duck, a segment of the Synopsys Software Integrity Group, stands out as a prominent provider of application security testing (AST) solutions. Their extensive array of offerings encompasses tools for static analysis, software composition analysis (SCA), dynamic analysis, and interactive analysis, which assist organizations in detecting and addressing security vulnerabilities throughout the software development life cycle. By streamlining the identification and management of open-source software, Black Duck guarantees adherence to security and licensing regulations. Their solutions are meticulously crafted to enable organizations to foster trust in their software while effectively managing application security, quality, and compliance risks at a pace that aligns with business demands. With Black Duck, businesses are equipped to innovate with security in mind, delivering software solutions confidently and efficiently. Furthermore, their commitment to continuous improvement ensures that clients remain ahead of emerging security challenges in a rapidly evolving technological landscape.

Appvance IQ (AIQ), delivers transformative productivity gains and lower costs for both test creation and execution. It offers both AI-driven (fully automated tests) and 3rd-generation codeless scripting for test creation. These scripts are then executed using data-driven functional and performance, app-pen, and API testing -- both for web and mobile apps. AIQ's self healing technology allows you to cover all code with only 10% of the effort required by traditional testing systems. AIQ detects important bugs automatically and with minimal effort. No programming, scripting, logs, or recording are required. AIQ can be easily integrated with your existing DevOps tools, processes, and tools.

SecurityHQ is a Global Managed Security Service Provider (MSSP) that detects & responds to threats 24/7. Gain access to an army of analysts, 24/7, 365 days a year. Receive tailored advice and full visibility to ensure peace of mind, with our Global Security Operation Centres. Utilize our award-winning security solutions, knowledge, people, and process capabilities, to accelerate business and reduce risk and overall security costs.

Pentesting as a Service (PTaaS) provides a tailored, economical, and proactive strategy for protecting your digital assets, significantly enhancing your security posture through the expertise of experienced professionals and sophisticated testing techniques. Strobes PTaaS is designed to integrate human-driven assessments with a cutting-edge delivery system, allowing for the easy establishment of continuous pentesting programs that feature seamless integrations and straightforward reporting. This innovative approach eliminates the hassle of securing individual pentests, streamlining the entire process for users. To fully grasp the advantages of a PTaaS solution, one must engage with the model directly and experience its unique delivery system firsthand, which is truly unparalleled. Our distinct testing approach combines both automated processes and manual evaluations, enabling us to identify a wide array of vulnerabilities and effectively protect you from potential breaches. This multifaceted strategy ensures that your organization's security remains robust and adaptable in a rapidly changing digital landscape.

We are the #1 incident response provider in the world. We protect, detect, and respond to cyberattacks by combining complete response capabilities and frontline threat information from over 3000 incidents per year with end-to-end expertise. Contact us immediately via our 24-hour cyber incident hotlines. Kroll's Cyber Risk specialists can help you tackle the threats of today and tomorrow. Kroll's protection solutions, detection and response are enriched with frontline threat intelligence from 3000+ incident cases each year. It is important to take proactive measures to protect your organization, as the attack surface is constantly increasing in scope and complexity. Enter Kroll's Threat Lifecycle Management. Our end-to-end solutions for cyber risk help uncover vulnerabilities, validate the effectiveness your defenses, update controls, fine-tune detectors and confidently respond any threat.

OWASP ZAP, which stands for Zed Attack Proxy, is a freely available, open-source tool for penetration testing, managed by the Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP). This tool is specifically crafted for evaluating web applications, offering both flexibility and extensibility to its users. At its foundation, ZAP operates as a "man-in-the-middle proxy," allowing it to sit between the user's browser and the web application, enabling the interception and inspection of communications exchanged between the two, with the option to modify the content before relaying it to its final destination. It can function independently as a standalone application or run as a daemon process in the background. ZAP caters to various experience levels, making it suitable for developers, novices in security testing, and seasoned security testing professionals alike. Furthermore, it is compatible with major operating systems and Docker, ensuring users are not restricted to a single platform. Users can also enhance their ZAP experience by accessing additional features through a variety of add-ons found in the ZAP Marketplace, which can be conveniently accessed directly within the ZAP client. The continuous updates and community support further contribute to its robustness as a security testing solution.

MaxPatrol is designed to oversee vulnerabilities and ensure compliance within corporate information systems. Central to its functionality are penetration testing, system evaluations, and compliance oversight. These components provide a comprehensive view of security across the entire IT infrastructure while also offering detailed insights at the departmental, host, and application levels, delivering essential information that facilitates the swift identification of vulnerabilities and the prevention of potential attacks. Additionally, MaxPatrol streamlines the process of maintaining an updated inventory of IT assets. It allows users to access details regarding network resources—including network addresses, operating systems, and available applications and services—while also identifying the hardware and software in operation and tracking the status of updates. Remarkably, it monitors changes within the IT infrastructure without missing a beat, detecting new accounts and hosts as they emerge and adapting to updates in hardware and software. Data regarding the security status of the infrastructure is continuously gathered and analyzed, ensuring that organizations have the insights necessary to maintain robust security protocols. This proactive approach not only enhances security awareness but also empowers teams to respond effectively to emerging threats.

PentestBox is an open-source, pre-configured portable environment designed for penetration testing specifically tailored for the Windows platform. It was created to offer the most effective penetration testing setup for users of Windows. Typically, PentestBox operates with the permissions of a standard user, eliminating the need for administrative rights to start it. To enhance its functionality, PentestBox comes equipped with HTTPie, a command-line HTTP client aimed at making interactions with web services more user-friendly. HTTPie simplifies the process of sending various HTTP requests through a straightforward command and presents the results in color-coded output for better readability. It is particularly useful for testing, debugging, and overall engagement with HTTP servers. In addition, PentestBox includes a customized version of Mozilla Firefox that has all necessary security add-ons pre-installed, ensuring a more secure browsing experience for users engaged in penetration testing activities. This combination of tools and features makes PentestBox a powerful ally for security professionals.

SCYTHE is an adversary-emulation platform that serves the cybersecurity consulting and enterprise market. SCYTHE allows Red, Blue, or Purple teams to create and emulate real-world adversarial campaign in just minutes. SCYTHE allows organizations continuously assess their risk exposure and risk posture. SCYTHE goes beyond assessing vulnerabilities. It allows for the evolution from Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures to Tactics Techniques and Procedures (TTPs). Organizations should be aware that they may be breached. They should concentrate on assessing and alerting controls. Campaigns are mapped according to the MITRE ATT&CK framework. This is the industry standard and common language among Cyber Threat Intelligence Blue Teams and Red Teams. Adversaries can use multiple communication channels to reach compromised systems within your environment. SCYTHE allows for the testing of preventive and detective controls on various channels.

Gophish is an effective, open-source phishing toolkit that simplifies the process of assessing your organization's vulnerability to phishing attacks. With Gophish, users can effortlessly create or import highly realistic phishing templates. The comprehensive web interface features a fully functional HTML editor, allowing for seamless customization of templates directly from your browser. Once a campaign is launched, phishing emails are dispatched automatically in the background, and users have the flexibility to schedule campaigns for any desired time. Results are provided in nearly real-time, and they can be exported for inclusion in reports. Gophish boasts an attractive web interface that enhances user experience. You can easily import pre-existing websites and emails, activate email open tracking, and perform various other tasks with just a single click. Additionally, Gophish continuously updates results, enabling users to monitor a timeline for each recipient that tracks email openings, link clicks, credential submissions, and more. Every aspect of Gophish is crafted to operate smoothly and efficiently. Its intuitive setup and user-friendly design make achieving impactful results feel almost effortless, leaving users with the impression that it operates like magic. This ease of use not only promotes a streamlined phishing test process but also fosters a deeper understanding of potential vulnerabilities within the organization.

We help companies build their trust by creating real security controls and then attesting these controls with a SOC2 report. Oneleet's full-stack platform makes cybersecurity easy and painless. We help businesses to stay secure so they can focus on delivering value to their clients. We'll begin by having a scoping conversation to learn about your security concerns, compliance needs, and infrastructure. We'll then build you a custom security plan that is appropriate for your stage. We'll also take you through a SOC 2 audit with a third-party CPA. Oneleet offers everything you need in one place to become compliant. All tools under one roof make the compliance journey seamless.

Prepare for and thwart sophisticated cyber attacks by adopting AppSecure’s proactive security strategy. Uncover significant vulnerabilities that can be exploited and ensure they are consistently addressed through our cutting-edge security solutions. Strengthen your defense mechanisms over time while revealing hidden weaknesses through the lens of a potential hacker. Assess how well your security team is equipped to handle relentless cyber threats targeting vulnerable points in your network. With our comprehensive approach, pinpoint and rectify critical security weaknesses by rigorously testing your APIs based on the OWASP framework, complemented by customized test cases designed to avert future issues. Our pentesting as a service provides ongoing, expert-driven security assessments that help identify and fix vulnerabilities, significantly bolstering your website’s defenses against ever-evolving cyber threats, thus enhancing its security, compliance, and overall reliability. In doing so, we ensure that your organization remains resilient in the face of emerging challenges.