Thousands of organizations worldwide trust Darktrace’s unique approach to defend against known, novel and insider threats.
See for yourself why organizations of all sizes choose Darktrace to get better security outcomes in Network Detection and Response (NDR) and beyond.
Trusted by thousands of organizations globally, from small enterprises to the largest multinational organizations and governments
Darktrace is recognized as a Leader in NDR by Gartner® and IDC. We also do so much more, from cloud to OT, email security, forensics and proactive security capabilities.
Discover why Darktrace was named as the only Customers’ Choice in the 2025 Gartner® Peer Insights™ Voice of the Customer for NDR.
Gartner Peer Insights content consists of the opinions of individual end users based on their own experiences with the vendors listed on the platform, should not be construed as statements of fact, nor do they represent the views of Gartner or its affiliates. Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in this content nor makes any warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this content, about its accuracy or completeness, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. The GARTNER PEER INSIGHTS CUSTOMERS’ CHOICE badge is a trademark and service mark of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates and is used herein with permission. All rights reserved. This graphic was published by Gartner, Inc. as part of a larger research document and should be evaluated in the context of the entire document. The Gartner document is available upon request from Darktrace. GARTNER is a registered trademark and service mark of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and internationally and is used herein with permission. All rights reserved. Magic Quadrant and Peer Insights are registered trademarks of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates and is used herein with permission. All rights reserved.
Multi-layered AI approach that understands normal behavior for each unique deployment. Builds a behavioral ‘pattern of life’ for every network entity that is updating continuously and dynamically.
AI is deployed locally and learns each unique environment from scratch, without relying on cloud processing via globally trained and centralized vendor models.
Self-Learning AI continually and autonomously learns each unique environment and reduces most detection engineering efforts.
Minimal fine-tuning is needed over time, however each detection can be fine-tuned if desired.
Comprehensive and intuitive Model Editor to change existing models and create custom models. Native in the Darktrace UI with no scripting required.
Alerts require ongoing manual tuning and the underlying detection models cannot be edited directly (Source).
‘Triage filtering’ is needed on an ongoing basis to help “maintain relevance and effectiveness” (Source).
Custom detections require an additional license (Vectra Recall), which is reliant on rule-based triggers that run on an hourly basis (Source) and requires a cloud connection (Source).
Vectra Recall is priced per GB per day of metadata (Source).
Uses advanced AI techniques to accurately detect known threats, novel attacker behavior and insider risks. Not reliant on known attack data, threat intelligence, or creating custom rules/signatures.
Not reliant on decryption to detect threats, however can decrypt network traffic if desired or required for compliance/regulatory purposes.
Proven to detect and contain zero-day threats on average 8 days before public CVE disclosure, with multiple examples. (Source)
Detects known threats and attacker
behaviors applying behavioral analytics and basic anomaly detection to known TTPs. Some customers have reported high alert volumes and false positive rates (Source).
Not reliant on decryption for threat detection, but is unable to natively decrypt network traffic if desired or required (Source).
We have been unable to identify publicly available examples of unknown threat detection and autonomous containment without relying on known TTPs/attacker behaviors, threat intelligence or manual intervention.
Darktrace Cyber AI Analyst™ is a sophisticated agentic AI system first released in 2019 and is included as standard for all customers.
Autonomously performs end-to-end triage and investigation of all relevant alerts, including third-party alerts. Does not require any user interaction or prompting.
Mirrors the L1 + L2 human investigative process, continually investigating and updating hypotheses as new data is available. Shows clear investigation and decision logic and clear recommended actions.
Proven public examples of transforming SOC workflows and investigating sophisticated threats (Source).
Vectra AI Analyst is a GenAI-powered SOC assistant (Source) and is only available for MDR customers (Source).
Provides attack summaries and guidance but does not perform cognitive functions autonomously or continuous analysis (Source). Requires human analysts to enter prompts or choose queries manually (Source).
We have been unable to identify publicly available examples or demonstrations of how Vectra AI Analyst or Vectra AI Assistants have uncovered sophisticated threats in practice.
Vectra’s ‘AI-Triage’ agent is not turned on by default and does not run continuously – it only scans and triages detections once per day (Source).
Takes precise, behavioral response actions to contain threats at the earliest stages. Acts autonomously based on the context and behavioral understanding on the environment, containing known threats, ‘low and slow’ attacks and insider risks in real-time.
Autonomously applies the most appropriate action (natively with physical/virtual Darktrace appliances or via third party integrations) based on the severity of the threat, at machine speed.
Can enforce only normal activity for a device or user as a response action (pattern of life), while blocking anything else – containing threats while preventing business disruption.
Contains known, novel and insider threats autonomously as risk emerges and as behavior adapts, without requiring a set threshold to be hit.
5,000+ organizations use Darktrace in fully autonomous mode, which is fully configurable.
Has an ‘Automated Response Framework’, which requires orchestration via integrations (Source).
Claims to have native response but cannot execute network-level actions without integrating with third-party tools such as an EDR agent, Active Directory, EntraID, firewalls, SOARs, etc. (Source).
Triggers a binary response action when a detection alert threshold is reached, not at the earliest stages of threatening activity (Source).
Network traffic is contained with ‘Traffic Lockdown’, which uses static ‘threshold-based triggering’ to add compromised IPs to a managed blocklist that can be used by integrated firewalls (Source).
100+ integrations across security tools such as EDRs and firewalls to add further context to investigations and take response actions, plus workflow solutions such as Microsoft Teams, Jira and ServiceNow.
Darktrace currently offers the most integrations in the NDR industry (Source).
No additional cost or licensing to export data to other tools.
Native endpoint visibility in addition to EDR integrations, CDR, cloud forensics, specialist OT capabilities and email security.
Recognized as a Visionary by Gartner® in the 2026 Magic Quadrant™ for CPS (OT) (Source).
Full range of pre-emptive and proactive capabilities such as attack path modeling, exposure management, attack surface management, incident readiness and simulations.
Darktrace / Proactive Exposure Management and / Attack Surface Management capabilities were launched in 2022, and / Incident Readiness and Recovery was launched in 2023.
No native endpoint agent for extending NDR to remote workers and/or satellite office coverage if desired (Source).
No cloud forensic capabilities for automated disk-level evidence capture and forensic investigation to support incident response (Source).
Can cover OT and IoT, but is not recognized as a standalone OT solution by industry analysts such as Gartner® (Source).
Limited exposure management capabilities, with no attack path modelling, human risk identification, attack surface management or incident simulation capabilities (Source).
‘Vectra Exposure Findings’ is in private preview and not generally available as of June 2026 (Source).
Proven Self‑Learning AI interprets context, intent, and behavioral drift across humans, infrastructure, and AI systems, detecting misuse, emerging risks, data exposure and enabling immediate response (Source).
Connect AI usage to network and user behavior, and secure business AI agent identities in real-time.
Real-time inspection of user prompts, sessions and responses across enterprise GenAI solutions.
Discover and control shadow AI, with out of the box detection models for shadow AI usage across network traffic and endpoint processes.
Extend AI security across the enterprise with native, integrated visibility for network, cloud, endpoints, OT, identities, and email.
Limited AI observability for network traffic and provides a basic inventory for AI agents (Source).
A Microsoft 365 Copilot dashboard can be used for monitoring active Copilot users and files accessed, but with no visibility or analysis of prompts (Source).
Investigations require human analysts to prompt an AI Assistant with natural language. No autonomous, behavioral understanding of AI agent activity (Source).
No visibility over email and human risk, and how this maps to AI usage across the enterprise (Source).
Score above market average and named the only 2025 Customers Choice ‘Voice of the Customer’ for NDR on Gartner® Peer Insights™.
Named a leader in both the 2025 and 2026 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for NDR.
“A strong program for collecting customer feedback and incorporating it to enhance the product shows the vendor listens to end users and helps keep the product roadmap fresh as the market evolves.” - Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for NDR, 2025*
“Darktrace delivers strong customer experience and support through regional sales personnel and regional offices across 29 countries around the world.” – Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for NDR, 2026
Scored below market average in the 2025 Customers Choice ‘Voice of the Customer’ for NDR on Gartner® Peer Insights™.
Named a leader in both the 2025 and 2026 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for NDR.
"Vectra AI’s customer retention is the lowest among NDR vendors” - Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for NDR, 2025*
“Vectra AI provides minimal initial assistance in architecting the system to capture all network traffic” – Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for NDR, 2026
This comparison has been prepared by Darktrace Holdings Limited using publicly available information believed to be reliable as of July 2026. It is provided for general informational purposes only, is not intended to be exhaustive, and may change over time as vendors update their offerings, so prospective customers should independently evaluate solutions based on their own requirements. Darktrace makes no representations, warranties, or assurances, whether express or implied, regarding the accuracy, completeness, or currency of the information presented, including the suitability of any product or feature for any particular purpose. All trademarks, logos, and brand names referenced are the property of their respective owners.
Disclaimer: The 2026 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Network Detection and Response (NDR) ,The 2026 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Network Detection and Response (NDR), Thomas Lintemuth, Charanpal Bhogal, Nahim Fazal, 18 May 2026.
Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.
Gartner® Peer Insights™ content consists of the opinions of individual end users based on their own experiences, and should not be construed as statements of fact, nor do they represent the views of Gartner or its affiliates. Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in this content nor makes any warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this content, about its accuracy or completeness, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.
GARTNER is a registered trademark and service mark of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and internationally and is used herein with permission. All rights reserved. Magic Quadrant and Peer Insights are registered trademarks of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates and is used herein with permission. All rights reserved.
Darktrace customers
Customer story
“I don’t see any other way than Darktrace. It learns from our network using unsupervised machine learning and looks at our traffic. Any deviation will be alerted. That’s a beautiful thing.”
Jagadeesh Reddy Bhimireddy, Director of Information Security
Protect your organization from known, unknown and insider threats. See what Darktrace's AI can find in your environment.
Darktrace covers hybrid networks with native coverage across IT, OT, hybrid cloud, remote worker endpoints, identities, SaaS, ZTNA and much more. With a range of deployment options and sensors available, Darktrace can cater for even the largest and most complex modern networks.
Yes, Darktrace is capable of operating in fully air-gapped environments without significant loss of functionality. Unlike many other NDR vendors, threat hunting capabilities (such as Darktrace Advanced Search) and the creation of custom detection and response models (via the Darktrace Model Editor) do not require a cloud connection and can be utilized completely offline. They also do not incur any additional cost or require additional licensing.
“Darktrace supports full functionality for air-gapped deployments, eliminating the need for cloud connectivity required by some NDR solutions. This is appealing to buyers with cyber physical systems (CPS) or classified environments.” - 2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for NDR
Darktrace’s Self-Learning AI detects anything that is considered anomalous for a network entity or a peer group of devices, based on its continual understanding of what is normal for the environment. However, just because something is ‘anomalous’, does not mean it is suspicious or malicious.
That's where Darktrace's Cyber AI Analyst comes in. It is sophisticated agentic AI that automatically triages and investigates all relevant alerts, including third party alerts, to determine what is suspicious and/or interesting for a human SOC analyst to review. It autonomously contextualizes alerts across multiple security domains to generate high-fidelity incidents, which are prioritized so analysts know exactly where to spend their time. This also typically results in a very low number of incidents that need to be addressed by security teams.
Darktrace removes this risk with clustering algorithms. To create a holistic image of the relationships within the environment, Darktrace employs a range of different clustering methods including matrix-based, density-based, and hierarchical. The resulting clusters are then used to algorithmically identify significant groupings and inform modeling of normative behavior. Continuous clustering not only identifies emerging suspicious activity before it looks obviously malicious, but it also identifies pre-existing compromises.
Other solutions that have definite training periods could learn malicious behavior as part of the baseline. However, clustering compares access, roles, identities, and functions across peer groups and so will recognize if no other devices are executing that same type of behavior.
Yes, Darktrace has 100+ integrations to seamlessly operate alongside your existing technology stack, including security tools such as EDRs, firewalls and SASE, plus workflow solutions such as ServiceNow and Jira. Darktrace has the most integrations in the NDR industry* and does not require additional licensing to ingest or export data to/from third party tools.
*IDC MarketScape for NDR, 2024.
