Burp Suite vs openarchiver

Burp Suite and openarchiver sit in unrelated categories rather than competing head to head: Burp Suite is PortSwigger's web application security testing…

Best for Burp Suite: Penetration testers and AppSec teams who need manual web app testing tools (free in Community Edition) or automated, CI/CD-integrated vulnerability scanning at scale via Professional or Enterprise DAST.
Best for openarchiver: IT and compliance teams who need to archive company email for backup and eDiscovery, especially those wanting a self-hosted platform with Microsoft 365/Google Workspace connectors and PST/EML import for legacy data.

At a Glance

 Burp Suiteopenarchiver
Primary categorySecuritySecurity
RatingNot documentedNot documented
Pricing modelFreemiumOpen Source
Starting priceFree (Community); Professional $475/user/yearFree (self-hosted)
Free planYesNot documented
Free trialNot documentedNot documented
PlatformsWeb, Mac, WindowsNot documented
Team collaborationNot documentedNot documented
AI featuresNot documentedNot documented
Public APINot documentedNot documented

Key Differences

Core Product Category

Burp Suite: Burp Suite is a web application security testing platform with a manual testing toolkit, an automated DAST vulnerability scanner, and attack surface visibility.

openarchiver: openarchiver is described as a self-hosted email archiving platform for backup, compliance, and eDiscovery with full-text search across archived mail.

Confirming the category prevents buyers from mistakenly treating these as interchangeable options during vendor selection.

Deployment Model

Burp Suite: Burp Suite's Community Edition is manual desktop testing software, while Enterprise DAST is built for automated, CI-driven scanning across many applications; a self-hosted deployment mode is not documented for Burp Suite.

openarchiver: openarchiver is explicitly positioned as a secure, self-hosted platform, meaning organizations run and control the archiving infrastructure themselves.

Self-hosting affects data residency, infrastructure overhead, and who is responsible for uptime and patching.

Pricing Structure

Burp Suite: Burp Suite uses a freemium model: Community Edition is free, while Professional and Enterprise (DAST) editions are both listed as "Contact for pricing" with no published rates.

openarchiver: openarchiver's pricing model is listed as Freemium, but no starting price or plan-level pricing details are published in its facts.

Neither tool publishes full self-serve pricing for its higher tiers, so buyers should expect a sales conversation before committing budget.

Integration Surface

Burp Suite: Burp Suite integrates into CI/CD pipelines to catch vulnerabilities during the development process, particularly in the Professional and Enterprise editions.

openarchiver: openarchiver connects directly to Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, plus generic IMAP servers, and can import existing PST and EML archive files.

The integrations each tool ships with reveal where it plugs into a stack -- development pipelines versus email/collaboration platforms.

Training and Enablement

Burp Suite: PortSwigger backs Burp Suite with the free Web Security Academy, offering security training content alongside the product.

openarchiver: No training or academy program is documented for openarchiver in the available facts.

Free vendor-provided training can shorten ramp-up time for new users and reduce reliance on paid onboarding.

Feature-by-Feature

Core Capabilities

FeatureBurp Suiteopenarchiver
Manual web app security testing toolkitAvailableUnavailable
Automated vulnerability (DAST) scanningAvailableUnavailable
Email archiving and backupUnavailableAvailable
Full-text search across archivesUnavailableAvailable
eDiscovery / compliance supportUnavailableAvailable

Pricing & Plans

FeatureBurp Suiteopenarchiver
Free entry-level tierAvailableNot documented
Published Professional/paid pricingUnavailableUnavailable
Enterprise-scale automated tierAvailableNot documented

Deployment & Integrations

FeatureBurp Suiteopenarchiver
Self-hosted deploymentNot documentedAvailable
Microsoft 365 / Google Workspace connectorsUnavailableAvailable
PST/EML file importUnavailableAvailable
CI/CD pipeline integrationAvailableNot documented
Free vendor security trainingAvailableNot documented

Pricing Compared

Starting price reflects the lowest paid tier, not the full cost for every team size or usage level.

Burp Suite

Community Edition — Free N/A
Professional — $475/user per year
Enterprise (Burp Suite DAST) — Custom annual, contact sales

openarchiver

Self-Hosted Community — Free N/A

Pros & Cons

Burp Suite

Pros

  • Industry-standard toolkit taught extensively in penetration testing and bug bounty training
  • Free Community Edition provides real manual testing capability, not just a crippled demo
  • Deep manual testing controls (Repeater, Intruder) alongside automated scanning
  • Extensible via the BApp Store for custom or niche testing needs

Cons

  • Full scanning capability requires the paid Professional license
  • Enterprise/DAST pricing is not public and requires a sales conversation
  • Steeper learning curve for testers unfamiliar with manual proxy-based workflows
  • Community Edition throttles Intruder speed, limiting large-scale automated testing

openarchiver

Pros

  • Fully open source with no license fee for the core platform
  • Full data ownership and sovereignty since everything is self-hosted
  • Tamper-evident storage and audit trails suited to compliance and eDiscovery needs
  • Supports major mail platforms including Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, and IMAP
  • Portable .eml storage format avoids vendor lock-in

Cons

  • Requires self-hosting expertise and infrastructure to operate reliably
  • No official hosted cloud offering or published SaaS pricing tier
  • Smaller company and community compared to established commercial archiving vendors
  • Enterprise support depends on a partner program rather than a large in-house support team
  • Newer project with a shorter track record than long-established archiving suites

Use Cases

Choose Burp Suite: Penetration testers and AppSec teams who need manual web app testing tools (free in Community Edition) or automated, CI/CD-integrated vulnerability scanning at scale via Professional or Enterprise DAST.
Choose openarchiver: IT and compliance teams who need to archive company email for backup and eDiscovery, especially those wanting a self-hosted platform with Microsoft 365/Google Workspace connectors and PST/EML import for legacy data.
Need both: A security and IT operations team could use both as unrelated tools within the same organization -- Burp Suite for offensive application security testing and openarchiver for email records retention -- but there is no functional overlap or integration between them to justify pairing them as alternatives.

Burp Suite

  • Manual web application penetration testing — Security consultants use Burp's proxy, Repeater, and Intruder to manually probe applications for logic flaws and input-based vulnerabilities.
  • Automated vulnerability scanning in CI/CD — AppSec teams deploy Burp Suite DAST in build pipelines to catch vulnerabilities before deployment across many applications on a schedule.
  • Bug bounty hunting — Independent researchers use Burp Suite Professional's scanner and manual tools to find and report vulnerabilities in bug bounty programs.

openarchiver

  • Regulatory email retention — Meet legal and regulatory requirements to retain and produce email records for a defined retention period.
  • Litigation holds and eDiscovery — Search and export tamper-evident email archives with a verifiable chain of custody during legal disputes.
  • Self-hosted mailbox migration and backup — Archive mailboxes before decommissioning accounts or migrating between email platforms, preserving full-text searchable history.

Frequently Asked Questions

Are Burp Suite and openarchiver competitors?

No. Burp Suite is a web application security testing platform for penetration testing and vulnerability scanning, while openarchiver is a self-hosted email archiving tool for compliance and eDiscovery. They solve different problems and would typically sit in different parts of a technology budget.

Is Burp Suite free to use?

The Community Edition is free and includes manual testing tools, but the automated vulnerability scanner is only available in the paid Professional or Enterprise (DAST) editions.

Is openarchiver free?

openarchiver's pricing model is listed as Freemium, but no starting price or specific plan pricing is published in the available product information.

Does openarchiver connect to Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace?

Yes -- along with generic IMAP servers and the ability to import existing PST and EML files for historical archives.

Can Burp Suite integrate into a CI/CD pipeline?

Yes, Burp Suite's paid editions support CI/CD integration to catch vulnerabilities during development, and the Enterprise edition supports automated scanning across many applications.

Which of the two tools is self-hosted?

openarchiver is explicitly described as a self-hosted platform. Burp Suite's hosting model isn't detailed the same way in its facts -- Community Edition runs as desktop software, while Enterprise DAST is built for scanning at scale, but neither is described as self-hosted in the same sense as openarchiver.

Read the full Burp Suite review · Read the full openarchiver review