Security built into the pipeline. Not into the agent that writes the code.

GitLab Ultimate gives you SAST, DAST, SCA, container scanning and vulnerability management in one platform, and its Duo agents help triage and fix findings. Its scanners still run in CI after a push, not while an external AI agent is writing the code.

What GitLab Ultimate does well

Comprehensive built-in security (SAST, DAST, SCA, container, IaC, secrets), tight GitLab CI integration, a single-platform DevSecOps story, Duo agents that validate AI fixes through the pipeline and open merge requests, and AI-based false-positive detection for SAST and secrets.

Where it stops

Dependency scanning, DAST, advanced SAST, secret push protection and vulnerability management need Ultimate; lower tiers get raw scan reports. Scanners run in CI after a push, not while an agent writes. External agents can reach GitLab through its MCP server, in beta, but only to read or update GitLab data. No business-logic detection announced.

Feature by feature

22 features, checked on GitLab Ultimate's own site and documentation in September 2026.

Feature	CybeDefend	GitLab Ultimate
Detection
Agent-time scanning	Yes	No
SAST	Yes	Yes
SCA	Yes	Yes
IaC scanning	Yes	Yes
Container scanning	Yes	Yes
Secret detection	Yes	Yes
Business logic flaws	Yes	No
Reachability analysis	Yes	Partial
AI-BOM: AI component inventory (EU AI Act + NIST AI RMF)	Yes	No
Prompt injection & LLM-misuse scanner (OWASP LLM Top 10)	Yes	No
AI & Agent
Agent-time (Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf…)	Yes	Partial
IDE security copilot	Yes	Partial
AI-generated verified patches	Yes	Yes
Auto-fix → ready-to-merge PR	Yes	Yes
Security Code Knowledge Graph	Yes	Partial
VibeDefend: security rules distributed to AI coding agents	Yes	No
Coding agent sandbox policy (allow/deny/warn before every write)	Yes	Partial
Operations
CI/CD pipeline gate	Yes	Yes
Low false-positive rate	Yes	Yes
Fast self-serve setup	Yes	Partial
CybeRisk Score: 0-100 score + AI-generated weekly Top 10 brief	Yes	No
EU/US sovereign deployment	Yes	Partial

Yes NoPartial

Where we win

Platform-native vs agent-native

GitLab's security features are deeply native to the GitLab platform: an excellent selling point for fully GitLab-native teams. Most engineering teams today use a mix of tools: GitHub or GitLab for hosting, Claude Code or Cursor for AI coding. CybeDefend works across all of them.

Security Code Knowledge Graph

reachable
fixed path
vulnerable

The agent-time gap

GitLab CI runs your SAST scanner after the developer pushes a commit, and its VS Code extension offers an experimental real-time scan of the open file. CybeDefend enforces security rules inside the AI agent before a file is even saved. Moving from detection in the pipeline to prevention in the agent removes a remediation round trip for every issue it catches.

SQL injection, found while the agent writes

CWE-89

const id = parseInt(req.query.id, 10)

PR opens clean

VibeDefend: rules that reach the agent before the pipeline

GitLab's SAST runs in branch pipelines once code is pushed, after it is written. VibeDefend runs before the agent types a character, distributing your organisation's custom security rules as MCP context into Claude Code, Cursor and Copilot before a single write.

VibeDefend: rule broadcastactive

Claude CodeRules served
CursorRules served
GitHub CopilotRules served
OpenAI CodexRules served

Platform-agnostic: works with GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket and the AI coding agents your team already uses. Checks business logic, which GitLab's scanners do not claim to cover, and acts in the agent loop, not only in the pipeline.

Pricing at a glance

Our platform is free to self-host, or priced per active developer on Cloud. VibeDefend is free to try, then priced with you after a pilot.

CybeDefend

CommunityFree, on your servers
CloudPriced per active developer
EnterpriseOn quote
VibeDefendFree to try, then a price set with you

See full pricing

GitLab Ultimate

Premium10 users$3,480/year
UltimateContact sales

Competitor prices: the lowest annual list price published for the plan shown, taken from the vendor's website or its own marketplace listing and checked in September 2026. Always verify before purchasing.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can CybeDefend work with GitLab CI?

Yes. CybeDefend integrates with GitLab CI for pipeline-level gating, in addition to its agent-time enforcement. The two are complementary.

Is GitLab Ultimate's security comparable to CybeDefend in breadth?

GitLab Ultimate covers SAST, DAST, SCA, IaC, container and secrets: strong breadth. CybeDefend covers the same code-level categories, without DAST, and adds two things GitLab does not announce: checks inside the AI agent while it writes, and business-logic flaw detection through the Security Knowledge Graph.

What's the pricing difference?

GitLab publishes Premium at $29 per user per month, billed annually; Ultimate, which carries most security features, is priced on request. CybeDefend Platform is free to self-host or priced per active developer on Cloud, and VibeDefend is free to try, then priced with you after a pilot. CybeDefend needs no GitLab subscription and works with self-managed GitLab instances too.

Install VibeDefend

One command wires every coding agent on this machine to your rules and your guards.

npx -y @cybedefend/vibedefend@latest install