How much does SOC 2 cost in 2026?

Total cost ranges from 50,000 USD to 180,000 USD for a first-year Type 1 plus Type 2 program, depending on whether you use software-only platforms with separate consultants or bundled services. Audit fees alone run 12,000 to 35,000 USD per engagement.

How much does Vanta cost?

Public Vanta pricing typically runs from 7,500 USD to 25,000 USD per year for SOC 2, with the higher end including more frameworks or larger team sizes. Quoted per engagement; published list pricing is rare.

What is the cheapest path to SOC 2?

DIY using a low-cost platform (Sprinto, Scrut, Drata starter tiers) plus internal engineering hours and a smaller audit firm can land at 25,000 to 50,000 USD year one. The trade-off is engineering time, typically two to three months of one engineer.

Why are bundled services not always cheaper than software plus consultants?

Bundled programs price for total scope, not per line item. The cost is similar to the total of software plus a consultant, but with one engagement instead of two contracts and predictable scope instead of hourly creep.

How much SOC 2 actually costs in 2026

SOC 2 pricing is hard to find online because vendors quote per engagement and most published numbers are stale. The 2026 numbers below come from current customer quotes and audit firm engagement letters, with ranges instead of point estimates because real pricing varies by company size, framework count, and audit firm tier.

The four line items

Every SOC 2 program has four cost lines. The total bill changes based on how you combine them.

Compliance software platform. Vanta, Drata, Secureframe, Sprinto, Scrut, or HSD's included platform.
Remediation work. Either internal engineering hours, a separate consultant, or bundled engineering services.
Audit firm fees. The CPA firm that performs the audit and issues the report.
Penetration test. Annual external penetration test, expected by most auditors as part of risk assessment evidence.

Software platform pricing in 2026

Public list pricing is sparse. These are the typical quoted ranges for SOC 2 alone, US-headquartered SaaS, single-framework engagements:

Vanta. 7,500 USD to 25,000 USD per year. Higher tiers add ISO 27001, HIPAA, PCI add-ons.
Drata. Similar to Vanta, with negotiation room. 8,000 USD to 24,000 USD typical.
Secureframe. 10,000 USD to 28,000 USD; managed services are billed separately on top of the platform subscription.
Sprinto. 6,000 USD to 18,000 USD. Lower entry point; popular with early-stage teams.
Scrut Automation. 6,000 USD to 18,000 USD. Comparable to Sprinto on price.
Thoropass. 25,000 USD to 50,000 USD. Includes the audit; not directly comparable to software-only platforms.

Multi-year deals shave 10 to 20 percent. Multi-framework bundles add 30 to 60 percent over the single-framework price.

Remediation cost

Software does not write your policies, configure your IAM, or roll out MDM. That work happens before the audit, regardless of platform. The realistic cost depends on how it is staffed.

In-house engineering. Two to three engineering months for a Series A SaaS without significant prior controls. At a fully-loaded engineer cost of 200,000 to 350,000 USD per year, that is 33,000 to 88,000 USD of opportunity cost per framework. Real cost depends on what work the engineer would have shipped instead.
Separate compliance consultant. 30,000 to 80,000 USD per framework, hourly billing. Scope creep is the usual surprise; 50,000 USD quoted often becomes 70,000 USD invoiced.
Bundled engineering services. Included in HSD's program; scoped per engagement rather than billed hourly.

Audit firm fees

CPA firm fees vary more than first-time buyers expect:

Boutique firms. 8,000 to 15,000 USD for SOC 2 Type 1, 12,000 to 25,000 USD for Type 2. Faster turnaround, more flexible. Some enterprise customers reject reports from firms below a certain size; check first.
Mid-tier firms. Schellman, A-LIGN, Coalfire, BDO, RSM. 15,000 to 30,000 USD for Type 1, 20,000 to 40,000 USD for Type 2. Sweet spot for most Series A and Series B SaaS.
Big-four. 35,000 to 80,000 USD or more. Worth the premium when enterprise customers explicitly require a Big Four name on the report.

Audit firms do not include remediation; they are independent. Avoid firms that offer to do both for SOC 2 unless the conflict is acceptable to your enterprise customers.

Penetration test

Annual external pentest of the application:

Boutique pentesters: 8,000 to 15,000 USD for a small SaaS.
Mid-tier pentest firms (Bishop Fox, NCC Group, Trail of Bits, Doyensec): 20,000 to 60,000 USD.
HSD includes annual pentest as part of the bundled compliance program.

Total program cost in 2026

Putting the line items together, here is the realistic range for a first-year SOC 2 Type 1 + Type 2 program:

DIY with low-cost platform. Sprinto or Scrut subscription (6,000 to 18,000 USD), in-house remediation, smaller audit firm (12,000 to 25,000 USD), pentest (8,000 to 15,000 USD). Total: 26,000 to 58,000 USD plus engineering opportunity cost.
Mainstream. Vanta or Drata (12,000 to 25,000 USD), separate consultant (40,000 to 80,000 USD), mid-tier audit firm (25,000 to 40,000 USD), pentest (15,000 to 30,000 USD). Total: 92,000 to 175,000 USD.
Enterprise-grade. Vanta or Drata (20,000 to 30,000 USD), specialty consultant (60,000 to 100,000 USD), big-four audit (50,000 to 80,000 USD), specialty pentest (40,000 to 80,000 USD). Total: 170,000 to 290,000 USD.
HSD bundled. Scoped per program; lands inside the mainstream range with everything in one engagement.

Year two and onward

Year-two costs typically run 60 to 75 percent of year one. Software subscriptions stay the same; remediation drops sharply because the program is established; audit fees drop slightly for Type 2 renewal; pentest stays similar.

Adding a second framework in year two (typically ISO 27001 or HIPAA) adds roughly 60 to 80 percent of the year-one number for that framework alone, since most controls overlap.

The line items most buyers forget

Costs that do not show up in vendor quotes:

SSO licensing. Okta, JumpCloud, or your IdP of choice. 4 to 12 USD per user per month adds up at fifty-plus headcount.
MDM licensing. Jamf, Kandji, Hexnode, Microsoft Intune. 4 to 9 USD per device per month.
SIEM or log retention. Datadog, Splunk, or AWS CloudWatch with one-year retention. Wide range; budget at least 500 to 2,000 USD per month for early-stage teams.
Background checks. Annual employee background checks. 30 to 80 USD per employee.
Security awareness training. KnowBe4, Hoxhunt, or similar. 4 to 12 USD per user per year.

Aggregate, these line items add 1,000 to 5,000 USD per month for a fifty-person SaaS company that did not have them before.

How to actually budget

For a Series A SaaS doing first-time SOC 2 in 2026, budget 80,000 to 150,000 USD all-in for year one. Anything below 50,000 USD assumes significant in-house engineering hours; anything above 200,000 USD usually means premium audit firm and consultant choices.

The cheapest path on paper is rarely the cheapest path in practice once engineering opportunity cost is real. Compliance is best treated as a fixed-scope project with a known total, not a software subscription with surprise consultant invoices three months in. Talk to HSD if you want a fixed-scope quote for your specific environment.