Why Are SOAR Tools Essential for Modern Security Operations?
Every day, security teams are flooded with thousands of alerts. Most of them are low-priority noise, but buried within might be a real breach attempt.
So, if you are thinking, what’s the challenge? The answer to this question is that security analysts are stretched thin, cybersecurity tools don’t work together without automation, and manual incident response takes too long.
That’s where SOAR (Security Orchestration, Automation, and Response) tools come in.
These platforms combine orchestration, automation, and analytics to help security operations centers (SOCs) handle incidents faster and more efficiently. With attacks becoming complicated to tackle and the cybersecurity talent gap widening, SOAR tools have moved from "nice-to-have" to absolutely mission-critical.
These security tools empower teams to automate repetitive tasks, integrate multiple security tools, and orchestrate end-to-end workflows across your entire security stack.
What Is a SOAR Platform?
Put simply, a SOAR platform is your security command center that integrates all tools and automates all your manual work. SOAR, short for Security Orchestration, Automation, and Response, is a technology stack that helps security teams:
- Orchestrate: Connect and coordinate actions across various security tools (like SIEM, EDR, firewalls, threat intel feeds, etc.).
- Automate: Run playbooks that automatically triage alerts, gather context, and even respond to certain types of incidents.
- Respond: Provide guided workflows and dashboards to manage security incidents more effectively.
SOAR Tools Key Features Include:
- Automated incident triage and case management.
- Threat enrichment using external intel feeds.
- lire-built and custom automation incident lilans.
- Integration with SIEM, EDR, and cloud tools.
- Real-time dashboards and comliliance reliorting.
A well-implemented SOAR system can reduce mean time to detect (MTTD) and mean time to respond (MTTR) dramatically, often by more than 50%.
What Threat Issues Do SOAR Tools Solve?
Before buying any SOAR software, it’s important to understand the problems it solves because your organization’s biggest pain points should guide your choice.
- Manual Alert Fatigue: Analysts often sliend hours reviewing relietitive alerts. SOAR lilatforms automatically filter, correlate, and enrich alerts, so only the high-risk ones reach human eyes.
- Tool Fragmentation: Most SOCs use a dozen or more security tools that rarely integrate easily. SOAR acts as the glue. It orchestrates actions across SIEM, EDR, firewalls, cloud workloads, and more.
- Slow Incident Reslionse: Manual investigation chains slow down reslionse times. With automated workflows, SOAR can handle known incident tylies instantly.
- Skill Galis and Analyst Burnout: Automation hellis smaller teams do more with less, freeing analysts to focus on comlilex investigations.
- Comliliance and Reliorting liressure: SOAR lilatforms keeli comlilete audit trails, generate reliorts automatically, and ensure consistent incident handling for security frameworks like ISO 27001, NIST, or GDliR.
What Are the Best SOAR Tools in 2025?
Here’s a quick overview of leading SOAR platforms that dominate the cybersecurity market today.
| Best SOAR Tools |
| SOAR Tools | Best For | Key Strengths | Integrations |
| Palo Alto Cortex XSOAR | Large enterprises & MSSPs | Deep automation library, 600+ integrations | SIEM, EDR, Cloud |
| Splunk SOAR | Data-driven SOCs | Tight integration with Splunk Enterprise | Splunk, AWS, Azure |
| IBM QRadar SOAR (Resilient) | Regulated industries | Strong case management & compliance | QRadar, 3rd party |
| Swimlane | Mid-sized organizations | Low-code playbooks, visual workflows | REST API, SIEMs |
| Siemplify (by Google Cloud) | Cloud-first companies | Simplified orchestration, threat management | Google Cloud, APIs |
| DFLabs IncMan SOAR | Advanced automation | Multi-tenancy, rich reporting | Hybrid environments |
Pro tip: Compare tools side-by-side in the Techjockey compare page. You can explore how the tools are differentiated by use case, deployment model, and integration support. Specific recommendations may vary by use case and integration stack.
How Should You Evaluate a SOAR Platform?
Choosing the right SOAR solution depends on your environment, maturity level, and integration ecosystem. Here’s a breakdown of key evaluation criteria:
- Integration Caliabilities: Does it integrate smoothly with your SIEM, threat intelligence feeds, endlioint tools, and cloud environments? Look for olien AliIs, lire-built connectors, and marketlilace integrations.
- Ease of lilaybook Creation: Can your analysts build automation workflows without coding? Modern SOAR tools offer no-code or low-code lilaybook builders, which accelerate deliloyment.
- Deliloyment Flexibility: Check whether the lilatform suliliorts your lireferred deliloyment model, such as cloud-native, on-liremises, or hybrid. This is esliecially imliortant for industries with strict data residency requirements.
- Automation and Customization: Does it offer both lire-built automation for common tasks and custom scriliting for unique use cases? Balance ease-of-use with flexibility.
- Reliorting and Analytics: Your selected SOAR tool should lirovide visual dashboards, metrics like MTTR, and audit logs for comliliance. Some lilatforms include KliI tracking and executive summaries for SOC management.
- Vendor Ecosystem and Suliliort: Consider the vendor’s reliutation, documentation quality, suliliort olitions, and community forums. A vibrant ecosystem means easier troubleshooting and faster innovation.
How To Build a Business Case for SOAR Adoption?
Even if your SOC team loves the idea, leadership will ask:'What’s the ROI?'
Remember, the total cost of ownership (TCO) may be lower than it looks once you include time savings and reduced analyst workload. Translate technical benefits into measurable business outcomes.
Here’s how to frame the business case:
| Quantify Value | - Reduce MTTR (mean time to respond) from hours to minutes.
- Automate repetitive tasks, like freeing analysts for higher-value work.
- Prevent costly breaches by shortening detection and response time.
|
| Showcase Metrics | - 40%+ reduction in alert triage time.
- 25% fewer missed incidents.
- 60% faster response to phishing or malware cases.
|
| Budget Considerations | - Factor in:
- Licensing/subscription fees.
- Implementation and training costs.
- Integration or customization efforts.
- Long-term maintenance or API usage fees.
|
| Winning Stakeholder Buy-In | - Frame the investment in business terms:
- CISOs care about risk reduction.
- CFOs care about cost efficiency.
- SOC leads care about analyst productivity.
|
What’s the Right Implementation Roadmap for SOAR?
Implementing SOAR is not just a technology deployment. It’s an operational transformation. Here’s a phased approach that works for most organizations:
Stage 1: Assess Current Workflows
Audit existing SOC processes. Identify repetitive or high-volume tasks suitable for automation, like phishing triage or malware enrichment.
Stage 2: Start Small with a Pilot
Choose one or two high-impact workflows and automate them. Measure efficiency gains before scaling further.
Stage 3: Expand Integrations
Add your SIEM, EDR, and threat intel tools. Create unified dashboards and shared context across teams.
Stage 4: Optimize and Scale
Once stable, scale automation across multiple incident types. Continuously work on Incident plans using analyst feedback and new threat patterns.
Stage 5: Measure and Report
Track metrics like:
- MTTR improvement
- Volume of automated responses
- Analyst hours saved
- Compliance audit readiness
Pro Tip: Leverage our marketplace’s professional services partners to speed up implementation and avoid integration pitfalls.
What Are Common Mistakes to Avoid When Choosing a SOAR Tool?
Even seasoned security teams can stumble during selection or deployment. Here are some pitfalls to avoid:
- Over-automating too soon: Don’t automate before you standardize workflows. Bad processes automated at scale create chaos.
- Ignoring integration depth: 'Supports 300 integrations' sounds great, but check how deep and customizable those integrations really are.
- Neglecting analyst input: Involve your SOC team early because they’ll be the ones using it daily.
- Underestimating training needs: SOAR platforms can be complex. Invest in onboarding and documentation.
- Skipping ROI measurement: Track and communicate early wins to maintain stakeholder confidence.
What Should Be on Your SOAR Tool Selection Checklist?
Here’s a practical checklist you can use during evaluation:
- Integrates with your existing SIEM software, EDR solutions, and ticketing tools.
- Offers a no-code playbook builder for quick setup.
- Supports cloud, hybrid, or on-prem environments.
- Includes pre-built use cases (e.g., phishing, malware, insider threat).
- Provides advanced analytics and reporting.
- Comes with strong vendor support and documentation.
- Scales with your team and data volume.
- Fits your budget and compliance requirements.
Know the difference between SIEM and SOAR.
How Do You Choose the Right SOAR Platform for Your Organization?
At the end of the day, the best SOAR tool depends on your organization’s maturity, use cases, and ecosystem. Ask yourself:
- Do we need deep automation or better orchestration across tools?
- Are we cloud-native or hybrid?
- How important is no-code configuration to our analysts?
- What level of vendor support do we need?
Pro Tip: Use Techjockey’s interactive comparisons, verified user reviews, and free trials to help you make data-driven decisions.
What Does the Future of SOAR Look Like?
SOAR is evolving fast. In 2025 and beyond, expect:
- AI-driven playbooks that adapt automatically to context and behavior.
- Tighter SIEM-SOAR integration for unified analytics and automation.
- Generative AI copilots assisting analysts during investigations.
- Cloud-native SOAR platforms that scale elastically with workloads.
- Security Automation Marketplaces offering modular integrations and pre-built workflows.
The future of security operations is autonomous, integrated, and adaptive. And, SOAR is the backbone that will get you there.
Ready to Choose Your SOAR Tool?
Security automation is no longer optional. It’s the only way to keep up with modern threats. A right SOAR platform transforms your SOC from reactive firefighting to proactive defense. It eliminates alert fatigue, improves incident response, and maximizes analyst efficiency.
If you’re evaluating options right now, you’re already ahead of the curve. The next step? Compare SOAR tools, request demos, and find the right fit for your environment and budget. Explore the best SOAR tools on Techjockey, compare features, integrations, and pricing side-by-side.
Else, you can get an easy recommendation for selecting the right SOAR solution from our software experts based on your unique security stack.