I get a version of this question often enough that it deserves a direct, honest answer rather than a generic "depends on your needs": should you get a one-time Deep Audit, or the ongoing Continuous Shield? The right answer comes down to one thing, how often your app is actually still changing.
What Deep Audit is built for
A single, thorough pass through your app as it exists right now: database rules, authentication, ownership checks, the whole set of patterns I've written about across this entire blog, tested directly rather than just scanned for surface-level patterns. It's the right fit for an app that's reasonably stable, or being checked specifically before a defined milestone, a launch, a funding conversation, taking on a client who's going to ask hard questions.
What Continuous Shield is built for
If you're still actively shipping new features, and especially if you're doing that with an AI coding tool generating a meaningful share of that new code, a one-time audit's shelf life is roughly as long as the app stays unchanged, which for an actively developed product usually isn't very long. Continuous Shield checks new code as it ships, on an ongoing basis, catching the mistake a new feature introduces close to when it actually happens, rather than waiting for the next big audit to eventually surface it.
A simple way to decide
- Shipping new features regularly, especially with AI tools doing a lot of the generating: Continuous Shield fits the actual shape of the risk.
- Stable, mostly unchanged, or checking before one specific, defined milestone: Deep Audit answers exactly the question being asked.
- Not sure yet, still early: start with Deep Audit to get a real baseline, then decide whether the pace of new shipping justifies moving to ongoing coverage.
Why I built both instead of just one
These solve genuinely different problems, not the same problem at two price points. A single deep look and an ongoing watch over what changes are two different shapes of protection, and forcing every app into one or the other regardless of how it actually operates would mean a real mismatch for a lot of builders. The honest answer really is that it depends on your shipping pace, not on which option sounds more thorough on paper.
Related reading
- A One-Time Audit vs Recurring Checks: Which Does Your App Actually Need?
- A Fixed-Price Audit vs Hiring a Freelance Pentester: What Actually Differs
- A Monitoring Subscription and a One-Time Audit Solve Different Problems
See both, side by side, with fixed pricing for each.
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