The 282% ROI of Unified Security

We’re excited to share the findings of our commissioned Forrester Consulting Total Economic Impact™ (TEI) study, published in January 2026. This study examines the return on investment (ROI) that organizations realized by deploying a unified platform for managing and securing the software supply chain.

Today, software supply chains are facing unprecedented pressure from surging open-source vulnerabilities, increasingly sophisticated malicious packages, regulatory shifts, and the high cost of delayed releases. Many teams still rely on a patchwork of fragmented toolchains and manual processes for artifact management and vulnerability scanning. These inconsistent and slow processes are not sustainable, given the increased speed at which vulnerabilities are exploited.

JFrog is committed to helping organizations gain trust and confidence at every stage of their development cycle. Businesses realize significant value from natively integrating security into the management of software artifacts, from ensuring selection of curated open source packages to continuously scanning artifacts throughout the stages of the development lifecycle to validate their safety.

How much value can this transition provide? Keep reading for a summary of the study’s findings, or download the full study.

The Numbers You Need to Know

The study, based on in-depth interviews with five decision-makers—including roles such as Principal Engineer, Director of Software Development, and Head of R&D—at global organizations leveraging JFrog, found that a composite organization realized a significant financial impact over three years. This composite organization, designed by Forrester to represent the aggregate experiences of these interviewees, is a global enterprise operating in a regulated industry with 500 engineers and $2 billion in annual revenue.

By analyzing the real-world costs and benefits reported by these diverse firms, the study determined that the platform enabled the following results:

• 282% Return on Investment (ROI): A clear indicator of the value gained from shifting security left.
• $4.0 Million Net Present Value (NPV): Total risk-adjusted net benefits over three years.
• Payback in Under 6 Months: A rapid breakeven point for the initial investment.

Other key quantified benefits

The research reveals how an integrated platform approach enabled organizations to transition from a reactive “bottleneck” security model to a proactive, “shift-left” strategy.

By embedding security natively throughout the development lifecycle, the platform addressed the following key areas:

• Vulnerability Reduction: The composite organization achieved a 65% reduction in critical vulnerabilities reaching production through automated curation and early detection.
• Accelerated Remediation: Instead of spending days tracing dependency trees, developers resolved issues in hours—a 80% reduction in remediation time.
• Streamlined Onboarding: New software developers became productive within hours rather than days, saving 38 hours per hire.
• Tool Consolidation: Organizations saved nearly $136,000 annually by retiring redundant point solutions and outdated legacy tools.

Key unquantified benefits

In addition to the financial metrics, the study identified several strategic advantages that deliver significant value to the composite organization but were not assigned a specific dollar amount:

• Greater developer confidence and autonomy: By providing real-time feedback and contextual analysis directly within developer workflows, engineers can resolve issues independently. This reduces a team’s reliance on security departments, speeds up development cycles, and raises overall code quality.
• Faster and more consistent audit readiness: The platform automates the generation of Software Bill of Materials (SBOMs) and maintains continuous scanning. It also provides robust governance by enforcing policies and automatically logging every package decision in detailed audit trails accessible via UI and APIs. These features simplify compliance reporting, reduce manual labor, and improve transparency for both internal and external stakeholders in regulated industries.
• Reduced noise in vulnerability management: Using AI-driven filtering and contextual CVE analysis, organizations can focus on exploitable risks rather than wasting time on false positives. This ensures that engineering efforts are prioritized for high-impact security issues.
• Improved cross-functional collaboration: JFrog acts as a “single pane of glass” for DevOps, DevSecOps, and security teams. Unified dashboards break down departmental silos and enable a coordinated response to operational challenges.
• Enhanced resilience and business continuity: Features like federation and caching ensure that critical artifacts remain accessible even during network outages or connectivity disruptions.
• Modernized technological performance: The cloud-native design and integration with infrastructure-as-code (IaC) tools help organizations reduce technical debt. This simplifies toolchain management and supports broader digital modernization initiatives.

The High Cost of Fragmented Security: Why Organizations are Switching

Before adopting a unified platform, the organizations interviewed for the Forrester TEI study struggled with a patchwork of manual, inconsistent processes that slowed down time to remediation, and increased risk. These challenges often forced security and development teams into a reactive cycle that slowed down the entire software development lifecycle.

By consolidating these fragmented processes into a single platform, the composite organization transitioned to proactive measures that significantly reduced the number of vulnerabilities requiring remediation while practically eliminating noise from false positives.

Are you ready to start building confidently with both greater security and higher velocity? Download the full Forrester TEI Study to explore the complete framework and financial analysis.