The Real Cost of SOC 2 Compliance in 2026 (With Actual Numbers)

You just got the email. Your biggest prospect's security team wants to see your SOC 2 report, and you don't have one. Or your Series A investors want a compliance roadmap on the board deck. Or you're watching deals stall in procurement because enterprise buyers won't sign without it.

So now you're Googling "how much does SOC 2 cost" and every answer is either "it depends" or a thinly veiled pitch to buy some compliance platform. Not helpful.

This post gives you actual numbers. Not ranges so wide they're useless, but realistic costs based on what companies actually pay in 2026. Your situation is different from every other company's, but I can give you a much tighter answer than "it depends."

The Three Things You're Paying For

Most people think SOC 2 is one cost. It's actually three separate line items, paid to three different vendors. Understanding this is the most important thing in this entire post because it's where the confusion comes from.

1. Compliance Platform ($5,000 - $25,000/year)

Vanta, Drata, Secureframe, Thoropass. These platforms automate evidence collection, provide policy templates, integrate with your cloud provider, identity provider, and HR system, and give you a dashboard showing your control status. They do not implement controls or fix your infrastructure. They're the monitoring layer.

Realistic pricing in 2026:

• Vanta: starts around $10K/year for small companies, up to $25K+ for larger orgs. Usually requires an annual commitment.
• Drata: similar range, $8K-$20K/year depending on tier and company size.
• Secureframe: comparable pricing, sometimes slightly lower for smaller teams.
• Thoropass: bundles the platform with audit services, so pricing works differently.

If you're coming through an accelerator like Y Combinator or Techstars, ask about startup programs. Vanta and Drata both offer meaningful discounts through partner programs.

My take: for most SMBs doing their first SOC 2, any of the major platforms will work fine. Don't spend three weeks evaluating platforms. Pick one, connect your integrations, and move on. The platform is not the hard part.

2. Implementation / Consulting ($15,000 - $75,000+)

This is the actual work of getting compliant. It's also where the cost varies the most, because it depends on how much needs to change in your environment.

What implementation includes:

• Gap assessment against SOC 2 Trust Services Criteria
• Writing 15-20 policies and procedures (information security policy, access control policy, incident response plan, business continuity plan, risk assessment, vendor management, and more)
• Technical control implementation: configuring IAM with least-privilege access, enabling encryption at rest and in transit, setting up centralized logging and monitoring (CloudTrail, CloudWatch, GuardDuty), enforcing MFA everywhere, endpoint management, network segmentation, automated vulnerability scanning, backup and recovery procedures
• Configuring the compliance platform and connecting all integrations
• Employee security awareness training
• Vendor risk assessments
• Evidence preparation and pre-audit review
• Supporting the audit process

Here's how the costs break down by approach:

DIY with your internal team ($0 in direct cost, $30K-$80K+ in time). Possible if you have a dedicated security or DevOps person with SOC 2 experience. Most startups don't. Expect 200-400 hours of internal effort, which at an engineer's loaded cost of $150-$200/hour means $30K-$80K in opportunity cost. And it usually takes 2-3x longer because they're learning as they go.

Freelance or solo consultant ($15K-$30K). Can work for companies that are already fairly mature in their security practices and just need help with the compliance framework, policy writing, and audit prep. Won't work well if you need significant infrastructure changes.

Compliance consultancy / GRC firm ($25K-$60K). The traditional approach. They write policies, help with organizational controls, and manage the audit process. The weakness: most of them can't touch your infrastructure. They'll tell you "you need to configure CloudTrail with multi-region logging" but they can't actually do it. You still need your engineering team to implement every technical control.

Engineering-led implementation partner ($30K-$75K). Handles everything: policies, technical implementation, infrastructure hardening, platform setup, and audit support. Best for companies without a dedicated security team who need someone to both plan and execute. Costs more than a pure GRC firm, but you don't end up with a 50-item remediation list that your two-person engineering team has to figure out on top of their regular work. This is what Cavanex does.

3. Audit / CPA Firm ($10,000 - $30,000)

The actual SOC 2 examination has to be performed by a licensed CPA firm. Your implementation partner is not the auditor. These must be separate entities. This is a regulatory requirement, not a preference.

Realistic audit pricing:

• Type I audit: $10K-$20K for most SMBs
• Type II audit: $15K-$30K (covers a longer observation period, typically 6-12 months)
• Big Four firms: $50K+ (overkill for most startups, usually only needed for very large companies or specific regulatory requirements)

For most startups, work with mid-size CPA firms that specialize in SOC 2. Firms like Schellman, BARR Advisory, Johanson Group, or Prescient Assurance are experienced, efficient, and priced right for SMBs. Your implementation partner should be able to recommend auditors they've worked with before, which helps the process go smoothly.

Total SOC 2 Cost by Company Size

Here's what the total looks like when you add all three buckets together. These are Type I costs. Type II adds to the ongoing annual cost.

	Small Startup (5-25 employees)	Mid-Size SaaS (25-100 employees)	Larger Org (100-500 employees)
Platform	~$10K/yr	~$15K/yr	~$20K+/yr
Implementation	$30K-$45K	$40K-$70K	$60K-$100K+
Audit	$12K-$18K	$15K-$25K	$25K-$40K
Total (Type I)	$50K-$80K	$70K-$120K	$100K-$200K+
Timeline	10-14 weeks	12-16 weeks	16-24 weeks

The small startup profile is the most common one we see. Simple AWS setup, 15-30 employees, no existing compliance program, need SOC 2 because an enterprise prospect asked for it.

The mid-size bracket gets more expensive because of complexity: multiple cloud accounts, more employees to train, more vendors to assess, more complex access management, and usually more technical debt in the infrastructure.

For organizations over 100 employees, you're often looking at SOC 2 alongside HIPAA or ISO 27001, which adds scope but shares a lot of control overlap.

The Hidden Costs Nobody Tells You About

The numbers above are what shows up on vendor invoices. There are other costs that don't appear in any quote.

Internal Time

Even with an implementation partner doing the heavy lifting, your team will spend time on this. Expect your CTO or security lead to commit 5-10 hours per week during the engagement for decision-making, reviews, and approvals. Other employees need to complete security training (1-2 hours each). Someone needs to own vendor risk assessments on an ongoing basis.

For a 30-person company, that's roughly 80-120 hours of aggregate internal time over the engagement. It's manageable, but it's not zero.

Tools You Probably Don't Have Yet

SOC 2 requires certain controls that may require new software:

• MDM / endpoint management (Jamf, Kandji): $5-$15/user/month
• Password manager (1Password, Bitwarden): $4-$8/user/month
• SSO / identity provider if you're not on one (Okta, Google Workspace): $2-$8/user/month
• Background check provider for new hires: $30-$100/check
• Security awareness training (KnowBe4, Curricula): $15-$25/user/year
• Vulnerability scanning: varies widely, some are included with your cloud provider

These add up to $5K-$15K/year in additional SaaS spend that isn't part of anyone's SOC 2 quote. Budget for it.

Ongoing Annual Costs

SOC 2 is not a one-time expense. After your Type I report, you need to keep the machine running:

• Type II audit (annually): $15K-$30K/year
• Compliance platform renewal: $10K-$25K/year
• Ongoing control maintenance: either internal time or a retainer with your implementation partner ($1K-$5K/month)
• Annual penetration test: $5K-$15K

Total ongoing annual cost: $40K-$80K/year depending on company size and how much you handle internally vs. outsource.

If someone tells you SOC 2 is a one-time cost, they're either uninformed or they're selling you something that doesn't include renewal support.

How to Reduce SOC 2 Costs Without Cutting Corners

There are legitimate ways to spend less without undermining the quality of your compliance program.

Scope tightly. You don't need all five Trust Services Criteria. Most SaaS companies only need Security (required) and Availability. Adding Confidentiality, Processing Integrity, and Privacy increases scope and cost. Only add them if a customer specifically requires them in a contract.

Start with Type I, not Type II. Type I is faster and cheaper. Most enterprise buyers will accept a Type I report while you work toward Type II. Don't let anyone talk you into jumping straight to Type II unless a specific customer contract requires it.

Use a compliance platform. DIYing evidence collection in spreadsheets will cost you 3x in labor what the platform costs in licensing. It's one of the few tools that genuinely pays for itself.

Fix your infrastructure before starting the audit. Starting an audit before you're ready leads to findings, rework, and extended timelines. All of those cost more money. Get your controls in place first, verify them, then engage the auditor.

Pick the right auditor for your size. A Big Four firm will charge $50K+ for the same audit that a mid-size SOC 2 specialist does for $15K. The report carries the same weight with your customers.

Bundle frameworks if you need more than one. If you need SOC 2 and HIPAA, doing them together is 30-40% cheaper than doing them separately. The control overlap is significant, so you're not doing double the work.

Is SOC 2 Worth the Cost?

Let's be concrete about this.

If you're losing a single enterprise deal because you don't have a SOC 2 report, and that deal is worth $50K-$500K in annual recurring revenue, the compliance cost pays for itself on the first closed deal. For most growth-stage SaaS companies, that math is straightforward.

Enterprise sales cycles get 2-4 weeks shorter when you can hand over a SOC 2 report during security review instead of answering a 300-question security questionnaire manually. That acceleration compounds across every deal in your pipeline.

SOC 2 also becomes a competitive differentiator. When a procurement team is evaluating you against a competitor who doesn't have a SOC 2 report, you're easier to approve. Less risk for them, less work for their security team, faster time to contract.

And here's the thing most people don't talk about: the controls you implement for SOC 2 (access management, centralized logging, incident response, encryption, endpoint management) are things you should be doing anyway. SOC 2 just forces the discipline and gives you a framework to maintain it. Your infrastructure will be better for it regardless of the audit.

The companies that regret getting SOC 2 are companies that don't exist. The companies that regret waiting to get SOC 2 are everywhere. Every month you wait is another month of deals sitting in security review, another quarter of "we're working on it" emails to prospects.

What to Do Next

If you want to know where you stand before talking to anyone, we built a free SOC 2 readiness assessment. It takes about 3 minutes, scores your current posture across five areas, and tells you where the biggest gaps are.

Take the free SOC 2 readiness assessment here.

If you'd rather just talk to someone about what this would look like for your company, you can book a call here. No pitch deck, no 45-minute demo. Just a conversation about your situation and what it would take to get you audit-ready.