Managed Detection & Response (MDR)
Outsourced 24/7 threat detection and response.
Overview
MDR provides a vendor SOC that monitors, hunts, and responds on the customer's behalf, often atop the customer's EDR/SIEM. It fills the staffing and after-hours gap most teams face. Priced per endpoint, per user, or flat retainer. A dominant buying pattern for mid-market security.
Fills the 24/7 staffing gap; often replaces building an in-house SOC.
Advantages
- 24/7 SOC fills staffing gaps
- Arctic Wolf broad, Expel/Red Canary high quality
- Falcon Complete tight with CrowdStrike
- fast time-to-value.
Trade-offs
- Ongoing cost
- response authority/limits vary by provider
- may require their tooling (lock-in)
- SLAs differ widely.
Open-source option
MDR is a staffed 24/7 service, not a self-hostable product. Open-source EDR/SIEM (Wazuh, Velociraptor, Security Onion) can supply the telemetry, but the analysts and on-call response that define MDR cannot be downloaded.
Vendors & tools in this area
MDR strong in detection engineering Acquired by Zscaler (closed Aug 2025).
Visit site →Multi-signal MDR (endpoint, network, cloud, identity, log) with a stated response guarantee and 300+ stack integrations.
Visit site →MDR/managed EDR built for SMBs and the MSPs that serve them, with flat, predictable pricing and an 8-minute median response time.
Visit site →Enterprise MDR layered on the customer's existing SIEM; expert-governed AI triage.
Visit site →MSP-channel MDR; patented network mapping, transparent per-seat pricing, no lock-in.
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