SOC 2 Audit Cost

What a SOC 2 audit costs

A SOC 2 audit costs $7,000 to $25,000 for a Type I and $12,000 to $45,000 for a Type II at startup and mid-market scope, with enterprise Type II audits at $50,000 to $100,000 or more, according to BD Emerson's July 2026 guide ¹. Other published guides land in the same area:

• Drata (March 2026): Type I $7,500 to $15,000 and Type II $12,000 to $20,000 for small to midsize companies; Type I $20,000 to $60,000 and Type II $30,000 to $100,000 or more for large organizations ².
• Vanta: $10,000 to $50,000 for the audit itself, without splitting Type I and Type II ³.

Who signs the report moves the price as much as company size. BD Emerson cites quotes of $15,000 from a boutique CPA firm, $35,000 from a mid-tier firm and $90,000 from a Big Four firm for materially the same report ¹. Most customers want a clean, readable report from a licensed CPA firm. Before you pay for a large firm, ask the customer who requested the report whether firm size matters to them.

The audit fee is the smaller part of the bill. BD Emerson puts the first year at $30,000 to $90,000 all in and later years at $25,000 to $75,000 ¹. Drata's worked examples come to about $28,000 for a 25-employee startup and about $75,000 for a 100-employee company in the first year of a Type II ².

All three sources sell compliance services or software. Use their ranges to sanity-check quotes, not as a market average.

SOC 2 Type I vs Type II: report, timeline and price

A Type I report tests whether your controls are designed properly on a single date; a Type II report tests whether they actually operated over a period, usually three to twelve months ¹². Drata puts the Type II fee at 30% to 50% more than a Type I ².

Sources: timeline from Drata ²; fees from BD Emerson ¹.

A common path is a Type I to answer an urgent customer request, then a Type II with a short first window, then a 12-month window every year after. BD Emerson notes that skipping the Type I for a three-month Type II leaves nothing to show customers until the window closes ¹. It also advises booking the auditor about three months ahead, since fourth-quarter calendars fill up ¹.

If a large customer is waiting, ask them directly whether a Type I plus a dated plan for the Type II will satisfy their review. The decision is theirs, so get the answer in writing.

SOC 2 compliance cost beyond the audit fee

SOC 2 compliance cost beyond the audit fee usually runs $20,000 to $80,000 in the first year, covering readiness, tools, testing and remediation, according to Drata ². BD Emerson's line items ¹:

• Gap assessment: $5,000 to $15,000 for a consultant to find the gaps without fixing them.
• Full readiness support: $15,000 to $40,000 for consultants who drive remediation, write policies and prepare you for the auditor.
• Compliance automation platform: $8,000 to $30,000 a year; $8,000 to $20,000 for under 100 people on one framework.
• Penetration test: $8,000 to $25,000 for a web application and external network test. Our penetration testing guide covers scoping.
• Internal time: 100 to 300 hours in year one, which BD Emerson values at $10,000 to $40,000 of payroll.

Remediation is the line nobody can quote in advance. Typical gaps are single sign-on and MFA everywhere, device management and disk encryption, centralized logging, documented access reviews, background checks, vendor reviews and a tested incident response plan. Drata lists security tool upgrades at $5,000 to $50,000 or more ².

Much of that is ordinary IT and security work. If your managed IT provider already runs device management, patching and backups, ask for its control evidence before buying the same thing again. A cybersecurity risk assessment is a cheaper first step than a full readiness engagement when you do not know where you stand.

Compliance automation tool pricing

Compliance automation platforms typically cost $8,000 to $30,000 a year ¹. Vanta and Drata do not publish fixed price lists, so the clearest public numbers come from buyer contract data. Vendr, which negotiates software contracts for companies, reports ⁴⁵:

• Vanta: median contract $20,000 a year across 374 purchases, observed range $7,500 to $57,207; estimated single-framework pricing of $12,000 to $25,000 for 1 to 50 employees and $20,000 to $40,000 for 51 to 200 employees.
• Drata: median contract $24,934 a year across 236 purchases, observed range $9,415 to $68,250; starter deals of about $15,000 to $25,000 for 25 to 75 employees.

Both pages were last updated February 2026. Adding frameworks such as ISO 27001 or HIPAA raises the price.

What a platform does: connects to your cloud, identity and HR systems, collects evidence automatically, tracks policy sign-offs and gives your auditor one place to look. What it does not do: write your risk decisions, fix misconfigured systems or replace the CPA firm. If a platform offers an audit through a partner firm, you are still the audit firm's client, so read that engagement letter as carefully as the software contract.

For very small teams with simple cloud setups, a platform plus a part-time security lead such as a vCISO can replace most consultant hours.

Trust Services Criteria: choosing what the report covers

Every SOC 2 report is measured against the AICPA's Trust Services Criteria, which cover five categories: security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality and privacy ⁶. The current version is the 2017 Trust Services Criteria with revised points of focus from 2022 ⁶.

Each category you add means more controls to test and a higher fee, so pick categories based on what customers asked for and what you promise in contracts:

• Security covers protection of information and systems against unauthorized access. Start here.
• Availability fits companies with uptime commitments in their contracts.
• Confidentiality fits companies that hold customer business data under nondisclosure terms.
• Processing integrity fits services where accurate, complete processing is the product, such as payroll or billing.
• Privacy fits companies handling personal information on behalf of customers.

Scope also covers which systems, products and locations are in the report. A narrow, accurate scope is cheaper and easier to defend than a broad one written to impress.

SOC 2 is not the same as a security operations center. If you are looking for 24/7 monitoring, see our SOC as a service guide. If customers outside the US are asking, they may prefer an ISO certificate; compare the two on our ISO 27001 certification cost page.

How to compare SOC 2 audit firms

Compare SOC 2 audit firms on license, experience with companies like yours and the total quote for the full cycle, not only the first-year fee. SOC engagements are services that CPAs provide under professional standards the AICPA sets ⁷, so the firm signing your report must be a licensed CPA firm. We do not recommend specific audit firms. Ask each one:

• Which state licenses the firm, and can you see its most recent peer review report?
• How many SOC 2 reports did it issue last year for companies of your size and technology stack?
• Who does the fieldwork, and how much is done by the people named in the proposal?
• Is the quote fixed, and what triggers extra fees, such as added categories, a longer window or a second location?
• Does the price include the Type I, the first Type II and the following year?
• How does it keep any readiness consulting separate from the audit itself?

Get at least two written quotes on the same scope. Wide gaps are normal, as BD Emerson's $15,000 to $90,000 example shows ¹, so compare what each report will include.

Many buyers start by asking an outside adviser to scope the project. Our IT consulting guide covers how those engagements are priced. If you want help scoping a SOC 2 project, send a request through the form; we pass larger compliance work to an advisory partner and smaller requests to one provider.