ISO 27001 vs SOC 2: scope, cycle, and which you need

One is a certification issued by an accredited body on a three-year cycle. The other is an attestation report written by a CPA firm and usually renewed annually. They are genuinely different instruments, and different buyers ask for them. What they are not is meaningfully different in price: on the only pricing either framework publishes, they cost the same.

Updated July 2026

On published pricing, neither framework is dearer

This is the one part of the comparison with real published data, and it points the opposite way from how the question is usually framed. The GRC platforms are the only vendors in this market publishing list prices, and they price ISO 27001 and SOC 2 identically.

Drata

$7,500

Drata's listing prices every framework at the same flat figure: SOC 2, GDPR, ISO 27001, HIPAA, PCI DSS, CCPA, CMMC, MS SSPA and NIST CSF are each listed at $7,500.

Secureframe

$7,500

The First Framework dimension is published as "choice of any framework, per 12-month contract", so ISO 27001 and SOC 2 sit at the same figure.

Read off each vendor's public AWS Marketplace listing, checked July 2026, on 12-month contracts. These are framework dimensions that sit on top of a platform fee, not totals. The conclusion is narrow but firm: whatever should drive your framework choice, a published price difference between ISO 27001 and SOC 2 is not it, because there is not one.

Drata listing | Secureframe listing

The structural comparison

Attribute	ISO 27001	SOC 2
What you get	A certificate asserting conformity with the standard.	A report containing a CPA firm's opinion, plus the detail behind it.
Who issues it	A certification body accredited for ISMS certification. Accreditation is published on the accreditation body's own register.	A licensed CPA firm.
The instrument behind it	ISO/IEC 27001:2022 for the ISMS. ISO/IEC 27006-1:2024 governs how the body determines audit time.	The AICPA Trust Services Criteria.
Cycle	Three years. Two-stage initial audit, surveillance in the intervening years, recertification before expiry.	Typically annual renewal. Type 2 covers an observation period rather than a point in time.
Control model	93 Annex A controls across 4 themes, selected on the basis of risk and justified in a Statement of Applicability. Exclusion with justification is normal.	Trust Services Criteria. Security is mandatory; Availability, Confidentiality, Processing Integrity and Privacy are elected.
What is audited first	The management system: scope, risk assessment, risk treatment, internal audit, management review. Controls follow from it.	The controls, against the criteria you elected.
Where buyers ask for it	European and UK procurement, government-adjacent buyers, and international buyers wanting one portable certificate.	US enterprise SaaS procurement, where it is the routine ask.
Published price	None for the audit. No accredited body publishes a rate card.	None for the examination. CPA firms quote per engagement.

Which should you choose

Since the published pricing does not separate them, the decision is entirely about who is asking and what they will accept. These are the patterns worth recognising.

Scenario

Selling to European or UK enterprise and government

ISO 27001

European and UK procurement recognises ISO 27001 as the ISMS instrument. A SOC 2 report is frequently not accepted in these workflows, whatever its contents.

Scenario

Selling US SaaS to enterprise buyers

SOC 2

US enterprise security reviews routinely ask for SOC 2. ISO 27001 is well regarded but is rarely the item on the checklist.

Scenario

Selling into both regions

Both, sequenced

Start with whichever is blocking revenue now. The platforms carry both as separate published dimensions, so the second framework is an incremental line rather than a second programme.

Scenario

UK business, mixed sector

ISO 27001

UK supply chains recognise ISO 27001, and Cyber Essentials sits below it as a separate government-backed scheme rather than as a substitute.

Scenario

Defence and government supply chains

ISO 27001

ISMS certification from an accredited body is the recognised form. Specific programmes may impose their own frameworks on top, so read the tender rather than generalising.

Scenario

Buyer has not asked for either

Neither, yet

Both are revenue instruments. Without a buyer driving one, the work still lands on the same people, and a certificate nobody asked for does not pay for that.

Running both

Running both frameworks is common and reasonable. What we will not do is put a saving percentage on it, because no primary source states one and the number would be invented. What is published is how the platforms structure it, and that is genuinely informative: a second framework is an additive dimension with a stated price, not a discount.

Drata lists ISO 27001 at $7,500 on top of its platform fee, the same flat figure as every other framework it lists.
Sprinto lists frameworks from $2,000 each on top of its Starter platform. The listing calls that a starting point.
Scytale lists an additional framework at $2,100 on top of a platform dimension that bundles one framework.

All read off the vendors' public AWS Marketplace listings and checked July 2026, on 12-month contracts. Each is a separate dimension and none of them is a total. On the audit layer nothing is published either way, so the question to put to your certification body and your CPA firm is what running both actually changes about their scope and their evidence requests. That answer is specific to you, which is exactly why nobody can publish it.

Why neither audit layer has a published price

On the ISO 27001 side, an audit fee is audit days multiplied by a day rate and neither input is published. The days are determined by the certification body under ISO/IEC 27006-1:2024, whose audit-time provisions sit in the normative Annex C. ISO sells that standard; we have not read the tables, so we do not reproduce them. The day rate is commercial and no accredited body publishes one.

On the SOC 2 side, CPA firms quote per engagement as well. So any side-by-side table of audit costs for the two frameworks is a table of assumptions. What you can do is run both processes the same way: fix the scope first, send an identical brief to more than one firm, ask for the quantities and not only the totals, and price the whole cycle rather than year one. See how ISO 27001 audit fees are set.

What is published for your size

Platform bands by headcount

DIY vs consultant vs platform

The three routes, on published figures

93 Annex A controls

All controls across the four themes

Frequently asked questions

Should I get ISO 27001 or SOC 2 first?

Follow the buyers, because the published pricing gives you no reason to prefer one. If your pipeline is US SaaS enterprise sales, SOC 2 is the routine ask and ISO 27001 is a bonus. If your pipeline is European, UK, or government-adjacent procurement, ISO 27001 is the recognised instrument and SOC 2 often is not accepted. If you sell into both, start with whichever is blocking revenue now. What should not drive the decision is a belief that one is materially cheaper: the platform layer prices them the same, and both audit layers are quoted per engagement.

Is ISO 27001 more expensive than SOC 2?

On the only pricing either framework publishes, no. Drata's AWS Marketplace listing prices every framework at the same flat $7,500, with SOC 2, ISO 27001, GDPR, HIPAA, PCI DSS, CCPA, CMMC, MS SSPA and NIST CSF each listed at that figure. Secureframe's first-framework dimension is described as a choice of any framework, so ISO 27001 sits at the same figure as SOC 2 would. Checked July 2026. The audit layers cannot be compared on published data at all, because ISO 27001 certification bodies and SOC 2 CPA firms both quote per engagement and neither publishes a rate card.

What is the actual structural difference?

ISO 27001 is a certification. An accredited certification body audits your information security management system against the standard and issues a certificate, on a three-year cycle: a two-stage initial audit, surveillance audits in the intervening years, and recertification before expiry. SOC 2 is an attestation. A licensed CPA firm examines your controls against the Trust Services Criteria and issues a report containing its opinion, typically renewed annually. A certificate asserts conformity; a report contains an opinion and the detail behind it. That difference is why buyers in different regions ask for different things.

Can the same firm do both ISO 27001 and SOC 2?

Not with the same accreditation. ISO 27001 requires a body accredited for ISMS certification, and accreditation is published on the accreditation body's own register. SOC 2 requires a licensed CPA firm. Some large firms hold both capabilities under one roof, but they are different engagements under different rules producing different outputs, and the ISO 27001 side must be accredited for ISO/IEC 27001 specifically. Accreditation for ISO 9001 does not imply it. Check the register rather than the brochure.

What is the difference in what gets audited?

ISO 27001 audits the management system first and the controls second. The centre of the standard is the ISMS: scope, risk assessment, risk treatment, the Statement of Applicability justifying which of the 93 Annex A controls apply, internal audit, and management review. Controls are selected on the basis of risk, and excluding one with justification is a normal outcome. SOC 2 examines controls against the Trust Services Criteria, where Security is mandatory and Availability, Confidentiality, Processing Integrity and Privacy are included at your election. A SOC 2 Type 2 tests operating effectiveness across an observation period rather than at a point in time.

Does running both cost less than running them separately?

It is a reasonable expectation, but we do not publish a saving percentage because no primary source states one. What is genuinely published is that the platforms price frameworks as separate additive dimensions: Drata lists ISO 27001 at $7,500 on top of its platform fee, Sprinto lists frameworks from $2,000 each on top of its Starter platform, and Scytale lists an additional framework at $2,100 on top of a platform that bundles one. So on the platform layer, a second framework is a published incremental line rather than a discount. On the audit layer nothing is published, so ask both your certification body and your CPA firm what running both changes about their scope.