Choosing Between SOC 2, HITRUST, and HIPAA Attestation

It depends on your primary buyer. Enterprise SaaS buyers ask for SOC 2 Type II; hospital systems and health plans ask for HITRUST r2; smaller or non-standardized healthcare buyers accept a HIPAA assessment. Pursue whichever unblocks the most current revenue, and default to SOC 2 if the signal is mixed.

No. HIPAA's Security Rule requires you to have a compliance program, not a certificate, and there is no government-issued HIPAA certification. What you can obtain is a third-party assessment mapping your controls to the Security Rule, or you can use HITRUST or a combined SOC 2 + HIPAA report as evidence.

First-cycle ballpark: SOC 2 Type II runs $20-60K, HITRUST r2 $80-150K, a standalone HIPAA assessment $10-30K, and ISO 27001 $40-100K. Internal time is separate and often larger, from 100 to 800 hours depending on framework, and 2-3x that without a dedicated compliance owner.

For most US healthcare-adjacent SaaS, start with SOC 2 because it covers the largest buyer pool, then add HITRUST once healthcare deals start losing on 'you don't have HITRUST.' If hospital systems or health plans are your primary buyer from the start, pursue HITRUST r2 first.

Not recommended. The control artifacts overlap heavily (a control documented for SOC 2 is about 80% reusable for HITRUST), but the audit cycles and assessor relationships are separate, and running two cycles at once in a team under 100 engineers usually means both slip.

Skip it unless your sales motion includes significant European or global enterprise customers. For US-only healthcare or fintech, SOC 2 carries an equivalent or stronger signal at lower cost; add ISO 27001 only when you go global.