Scan Exports and Reports

You can export scans as a Nessus file or a Nessus DB file, as described in Export a Scan. You can then import these files as a scan or policy, as described in Import a Scan and Import a Policy.

You can also create a scan report in several different formats. For more information, see Create a Scan Report.

User report templates to define the content of a report, based on chapter selection and ordering. Once you define your custom templates custom (see Create a Custom Report Template for more information), you can use them to generate HTML or PDF reports for scan results. In addition to custom templates, Nessus provides some predefined system templates. To view custom and system report templates, see Customized Reports. For more information on the system templates, see https://www.tenable.com/nessus-reports.

Format	Description
Exports
Nessus	A .nessus file in XML format that contains the list of targets, policies defined by the user, and scan results. Nessus strips the password credentials so they are not exported as plain text in the XML. If you import a .nessus file as a policy, you must re-apply your passwords to any credentials.
Nessus DB	A proprietary encrypted database format that contains all the information in a scan, including the audit trails and results. When you export in this format, you must enter a password to encrypt the results of the scan.
Reports
PDF	A report generated in PDF format. Depending on the size of the report, PDF generation may take several minutes. You need either Oracle Java or OpenJDK for PDF reports.
HTML	A report generated using standard HTML output. This report opens in a new tab in your browser.
CSV	A CSV export that you can use to import into many external programs such as databases, spreadsheets, and more.