For a lot of MSPs, security has felt like a cost center — a stack of tools you maintain because clients expect it, eating margin and tier-2 hours. The 2026 data says it should be the opposite: security is the single best growth and margin lever in the MSP book right now, if you deliver it differently than the competition.

The demand curve is unmistakable

Every signal points the same direction:

  • 71% of MSPs grew cybersecurity revenue year-over-year — the fastest-growing service category they sell. (Kaseya 2026 State of the MSP Report)
  • 42% of SMB clients are actively asking their MSP for security services — the #2 client demand category, behind only AI. (Kaseya 2026)
  • 57% of SMBs now rank cybersecurity as their #1 business priority, up from 43% in a single year. (ConnectWise State of SMB Cybersecurity 2025)
  • 58% of SMBs say “improved security” is the #1 benefit of working with an MSP, up from 40%. (ConnectWise 2025)

Your clients are telling you what they want to buy. The question is whether they’ll buy it from you.

The switching risk — and the opportunity inside it

Demand alone doesn’t make it a growth lever. This does:

  • 73% of SMBs aren’t confident their MSP could defend them during an active attack. (ConnectWise 2025)
  • 47% would switch MSPs specifically for stronger cybersecurity capabilities. (ConnectWise 2025)
  • 32% would hold their MSP solely responsible for a breach; 79% would consider legal action. (ConnectWise 2025)

That’s the double edge: a weak security story is why you lose clients, and a strong one is how you win them — including competitive takeaways, which are 33% of new MSP wins. (Kaseya 2026)

The 35-point gap that’s yours to close

Here’s the wedge most MSPs are missing:

48% of MSP clients say AI/automation is their #1 IT need, but only 13% of MSPs generate meaningful revenue from AI services — a 35-point delivery gap. (Kaseya 2026)

Clients want AI-powered security. Almost no MSP can deliver it. The first ones who can will take share — and do it at margin, because differentiated capability resists the deal-size compression squeezing the rest of the channel (deals over $25K fell from 75% to 41% in a year — Kaseya 2026).

Why margin holds with an AI security team

The reason security has historically hurt margin is labor: someone has to watch the consoles and triage the alerts. An AI security team removes that cost. Kavach does the 24/7 watching, triage, correlation, and seconds-fast containment across every client; Argus writes the per-client cyber-insurance readiness reports that drive QBRs and upsell. Your team supervises an exception queue instead of staffing a night shift — so you can take on more clients without adding heads, in a market where 16% of MSPs already can’t hire the technicians they need (Kaseya 2026).

How Centeye is built for the channel

Centeye is multi-tenant by default — one console across every client tenant, per-client policy templates, and integration with ConnectWise, Autotask, NinjaOne, Entra, Google Workspace, and JumpCloud. It’s co-branded, not white-labeled away, so the value shows up under your brand. And the cyber-insurance readiness report turns renewal season into a recurring sales motion: walk each client through the eight control families, and every red row is an upsell.

Security stops being the thing that erodes your margin and becomes the thing that grows it.

Read the operational side in how an MSP runs 24/7 security without a 24/7 team, or explore the partner program. Ready to talk margins? Get in touch.

Figures cited from the Kaseya 2026 State of the MSP Report and the ConnectWise State of SMB Cybersecurity 2025.