We performed a comparison between Check Point Harmony Endpoint and Microsoft Defender for Endpoint based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: Check Point Harmony has a slight edge in this comparison. According to its reviewers, its interface is friendlier than that of Defender for Endpoint.
"Fortinet FortiEDR's firewalling, rule creation, monitoring, and inspection profiles are great."
"Fortinet is very user-friendly for customers."
"It notifies us if there's any suspicious file on any PC. If any execution or similar kind of thing is happening, it just alerts us. It doesn't only alert. It also blocks the execution until we allow it. We check whether the execution is legitimate or not, and then approve it or keep it blocked. This gives us a little bit of control over this mechanism. Fortinet FortiEDR is also very straightforward and easy to maintain."
"We have FortiEDR installed on all our systems. This protects them from any threats."
"Having all monitoring, response, tracking, and mitigation tools in one dashboard provides our analysts and SOC team with a comprehensive view at a glance."
"The product's initial setup phase is very easy."
"Ability to get forensics details and also memory exfiltration."
"Forensics is a valuable feature of Fortinet FortiEDR."
"The zero-day threat prevention is excellent."
"The technical support is good."
"The main advantage of the solution is the ability to implement complete security policies for the terminals in order to address how apps are installed on corporate devices."
"This software incorporates security AI features and effectively manages bandwidth with its DRS capabilities."
"I have found the Zero phishing and IPS features the most useful in Check Point Harmony Endpoint. Additionally, threat emulation sandboxing is effective."
"A unique feature with this product is that it will detect if the user is entering their password on a website, and then block it."
"We were under an attack in our environment, and the Check Point response was good because we didn't lose anything."
"It has a great ability to detect threats and keep us safe."
"I like the real-time protection features. Windows Defender will detect if there's a threat like a Trojan or something like that but Kaspersky lets it run normally."
"We have just started to implement it. It is useful for protection from malware and ransomware."
"It depends on the licensing. Most of the customers have got at least a 365 E3 license, and they can use most of the features of Windows 10 Defender. So, anyone who has got an enterprise license can start using those features. Some of the customers have got E5 licenses, and they can use all advanced features. Customers with E5 licenses use the advanced site protection (ATP) features and web content filtering without going via a proxy, which gives the benefit of replacing the proxy. They can get the benefit of MCAS and integration with Intune and the endpoint manager. It is a kind of single platform for all 365 technologies. It helps customers in managing everything through a unified portal."
"The most valuable features are that it is flexible, and it is integrated with Microsoft products."
"I've started to test it from the security point of view. There are plenty of features that are interesting, but at this time, the XDR functionality is most valuable. It is endpoint security on steroids."
"It is a straightforward setup."
"It's a Microsoft product; it's easier to deploy this product than other options."
"In my opinion, the most valuable aspects are the reporting analytics and integration with Sentinel. Defender does an excellent job of correlating the different entities that comprise threat analysis, analytics data, and log analytics. It helps to piece together investigations into any exploit or malicious activity within a specific tenant. AI and analytics tools are probably the most valuable components."
"Cannot be used on mobile devices with a secure connection."
"FortiEDR could add a separate scanning dashboard. In incident management, we prefer to remove the endpoint system from the environment and scan the system. We typically use Symantec for that, but if we want to use FortiEDR for that, then we need a scanning tab to clarify things."
"The EDR console should have more extensive reporting. You shouldn't need to purchase FortiAnalyzer. It should be included in the EDR part. The security adviser cloud platform could be improved with more options for exclusive or intensive rules for devices."
"We'd like to see more one-to-one product presentations for the distribution channels."
"The SIEM could be improved."
"It takes about two business days for initial support, which is too slow in urgent situations."
"We find the solution to be a bit expensive."
"I would like the solution to extend beyond endpoint protection and include other attack surfaces such as other network components."
"Enhanced behavioral analytics would provide a deeper understanding of endpoint activities, fortifying our defenses against sophisticated cyber adversaries."
"The price of the product could be more friendly."
"A little change in the product's user interface is required since it is one of the areas where the product has certain shortcomings."
"The response from the tool's support team, which starts with L1, is something my company doesn't find helpful, especially when compared to the other solutions that we use."
"I would like to see is this same solution being able to link with the services of different corporate networks as if they were a remote access VPN extension and thus not require additional licenses."
"The next release should consider a strong threat detection mechanism that can categorize various levels of attacks for faster analysis."
"There was a learning curve for our general population of employees (the user)."
"Infinity Portal sometimes requires more performance."
"The time it takes to restore the application could be improved. It has a lot of dependencies. It's not like the Microsoft security that comes with the OS. Updating through the command prompt, most of the time, it takes some time to download some of these dependencies."
"Microsoft Defender for Endpoint can improve by making the reporting faster. It takes some time to reflect back to the administration portal of what has been updated. For example, out of 100 Computers, approximately 90 computers received updates, but when you check the administration portal over one or two days, you will only see 75, even though 90 were updated."
"One thing that was lacking in Defender was web filtering. Its web filtering wasn't as comprehensive. Sophos was a little bit better than Defender for blocking URLs or installing programs."
"I'm not too sure of its current capabilities, but I'm pretty sure they are doing a good job on Windows and Mac. However, I'm not sure whether they covered Linux. If I remember correctly, Microsoft Defender didn't have anything proper on Linux back then, but if they have improved it from that aspect, it would already be ticking all the boxes."
"I would like to see better integration with their other security products to give better visibility from a higher level."
"Some integration components for Mac should be added. We use both Windows 10 desktops and Mac desktops, but presently, the Mac component is still lagging a bit behind."
"Microsoft Defender for Endpoint's licensing is confusing. It has conflicting information on the website. We also faced integration issues with other systems. It makes laptops slower than traditional antivirus systems."
"It needs to improve the cybersecurity for lateral movements. For example, when a hacker tries to enter a machine, they try to get the password by doing a lateral movement."
More Microsoft Defender for Endpoint Pricing and Cost Advice →
Check Point Harmony Endpoint is ranked 8th in Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) with 103 reviews while Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is ranked 1st in Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) with 182 reviews. Check Point Harmony Endpoint is rated 8.8, while Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of Check Point Harmony Endpoint writes "Excellent anti-ransomware protection, zero-day phishing protection, and web browsing filtering". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint writes "Eliminates the need to look at multiple dashboards by automatically providing one XDR dashboard to show the security score of each subscription". Check Point Harmony Endpoint is most compared with CrowdStrike Falcon, Kaspersky Endpoint Security for Business, SentinelOne Singularity Complete and Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks, whereas Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is most compared with Symantec Endpoint Security, Intercept X Endpoint, SentinelOne Singularity Complete, CrowdStrike Falcon and Tanium. See our Check Point Harmony Endpoint vs. Microsoft Defender for Endpoint report.
See our list of best Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) vendors and best Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) vendors.
We monitor all Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.