We performed a comparison between Check Point NGFW and Cisco Secure Firewall 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 users are happier with its VPN and with its pricing. However, Cisco Secure users are happier with its service and support.
"The most valuable feature is the web filter."
"Our security improved from being able to put in rules and close off unwanted traffic."
"Whenever I need something, Fortinet improves and updates the software for me."
"FortiGate improved our security. It's one of the best hardware firewalls."
"The FortiGate controls the user's activities and maximizes my bandwidth use overall."
"Security, SD-WAN, and Streetscape are valuable features."
"The customization potential is quite impressive."
"Our project needs to link two sides through the internet. One of these was in Cairo and the other in another city. We used FortiGate as the integrating solution between the two locations, i.e. the Fortinet 30E & 100E."
"By deploying Check Point, it has made it easier to manage everything from a single interface. The management dashboard and policies are on its single pane of glass."
"The most valuable features for us are identity awareness, IDS and IPS, and application control."
"The packet inspection capabilities are great."
"Being able to access almost everything in one location manage all your gateways and get all your logs is great."
"The management in Check Point is exceptional."
"Making configuring numerous layers of security policies easy to use was always one of the things I liked most about their firewall solution."
"The initial setup is easy."
"It secures my organization. With the application blade, I can make security as application based and the custom application is also very useful. With identity awareness blades we get insights on our local users who are accessing/passing through the respective rule as users. We also use the DLP, IPS, and VPN features."
"The Firepower+ISE+AMP for endpoint integration is something that really stands it out with other vendor solutions. They have something called pxGrid and i think it is already endorsed by IETF. This allows all devices on the network to communicate."
"The most important point is the detection engine which is now part of the next-generation firewalls and which is supported by Cisco Talos."
"VPN load balancing has been particularly essential for my connections to integrate via multiple time zones."
"I'm a big fan of SecureX, Cisco's platform for tying together all the different security tools. It has a lot of flexibility and even a lot of third-party or non-Cisco integration. I feel like that's a really valuable tool."
"The feature that I found most valuable is the overall stability of the product."
"I have found the most valuable feature to be the access control and IPsec VPN."
"Sourcefire has been a great addition. The visibility and control have been nice."
"I like the firewall features, Snort, and the Intrusion Prevention System (IPS)."
"The user interface could be improved."
"Fortinet currently has many products bundled with FortiGate including the basic firewall and load balancer, and I think that that they need to have separate product portfolios for each of these specialized services."
"The integration with third-party tools may be something that they should work on."
"The license renewal process, annual renewal price, and the web application firewall features should be improved."
"The setup is pretty complex and not easy to implement."
"Fortinet FortiGate could improve by adding FortiAnalyzer to its solution, we should not have to use another solution. FortiAnalyzer can provide more detailed information."
"There are SD-WAN network monitoring, SD-WAN features, Industrial Databases, Internet of Things, Detection, etc., however, we do have not licenses for those features. We thought that if you bought a product, you should have all of the features it offers. Why should you need to make so many extra purchases to enable features? They should have one price for the entire offering."
"I would prefer to have more detailed logs within the FortiGate products themselves rather than relying on a separate tool."
"Until you have some experience, the installation and configuration are difficult."
"It is a bit expensive according to the required blades but it is a platform that is worth having as security in a corporate."
"There is room for improvement in application-based filtering, as with other firewalls available in the market today."
"The interface could be better."
"In terms of new features, maybe it would help if we could start to manage all the stuff in the cloud and not in the on-prem servers. The management side could also be faster when you install policies. But other than that, I'm satisfied."
"If you have the standard support level, sometimes they take a long time to understand or even give you a solution or good workaround to a problematic situation."
"It would be best if the security management server console access is simpler for ease of management."
"I would like the user interface to be more user-friendly. I want the UI to be easier to use than Check Point's competitors."
"The intelligence has room for improvement. There are some hackers that we haven't seen before and its ability to detect those types of attacks needs to be improved."
"It can be improved when it comes to monitoring. Today, the logs from the firewalls could be improved a bit more without integrating with other devices."
"Maybe the dashboard could be a bit better."
"In Firepower, there is an ability to search and dig into a search, which is nice. However, I'm not a super fan of the way it scrolls. If you want to look at something live, it's a lot different. You're almost waiting. With the ASDM, where it just flows, you can really see it. The second someone clicks something or does something, you'll see it. The refresh rate on the events in Firepower is not as smooth."
"The pricing is a bit high."
"While this applies to all vendors, pricing can be always lower. In my opinion, Cisco is the most expensive. The pricing can be reduced."
"They really need support for deployment."
"Its user interface is good, but it could be better. Currently, you have to know what to do before you can manage a device. If you don't know what to do, you can mess things up. There are some devices that are easier, such as FortiGate. The user interface of FortiGate is more intuitive. It is very easy to log in and configure things."
Check Point NGFW is ranked 5th in Firewalls with 277 reviews while Cisco Secure Firewall is ranked 4th in Firewalls with 404 reviews. Check Point NGFW is rated 8.8, while Cisco Secure Firewall is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Check Point NGFW writes "Good antivirus protection and URL filtering with very good user identification capabilities". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Cisco Secure Firewall writes "Highlights and helps us catch Zero-day vulnerabilities traveling across our network". Check Point NGFW is most compared with Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls, Sophos XG, Netgate pfSense, Azure Firewall and OPNsense, whereas Cisco Secure Firewall is most compared with Palo Alto Networks WildFire, Netgate pfSense, Meraki MX, Sophos XG and OPNsense. See our Check Point NGFW vs. Cisco Secure Firewall report.
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