We performed a comparison between Netgate pfSense and Sophos XGS based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out in this report how the two Firewalls solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI."It has very easy management and an amazing ETM configuration."
"The most important feature, normally for small business customers, is link load balancing."
"The features that prevent internet connections, the filtering are the most valuable because we did not have any internet protection before."
"The flexibility and ease of configuration are the most valuable features."
"We have found it to be very reliable and that's why our teams and various users in our company use it as our main firewall every day."
"Web filtering and two-factor authentication are great features."
"I really like the captive portal feature for our guest network. It has nice VLAN features in terms of separating our network. The anti-virus is also good."
"Its administrative panel is very intuitive and simple. It is simpler than the other solutions that we had. As an administrator, we are always looking for the easiest solution to manage network policies. We are able to filter everything on our network and also use the VPN feature, which is important these days when people are working remotely during COVID."
"Content protection, content inspection, and the application level firewall."
"I like pfSense's reports and how I can control access to the policies on the firewall."
"An incomparable stability is achieved with other firewall systems."
"Is good at blocking IP addresses."
"A very stable product that lasts over time, easy to understand, and administer."
"The initial setup was simple and fast."
"The scalability is very good, where you can do an HA configuration and then bring in another box, if necessary."
"I have found the firewall portion for the blocking most valuable."
"It is a scalable solution."
"Sophos XGS's best features are its VPN and ATPR1 cert protection."
"Sophos XGS' most valuable features are protection and intrusion prevention detection."
"The most valuable feature of Sophos XGS is the application control."
"The solution is stable and reliable."
"Spam filtering is what I love most about XGS."
"We are happy and satisfied with all the features."
"The feature that I find most valuable is the synchronized security option where the endpoint talks to the firewall."
"The captive portal could be improved."
"Its customer service could be better."
"The way everything is set up could be easier. Currently, people need a lot of experience and knowledge to administer it and to link it to devices."
"They should offer special pricing to premium partners and customers."
"Fortinet FortiGate could improve by having more capabilities for troubleshooting VPN connections. For example, I do get some feedback about the current status, but I could use some history and logging of important events. The information is logged in our Syslog server, but I could use that information from the device. If they could provide a GUI to have some more insight on what's going with my VPN would be useful."
"Quality control on their firmware versions needs improvement. When they introduce new firmware, there tend to be bugs."
"It needs to improve its ISP load balancing."
"Fortinet could improve the windows opener or the virtual IP solutions for opening windows. The virtual IP settings need improvement as firewalls are trending in new development directions."
"One concern I have with Netgate pfSense is related to packet filtering. Specifically, issues can arise with certain functionalities like GP, and, at times, there may be bugs."
"The security could be improved."
"The solution could always work at being more secure. It's a good idea to continue to work on security features and capabilities in order to ensure they can keep clients safe."
"I would like to see multiple DNS servers running on individual interfaces."
"pfSense could improve by having a sandboxing feature that I have seen in SonicWall. However, maybe it is available I am not aware of it."
"We are at the moment looking to use it as a proxy service so that we can limit what websites people go and view and that sort of thing. That's an area I've struggled with a little bit at the moment and it could be a bit easier to set up."
"Also, simplifying the rules for the GeoIP. Making it simpler to understand would be an improvement."
"I would like to see different graphs available in the reporting."
"In future releases, this solution could have more graphical elements on the dashboard to make it easier to understand."
"I would like to see them in third-party evaluation reports like Gartner, Magic Quadrant, or Forrester to make it easier for us to show our customers that Sophos is a leader in the market."
"I would like to see a history of the monthly bandwidth utilization, the bandwidth consumption for a period of time."
"They need intelligent reporting, not just your simple, standard reports."
"Compared to Fortinet, the cost is high."
"The VPN capability needs some improvement in Sophos XGS."
"I rate Sophos' support five out of 10. It's sometimes difficult to contact them, and finding a solution is not easy."
"What could be improved in Sophos XGS is its connectivity with Azure AD. It's best if it could work directly without using any servers locally, or in the data center, and this functionality should be made available in this product."
Netgate pfSense is ranked 1st in Firewalls with 128 reviews while Sophos XGS is ranked 17th in Firewalls with 60 reviews. Netgate pfSense is rated 8.6, while Sophos XGS is rated 7.8. The top reviewer of Netgate pfSense writes "User-friendly, easy to manage the firewall, rule-wise and interface-wise". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Sophos XGS writes "Easy to use, simple to learn, and offers great reporting". Netgate pfSense is most compared with OPNsense, Sophos XG, KerioControl, Sophos UTM and Cisco Secure Firewall, whereas Sophos XGS is most compared with Sophos XG, OPNsense, WatchGuard Firebox, Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls and Meraki MX. See our Netgate pfSense vs. Sophos XGS report.
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