We performed a comparison between Cisco Secure Firewall and Fortinet Fortigate based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: Based on the parameters we compared, Fortinet Fortigate comes out on top. Its ease of deployment combined with its solid set of features and excellent service and support ratings make it a more desirable solution than Cisco Secure Firewall.
"The feature my customers find the most valuable is the exportability."
"I think Cisco ASA Firewall is the most stable firewall solution."
"The ASDM (Adaptive Security Device Manager) which is the graphical user interface, works out, and Cisco keeps it current."
"The greatest benefit for the organization is the confidence that we are secured."
"Cisco ASA is very strong."
"The technical team is always available when we have problems."
"The main thing that I love the most is its policy and objects. Whenever I try to give access to a user, I can create an object via group creation in the object fields. This way, I am not able to enter a user in the policy repeatedly."
"Valuable features include DMZ segmentation, and IDS and IPS."
"Fortigate's most valuable feature is that it doesn't need a push policy when writing rules."
"Security, SD-WAN, and Streetscape are valuable features."
"The most valuable features are the possibility of having one fabric for switching on security."
"The FortiGate controls the user's activities and maximizes my bandwidth use overall."
"It is user friendly, and has all the features you need."
"The most valuable features are simplicity, management, and that it's constantly evolving."
"The security on offer is very good."
"Fortigate represents a really scalable way of delivering perimeter network security, some level of layer 7 security, WAF, and also a way to create a meshed ADVPN solution."
"We found it difficult to publish an antennae sidewalk with the ASDM. I think Cisco should improve this by creating a simpler interface for the firewall."
"I would like for the user interface to be easier for the admin and network admin. I would also like to be able to access everything from the GUI interface. The way it is now, it needs somebody experience in iOS to be able to operate it. I would like to have a GUI interface."
"The product's user interface is an area with certain shortcomings where improvements are required."
"The service could use a little more web filtering. If I compare it to Cyberoam, Cyberoam has more the web filtering, so if you want to block a website, it's easier in other solutions than in Cisco."
"It needs to provide the next-generation firewall features that other vendors provide, like data analytics, telemetry, and deep packet inspection."
"Most of the time, when I try to run Java, it is not compatible with ASA's current operating systems."
"Maybe the dashboard could be a bit better."
"In terms of what could be improved, I would say the UTM part should be more integrated for one price, because if you buy ASA from Cisco, you need to buy another contract service from Cisco as a filter for the dictionary of attacks. In Fortinet, you buy a firewall and you have it all."
"FortiOS is not simple."
"Its customer service could be better."
"The renewal price and the availability could be improved."
"Lacks sufficient security options."
"They should offer special pricing to premium partners and customers."
"I would like Fortinet to add more automation to FortiGate."
"The solution can have more features in a single box that can be multi-applied to integrate everything."
"In the future, I would like to see improvements made to cloud-based management."
Cisco Secure Firewall is ranked 4th in Firewalls with 404 reviews while Fortinet FortiGate is ranked 2nd in Firewalls with 306 reviews. Cisco Secure Firewall is rated 8.2, while Fortinet FortiGate is rated 8.4. The top reviewer of Cisco Secure Firewall writes "Highlights and helps us catch Zero-day vulnerabilities traveling across our network". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Fortinet FortiGate writes "It's a reliable solution that's easy to install and cheaper than competitors ". Cisco Secure Firewall is most compared with Palo Alto Networks WildFire, Netgate pfSense, Meraki MX, Sophos XG and Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls, whereas Fortinet FortiGate is most compared with Sophos XG, Netgate pfSense, Meraki MX, Check Point NGFW and WatchGuard Firebox. See our Cisco Secure Firewall vs. Fortinet FortiGate report.
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