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 most valuable features are the flexibility and level of security that this solution provides."
"Being able to use it as a policy-based VPN is valuable. It's very easy to understand. It's very easy to troubleshoot."
"For us, the most valuable features are the IPX and the Sourcefire Defense Center module. That gives us visibility into the traffic coming in and going out, and gives us the heads-up if there is a potential outbreak or potential malicious user who is trying to access the site. It also helps us see traffic generated by an end device trying to reach out to the world."
"This solution helped us to identify the key areas where we need to focus to block traffic that is malicious to our organization."
"A stable, reliable solution used to protect the network's perimeter."
"Its in-depth monitoring and analysis help us to make better decisions and policies."
"This solution is easy to use if you know how to set it up."
"With Cisco, there are a lot of features such as the network map. Cisco builds the whole network map of the machines you have behind your firewall and gives you insight into the vulnerabilities and attributes that the host has. Checkpoint and Fortinet don't have that functionality directly on the firewall."
"The scalability of Fortinet FortiGate is good."
"The pricing is excellent. It's much less expensive than Cisco."
"The IPsec tunnels are very easily created, and quite interoperable with devices from other vendors."
"What I like the most is the configuration and that it's simple, and straightforward to maintain."
"Customers are more inclined towards FortiGate because of application control, web filtering, and anti-spam features. The support from the FortiGate team is good, and price-wise, it is affordable."
"Some of the key features of the solution is that it has good reporting, you can receive many details from the connection, for example, clients and website information."
"Centralized monitoring, policy management, and virtualized appliances allow us to take control over our public and private infrastructure."
"Fortigate's most valuable feature is that it doesn't need a push policy when writing rules."
"The graphical interface could be improved. From what I have seen, Fortinet, for example, has a nicer GUI."
"We would really like to see dual dual power supplies for some Cisco Firewall products."
"This product is managed using the Firepower Management Center (FMC), but it would be better if it also supported the command-line interface (CLI)."
"It integrates with other security products from Cisco, but sometimes, there can be glitches or errors."
"We were also not too thrilled when Cisco announced that in the upcoming new-gen ASA, iOS was not going to be supported, or if you install them, they will not be able to be managed through the Sourcefire. However, it seems like Cisco is moving away from the ASA iOS to the Sourcefire FireSIGHT firmware for the ASA. We haven't had a chance to test it out."
"It should have packets, deep level inspections and controls, like the features which other IPS solutions used to have."
"The only improvement that we could make is maybe [regarding] the roadmap, to have better visibility as to what we are targeting ahead in the next few quarters."
"Deploying configurations takes longer than it should."
"The stability could be a bit better."
"Fortinet FortiGate is not very easy to use. The navigation could be improved to make it easier to use."
"The monitor and the visibility, in this proxy, is very weak."
"The platform's interface could improve."
"Technical support could be better. You don't always get the level of help you need right away."
"Application management can be improved."
"Fortinet FortiGate should improve the VPN tokens."
"It should provide better visibility over the network and more information in the form of reports for the end users. Its installation should also be easier."
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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