We performed a comparison between Cisco Secure Firewall vs. pfSense based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: Cisco Secure Firewall and pfSense come out about equal in this comparison. Cisco ASA Firewall has a slight edge when it comes to service and support, but pfSense has an edge when it comes to pricing.
"The solution is very user-friendly."
"The solution has very good threat and content filtering switches."
"The performance is good."
"Their interface is very easy to use, it is without bugs."
"The most useful functionality of Fortinet FortiGate is the user interface, multiple engines, and their cloud with the latest integrations. Additionally, the Security Fabric tool is very good."
"The most valuable feature is the SSL VPN, as it allows us to connect and it separates this product from other firewalls."
"The web tutor and automatic rules by schedule are good features."
"It's very easy to configure."
"Cisco ASA provides us with very good application visibility and control."
"I would say the Firepower module is most valuable. I'm trying more to transition to this kind firewall. I had to study a little on Palo Alto Networks equipment. There is a lot I have to learn about the difference."
"The firepower sensors have been great; they do a good job of dropping unwanted traffic."
"When I was managing these firewalls, I found them easy to understand, easy to deploy, and easy to maintain as compared to some of the other firewalls I have been involved with earlier. The opinion of my coworkers is that it's easy and quick to establish new zones, expand, and maintain."
"I have not contacted technical support. There is a lot of information on the internet for troubleshooting. All you need to do is use a search engine and you will find the information you are looking for easily."
"I love the ASDM (Adaptive Security Device Manager) which is the management suite. It's a GUI and you're able to see everything at a glance without using the command line. There are those who love the CLI, but with ASDM it is easier to see where everything is going and where the problems are."
"The solution is excellent for enterprise-level networks."
"We have been using a 5520 for seven years in our datacenter and we are satisfied by this version."
"It is a good firewall with good performance."
"One of the advantages of pfSense is that it is very easy to work with. It is a very good open-source solution, and it works really well. pfSense provides a complete package. For some features, it could be the first solution in the world. It is a very good alternative in the market for a firewall solution. You don't need to go to Cisco or other brands with expensive firewalls. pfSense also allows us to offer some support services."
"Routing, load balancing, Traffic Limiter and queues. Since this company relies on an Internet connection, having these features is a must."
"We've found the stability to be very good overall."
"The product’s documentation is good."
"What I found most valuable is the cost of the platform, the flexibility of the platform, and the fact that the ongoing fees are not there as they are with the competitor. Some people may think you're taking a risk with using Opensource. I think it just provides the end user, specifically for us small, medium business providers of services, the flexibility we need at the right cost to provide them a higher end, almost enterprise type service."
"What I like about pfSense is that it works well and runs on an inexpensive appliance."
"Sophos Intercept X is scalable. Currently, we have almost 30 people using it in our company."
"The feature which gives us a lot of pain is ASIC architecture."
"My only complaint about FortiGate is a lack of QinQ VLAN tunneling. I haven't found this feature in any Fortinet product. You can do this on all Cisco routers, including the smaller models. However, QinQ isn't available on the biggest, most expensive Fortinet units. They still don't have that. I think now we're on software version 6.0, and they still haven't found a solution for QinQ. It isn't a dealbreaker, but that's my main complaint."
"The inability to scale the FortiAnalyzer to match our growth necessitates the purchase of new hardware."
"FortiGate should have a better way of detecting and managing the system memory because otherwise if the memory is too low, a system restart is required."
"There are some license issues. Not every feature must have a separate license. There must be some of kind synergy between the license so we don't have to pay for every individual license that we would like to have."
"Fortinet FortiGate could improve by having more storage in the hardware for log data."
"With the addition of some features, it is possible that FortiGate can be used in all verticals."
"The stability of Fortinet FortiGate could improve."
"Most of the features don't work well, and some features are missing as well."
"Its configuration through GUI as well as CLI can be improved and made easier."
"This is an older product and has reached end-of-life."
"Cisco ASA is not a next-generation firewall product."
"One feature lacking is superior anti-virus protection, which must be added."
"One feature I would like to see, that Firepower doesn't have, is email security. Perhaps in the future, Cisco will integrate Cisco Umbrella with Firepower. I don't see why we should have to pay for two separate products when both could be integrated in one box."
"The interface for monitoring could be improved to allow better views to make troubleshooting easier."
"Most of the time, when I try to run Java, it is not compatible with ASA's current operating systems."
"The solution could use better reporting. They need to offer more of it in general. Right now, the graphics aren't the best. If you need to provide a report to a manager, for example, it doesn't look great. They need to make it easier to understand and give users the ability to customize them."
"The stability could be improved."
"Web interface could be enhanced and more user friendly."
"We have not had any problems with it, and we also do not have a need for any new features. If anything, its reporting can be better. Sophos has better reporting than pfSense. Sophos has more detailed information. pfSense is not as detailed. It is summarized."
"A way to clean squid cache from the GUI."
"This solution is good for small businesses but it is not as stable as other competitors such as Fortinet."
"The security could be improved."
"My only observation is about the quality of the IPSec logs, which are difficult to interpret and are poor in filters."
Cisco Secure Firewall is ranked 4th in Firewalls with 404 reviews while Netgate pfSense is ranked 1st in Firewalls with 128 reviews. Cisco Secure Firewall is rated 8.2, while Netgate pfSense is rated 8.6. 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 Netgate pfSense writes "User-friendly, easy to manage the firewall, rule-wise and interface-wise". Cisco Secure Firewall is most compared with Palo Alto Networks WildFire, Meraki MX, Sophos XG, Juniper SRX Series Firewall and Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls, whereas Netgate pfSense is most compared with OPNsense, Sophos XG, Sophos UTM, KerioControl and Untangle NG Firewall. See our Cisco Secure Firewall vs. Netgate pfSense report.
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