We performed a comparison between Netgate pfSense and Palo Alto Networks WildFire based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out what your peers are saying about Netgate, Fortinet, OPNsense and others in Firewalls."Whenever I need something, Fortinet improves and updates the software for me."
"It's very fast and easy to configure."
"The solution can scale well."
"You can create multiple Virtual Domains (VDOMs), which are treated as separate firewall instances."
"We can use our devices to check all of the perimeters. It secures email websites."
"The most valuable features are simplicity, management, and that it's constantly evolving."
"The feature I like most is the SD-WAN. It allows you to manage more than one ISP at the same time. And there is a high-availability mode, so if one of your ISPs is down, you still have a backup."
"The user interface is relatively easy. The devices are easy to deploy and figure out when you have experience with other security appliances."
"It is easy to use and has integrity with other systems, such as proxies and quality of service."
"The most valuable features of pfSense are security, user-friendliness, and helpful online management."
"Stability has been excellent. We have experienced no issues; it never fails."
"The redundancy and scalability ARE very nice."
"The features I have found best are ease of use, GUI, and performance."
"The solution is very easy to use and has a very nice GUI."
"A very stable product that lasts over time, easy to understand, and administer."
"The tools' most valuable feature is load balancing."
"The most effective feature of WildFire for threat analysis is its collaboration with other security profiles on our Palo Alto firewall."
"My primary use case for this solution is for a secure gateway."
"The most valuable feature of Palo Alto Networks WildFire is its ability to adapt to environments and its robustness."
"I like the analysis they apply to the unknown files, and I think they have good technology to use as a sandboxing tool. I didn't find something similar to WildFire in the marketplace."
"They have many different options with Palo Alto WildFire and the set-up is quick. If you have all the details in hand, it does not take more than 15 minutes to deploy a firewall."
"For example, if a security Intel threat talks about an IOC. We can then go to our MSP and say, "Is there a signature for this particular type of malware that just came out?" And if they'll say yes, then we'll say, "Okay. Does it apply to these firewalls? And have we seen any hits on it?" There's absolutely value in it."
"We get support in the free version."
"Their technical support is outstanding and top-notch."
"The support we receive when we need to upgrade is not satisfactory and has room for improvement."
"The Wi-Fi controller needs a lot of improvement."
"The integration with third-party tools may be something that they should work on."
"The UI could be improved."
"It is very expensive, and their support is not very good. I hope that their technical support will be better in the future."
"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."
"The setup is pretty complex and not easy to implement."
"The stability of Fortinet FortiGate could improve."
"The Netgate forums and community don’t provide extensive discussions and topics related to every pfSense service."
"The security could be improved."
"There are several levels of firewall configuration such as beginner, advanced, and expert configurations. At each level, it becomes more complex and more tricky to set up the firewall. For example, if you want to install the firewall on your computer system, it would be a lot easier if it just tells you that this is the internet NIC and this is the Wi-Fi NIC."
"The GUI. There are TONS of plugins for pfSense, as such, if a user wants to add quite a bit of functionality, the GUI will feel a little congested."
"Also, the GUI is helpful, but it's not user-friendly. It's complicated. It should be more intuitive for the average user and have an excellent graphical view. Of course, the user will typically know about network administration, but it still should be easy to understand."
"We would like to see ready-made profiles to cover most users' needs."
"For the third-party packages, I'd rather have it built-in, like a core feature of pfSense, part of the core model."
"The solution requires a lot of administration."
"There are more specialized solutions that compete with Wildfire. Therefore, they need to work on their machine learning and AI to be more competitive."
"In the future, Palo Alto could reduce the time it takes to process the file."
"The cost of this solution could still be improved, in particular, giving product discounts for charitable causes."
"The price of WildFire should be reduced in order to make it more affordable for our customers."
"The GUI is better in 8.0, but I still feel it lacks the fast response most of us desire. Logs are much quicker."
"The support is good but they could be faster."
"I think it would be nice for Palo Alto to work without the connection to the cloud. It is 100% powerful when connected to the cloud. But, if you disconnect from the cloud, you only get 40-50% power."
"As a firewall and 360 degrees of security, there needs to be more maturity."
Netgate pfSense is ranked 1st in Firewalls with 128 reviews while Palo Alto Networks WildFire is ranked 3rd in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) with 58 reviews. Netgate pfSense is rated 8.6, while Palo Alto Networks WildFire is rated 8.4. 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 Palo Alto Networks WildFire writes "Good technical support and provides automatic analysis that saves us time in filtering email". Netgate pfSense is most compared with OPNsense, Sophos XG, Sophos UTM, KerioControl and Cisco Secure Firewall, whereas Palo Alto Networks WildFire is most compared with Cisco Secure Firewall, Proofpoint Email Protection, Juniper SRX Series Firewall, Fortinet FortiSandbox and Microsoft Defender for Office 365.
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