We performed a comparison between Netgate pfSense and Sophos UTM 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."One of the valuable features is a standardized OS."
"The pricing is excellent. It's much less expensive than Cisco."
"The most valuable feature is the ease of configuration."
"The initial setup is straightforward."
"The pipe filter application is an outstanding feature."
"User-friendly and affordable security solution that's recommended for SMB customers. This solution has good technical support."
"The most valuable feature is the SSL VPN, as it allows us to connect and it separates this product from other firewalls."
"One of the nice things about FortiGate is that it can be deployed on the cloud or on-premises. You can actually do both. That's the biggest reason why I stick with this solution as opposed to something like Cisco Meraki. Another nice thing is that I can log directly into a FortiGate or get to it through their FortiCloud access products. They're pretty reliable and consistent. One of the reasons why I started using the product was their single pane of management. I can deploy their line of firewalls in conjunction with their switching and access points, and I can manage the entire network from one interface. I don't have to log into one interface for the firewall, another one for the access points, and another one for the switches. These firewalls have access point controller functionality built right into the system, so I don't even have to purchase additional devices to manage them."
"The features I have found best are ease of use, GUI, and performance."
"I have found the most valuable features to be antivirus and malware protection."
"The intrusion detection feature is the most valuable. It is an open-source firewall, so there is a lot of material on it. I also find the open VPN capability very nice. It is pretty customizable. The clustering and the high availability are the two biggest things to be able to get out of a firewall."
"The solution is fairly scalable when it comes to integrating with other applications and data sets."
"I like pfSense's security features."
"The product’s documentation is good."
"The solution is very easy to use and has a very nice GUI."
"It is a better firewall than others and it has better features."
"Sophos has a single pane of glass which allows me to manage all my VPCs from a single instance, managing all my firewall from one place."
"Sophos UTM provides security for our network here and access through a VPN connection for our remote users. It also offers the flexibility to create different tools for accessibility."
"What I like about the solution is the ease of use."
"With Sophos, we have not had any incidents this year. The security provided has been good. It has proven to be okay for our needs."
"The initial setup is pretty straightforward."
"Configuration could not be made any easier."
"It does not take much effort or thinking to understand how it works."
"So far, the solution has been problem-free."
"I have to say that the initial setup was complex. The deployment took a few days to get set up. Initially, we were using an IPVanish. We switched to this tool since we thought it would be easier. But it turns out it wasn't easier to set up and run."
"I would like to see more advanced developments of a wireless controller 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."
"Its filtering is sometimes too precise or strict. We sometimes have to bypass and authorize some of the sites, but they get blocked. We know that they are trusted sites, but they are blocked, and we don't know why."
"Fortinet FortiGate needs to improve the logging and reporting. Additionally, the next-generation application's policies should be improved. When they were released they had bugs."
"We'd like more management across other integrations."
"Difficult to add or define, and not that easy to configure and manage."
"The search tool needs improvement. It's very difficult to search for policies right now."
"Layer 7 advanced firewall features are not included in the solution."
"I would like to see different graphs available in the reporting."
"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 believe improving integration with various antivirus vendors could be beneficial."
"This product needs improvements with respect to reporting and auditing."
"Web interface could be enhanced and more user friendly."
"The main problem with pfSense is that we have to use proxy solutions."
"I expect a better interface with more log analysis because I create my own interface."
"The management suite is easy and the agent is easy to develop."
"I would like to see Sophos UTM add support for all the new threat-detection technologies and the ability to respond to novel security threats that come along every day."
"The five-factor authentication needs improvement."
"I would like some features that are available in other brands. For example, I sometimes a person is using too much bandwidth, and it isn't easy to find this information in Sophos. Also, we have to switch connections manually when we are using a VPN and lose the MPLS connection. It isn't automatic."
"The scalability of the product is an area with certain shortcomings where improvements are required."
"Sophos UTM could improve if there was no limitation on users."
"Reporting: We have had to work manually in many of our reports."
"It would be nice if it had basic features, such as DLP (Data Loss Prevention)."
Netgate pfSense is ranked 1st in Firewalls with 128 reviews while Sophos UTM is ranked 1st in Unified Threat Management (UTM) with 110 reviews. Netgate pfSense is rated 8.6, while Sophos UTM 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 Sophos UTM writes "It's a highly stable platform with very few hardware issues". Netgate pfSense is most compared with OPNsense, Sophos XG, KerioControl, Cisco Secure Firewall and WatchGuard Firebox, whereas Sophos UTM is most compared with Sophos XG, OPNsense, Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls, Cisco Secure Firewall and Untangle NG Firewall. See our Netgate pfSense vs. Sophos UTM report.
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pfSense is opensource and has been the last 10 years in the top 10 best
firewall solutions in the world, it is free, stable, scalable, and easy to
administer ... and above all very safe, since it is one of the few systems
that could have been violated. It's free.
In fact, Karl, the 50-IP free version is for home use only, and not even then if it also protects business assets. You did a great job of explaining the difference, so I won't comment further.
To the original poster, it's cheaper to hire a Sophos consultant to create your original configuration. It costs twice as much to get a configuration "repaired" that wasn't correctly designed. A Sophos Solution Partner that has a Sophos Certified Architect with plenty of experience and good referrals is probably your best bet.
With Sophos is easy to configure and you have the support from the frabicant, with pfSense you have to learn from the community and learning curve is a little hard, last occasion with pfSense it don't have support for vpn dynamic, with Sophos they have RED equipment that is an extension from the core, only you need the serial number from the remote equipment and you have the vpn , both are great equipment and software, depend of the budget, pfSense is free and they have support if you pay the license very cheap
pfSense is just a basic firewall with VPN and Captive Portal functionality but does its job great. Only needs minimum resources to function. Price is right (FREE)
Sophos UTM is much more, hence the UTM. It does firewall, advance threat protection, VPN, Secure web gateway, email protection (AV, Spam, Encryption, and DLP), endpoint protection, Mobile Device control, Web Application Firewall, User Portal, built in reporting, and central management. It does require more resources but you get a lot more out of it. Two options depending on the size of your office, commercial version or the Free version that you can build on your own hardware. The free version is restricted to 50 IP addresses. (www.sophos.com)
I have used both and both have their place but using Sophos in my environment just because it offers a lot more functionality, nice dashboard, reports, and easy to use through the GUI.
One other big difference is that pfSense is FreeBSD based while Sophos UTM is linux based. It is also worth having a lool on cacheguard which is a proxy oriented product and also Linux based.
I´m afraid I am not able to help in this matter. We´ve decided to for FortiGate as services, based on our relationship with our IT security provider and the FortiGate reviews available on the net.
We used to use pfSence for one particular open network but let the full control on de FortiGate. During the investigation and analysis period we thought of Sophos but felt more comfortable going for FortiGate pretty much based on price and our relationship with our IT security provider. Hence my experience wouldn´t help in this case.
My best advice would is to refer to the article available on:
www.itcentralstation.com