We performed a comparison between Netgate pfSense and WatchGuard XTM [EOL] based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out what your peers are saying about Netgate, Fortinet, OPNsense and others in Firewalls."Fortinet FortiGate's most valuable features are ease of use, flexibility, and most of the configuration we can be done using the GUI. When we compare Fortinet FortiGate with other solutions the firewall policy are very easy to understand."
"The simplicity of the product is great. It's very easy to use, which is a compliment we get all the time in terms of feedback."
"The scalability of Fortinet FortiGate is good."
"The features that prevent internet connections, the filtering are the most valuable because we did not have any internet protection before."
"The inspection and web security features are most valuable."
"Valuable features include the Web Application Firewall, and it even has DLP (data leak prevention)."
"The SD-WAN function is very developed. It has SD-WAN functionality with security features in one device. We can manage from one single console SD-WAN and the security policy."
"Fortinet FortiGate is easy to use."
"The initial setup is easy."
"Improved service performance and availability through redundancy."
"This solution has increased the level of security, given us more control, provided a deep insight into network traffic, and is a great VPN solution."
"Its scalability is a strong point."
"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."
"The main features of this solution are customization and ease to use."
"Easy to deploy and easy to use."
"pfSense allows us to spread the hours of connection and do the filtering on the pfSense site."
"Application Control is fantastic with over 2,500 applications and the granularity that we can either allow people to view but not be able to log on to Facebook; or view it and log onto it if they're in the marketing department, but not play Facebook games. There are all sorts of different options like that. So it's highly granular."
"After installing the product, we achieved awareness of our data protection needs and email misuse."
"Reputation Enabled Defense indicates that some websites are so infested that it's not even worth visiting them, and therefore saving the bandwidth of going through the detection process."
"I like the hostwatch because I can see what traffic uses the most bandwidth and I can block that site."
"It is stable and does not require you to reboot all the time."
"SNMP status monitoring and the Central Management Software."
"We have used technical support for WatchGuard many times and overall, we are satisfied with it. They are always listening and there is a good reaction time to our findings. When there are issues, they really try to resolve them."
"It configures in all-in-one place."
"The platform's interface could improve."
"There aren't really any negative aspects to discuss."
"The solution is very expensive."
"There can be more security in hybrid implementations. When a customer has a hybrid environment where some parts are in the cloud, we need a consistent security solution for such scenarios."
"Fortinet Fortigate could benefit by simplifying some of their processes."
"In terms of what could be improved, the SD-WAN is quite difficult, because if you install the new box, 15 is okay, but if you change from an old configuration, if there is already configuration and a policy when you change to SD-WAN, you must change the whole policy that you see in the interface."
"It should have a better pricing plan. It is too expensive. It should also have a more granular view of the attack. I don't have FortiAnalyzer, and it is difficult for me to have a complete view when there is an attack on my server."
"We would like to have the ability to disable some of the security functionalities."
"I tried pfSense, and it has a big issue with file system consistency, and this is what drove me to OPNsense. The file system stability is quite a big issue for us. We have a lot of outages related to power issues, and OPNsense is much more stable on this side."
"Layer 7 advanced firewall features are not included in the solution."
"pfSense has some limitations in detecting site sessions. We want to control internet usage based on sites and their content, and pfSense doesn't perform this function."
"The security could be improved."
"Perhaps the documentation is not clear and because it is supported in the community there is no basic documentation."
"Needs services on additional features, such as managing inventory and generating reports."
"The integration could be improved."
"ClamAV AntiVirus can cause some crashes. That service should be improved."
"Sometimes we have had issues with stability of the product."
"I would like them to improve the product's overall protections. This would be good for all product users."
"The initial setup is neither simple nor complex. If you know the base in networking and how the firewall works, you will be able to figure it out."
"One huge issue with WatchGuard XTM is that I'm not getting reports in a readable format. Readable means, I don't want Excel online. We repeat auditing when we trigger the report or setup calendar. That functionality is what we are looking for from WatchGuard XTM here."
"Syslog (Dimension) is focused on presentation, but needs more focus on utility like SonicWall syslog (GMS/Analyzer)."
"The VPN errors are not helpful when troubleshooting."
"The setting policies need improvement. It needs an easier way to do static NAT and check on what policy is being used for that specific traffic."
"WatchGuard doesn't have a product that allows them to get into the data center. And that's just because there is no hardware to do the job. The software could do it, but there's no hardware that allows that to happen at the moment. So it doesn't scale as well as some other products, that's for sure."
Earn 20 points
Netgate pfSense is ranked 1st in Firewalls with 15 reviews while WatchGuard XTM [EOL] doesn't meet the minimum requirements to be ranked in Firewalls. Netgate pfSense is rated 8.6, while WatchGuard XTM [EOL] is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of Netgate pfSense writes "Feature-rich, well documented, and there is good support available online". On the other hand, Netgate pfSense is most compared with OPNsense, Sophos XG, Sophos UTM, Cisco Secure Firewall and KerioControl, whereas WatchGuard XTM [EOL] is most compared with .
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