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."The threat prevention is the solution's most valuable aspect."
"The features that I have found most valuable are the SD-WAN and their IP4 policy."
"Fortinet FortiGate is easy to use."
"The most valuable features are SD-WAN, application control, IPS control, and FortiSandbox."
"The integration with Active Directory is one of the good features. Most of the customers are now looking for the Single Sign-on feature. So, being able to integrate Active Directory with the firewall is useful. It is also easy."
"FortiGate SD-WAN facilitated a smooth transition for our customers between their two internet service providers, ensuring uninterrupted connectivity without any downtime."
"Initial setup is straightforward. There weren't too many issues with setting it up. It takes one hour or so."
"The multi-tenancy feature is most valuable. It integrates very well with FortiManager and FortiAnalyzer."
"Centralized administration with multiple services, which allows for execution in several important functionalities of information security."
"The ability to create a VPN allows me to monitor branch offices from a central location."
"Sophos Intercept X is scalable. Currently, we have almost 30 people using it in our company."
"It is easy to use and has integrity with other systems, such as proxies and quality of service."
"Easy to deploy and easy to use."
"It is a very good solution for enterprises that need a VPN for their employees. It is the best way to provide a remote work facility to employees at a very low cost. Other solutions that I have had in the past were very expensive. Enterprises don't always have that kind of money to invest."
"The initial setup is easy."
"The solution has good customization abilities and plenty of features."
"It configures in all-in-one place."
"After installing the product, we achieved awareness of our data protection needs and email misuse."
"I like the hostwatch because I can see what traffic uses the most bandwidth and I can block that site."
"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."
"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."
"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."
"It is stable and does not require you to reboot all the time."
"They have a reporting system which can store data over a very long period of time. Not many other firewall vendors provide a reporting system, but if they do, like Fortinet does, then you've got buy that as an additional product and that can be more than twice as expensive as the initial investment in the firewall. And without reporting over a long-term period, you're just about wasting your time."
"Fortigate's hardware capacities could be improved."
"The initial setup is complex."
"Vulnerability scanning could be improved."
"The captive portal could be improved."
"There is one big configuration file with no separations for the unique VDOMs. Maybe they could separate individual VDOM configuration files with the root VDOM configuration file referencing the individual VDOM config files."
"It is quite new for us, and we need to go more in-depth into the monitoring tools. It provides different features that we need to do what we want. So far, it is okay for us. In terms of improvement, in the future, they can provide a faster implementation of features. Some of the features are first available in other solutions. Fortinet sometimes takes a little bit longer than other solutions, such as Check Point, to implement new features."
"The solution could be more evenly structured."
"Sometimes you do need to know some CLI commands, so it's a bit harder for technicians or new people that don't know it."
"The user interface can be improved to make it easier to add more features. And pfSense could be better integrated with other solutions, like antivirus."
"ClamAV AntiVirus can cause some crashes. That service should be improved."
"Network monitoring and device inventory could use some improvements. I'm using SpiceWorks for this because it never really worked in pfSense."
"The product could offer more integrated plugins."
"Reporting and real-time monitoring, since I'm used to Watchguard's reporting features, it would be nice to have an embedded solution for reporting."
"The technical support needs to be improved."
"Ultimately, we'd like something stronger, and something that can handle threats better in real-time."
"My only observation is about the quality of the IPSec logs, which are difficult to interpret and are poor in filters."
"I would like them to improve the product's overall protections. This would be good for all product users."
"Sometimes we have had issues with stability of the product."
"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 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."
"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."
"The VPN errors are not helpful when troubleshooting."
Earn 20 points
Netgate pfSense is ranked 1st in Firewalls with 128 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 "User-friendly, easy to manage the firewall, rule-wise and interface-wise". On the other hand, the top reviewer of WatchGuard XTM [EOL] writes "The multi-layer security of the products are the primary reason we use these appliances, however, the gateway wireless functionality for managing access points leaves much to be desired". Netgate pfSense is most compared with OPNsense, Sophos XG, Sophos UTM, KerioControl and Cisco Secure Firewall, whereas WatchGuard XTM [EOL] is most compared with .
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