We performed a comparison between Check Point CloudGuard Network Security and WatchGuard Firebox 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."The initial installation is very straightforward."
"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 simplicity of the configuration and the stability of the product are most valuable. The VPN concentrator is very useful."
"We are very happy with the general bandwidth agility we have seen from one website to another website."
"User-friendly and affordable security solution that's recommended for SMB customers. This solution has good technical support."
"Their proxy-based inspection is responsive and secure."
"From the firewall perspective, the rules and policies are very sufficient and easy to use."
"Fortinet FortiGate is easy to use. Anyone can easily maintain it."
"The most valuable feature for us is the ability to run the gateways as virtual machines in our virtual data center. The tool protects the virtual data centers."
"The scalability is very good; again, very user-friendly. I wouldn't even say "user-friendly" because, as long as you deploy it properly, you can kill an EC2 and it will spin up another one right away, within about a minute and a half. And it will be ready for production right away."
"A unique architecture makes this product stand out from other solutions."
"Customers appreciate the CME plugin for automatically understanding assets within the cloud. This information appears in the manager, allowing users to tag the assets and adjust policies and rules accordingly."
"The most valuable feature is the centralized dashboard, which is used for managing all of the Check Point Security Gateways."
"The most valuable feature I have found in CloudGuard Network Security is the flexibility to rebuild the firewall as needed."
"We have unified management. It is one of the advantages of this product."
"The solution could improve to have a DLP feature."
"WatchGuard Firebox is easy to configure and has a nice user interface."
"Their support is excellent, and the stability is very good."
"Regarding the reporting, I was in the Dimension server earlier today. It's very powerful. I like it. And the management features are easy to use. I like the fact that I can open up the System Manager client or I can just do it through the web if I'm making a quick change."
"It's pretty simple to use. It's pretty simple to understand, and there's plenty of documentation. It does a pretty good job of what it is meant to do."
"It provides us with Layer 2 and Layer 3 security."
"The solution has increased productivity with our outside salespeople being able to connect into their computers and use those remotely."
"The most valuable feature is the GUI, especially the real-time bandwidth usage report. Also, its integration with WiFi access points is nice."
"The main features of the solution are the control of the site-to-site network access and the overall features."
"There aren't really any negative aspects to discuss."
"I would like to see improvements in the support from Fortinet. Here in the Philippines, whenever we have problems with a Fortinet product, we mostly ask for support from distributors and resellers and not directly from Fortinet."
"This product needs to have an analysis feature, rather than having the analysis done through the integration of a different product."
"There are problems with the custom reporting of the unique traffic. The data is there, but it is too difficult for us to extract."
"The search tool needs improvement. It's very difficult to search for policies right now."
"For the migration, everyone has a firewall in use and I am selling Fortinet. Typically, I am replacing another firewall. Previously, there was a tool available to convert configurations from one firewall, such as Palo Alto, to Fortinet, but this tool is no longer free. If it could be made free again, it would be very beneficial."
"The firewall engine is not so strong as of now, in my opinion... My second concern is that, while they have Zero-day vulnerability and anti-malware features, the threat engine needs to be strengthened, its efficiency can be increased."
"It's my understanding that more of the current generation features could be brought in. There could be more integration with EDRs, for example."
"Check Point has a history of moving fast with software release and upgrade cycles which are difficult to keep up with at times."
"I think they have pretty much mastered what can be done. There are some nuances like when you fail over from one cluster member to the other, the external IP address takes about two minutes to fail over."
"The solution lacks the capability to scale effectively."
"At CPX, we heard that we can see all the things on the same platform. That is what we have been asking for, and hopefully, we are going to start seeing it this year."
"The solution could improve to have a DLP feature."
"CloudGuard Network Security's pricing is expensive. We have encountered issues with its licensing."
"We have the product deployed on Azure China. One crucial concern is the version limitation; unfortunately, in Azure China, we are restricted to running version R80. Our architecture has a Load Balancer, VMSS CloudGuard, etc. The duplication in this setup prevents the application from seeing the original client IP. This poses a problem for certain applications that require the original IP for login purposes. Although we managed a workaround with a different architecture involving a WAF, it is not as straightforward as the standard Azure setup."
"CloudGuard Network Security needs to include new features. One specific feature I would like to see is the ability to protect external resources using single sign-on integration with various identity providers, including custom identity providers. Its pricing could also be cheaper."
"I would like to see more simplified management of the firewall... It's a complicated system to use."
"The software base, the management piece that goes onto a server, is not as user-friendly as I would like. There are three different pieces that you have to manage, so it's a little bit convoluted, in my opinion."
"The reporting is a little on the weak side. I would like to see a better reporting set and easier drill-down options."
"I don't think I can get a full-blown DNS client from it. I've been trying to have DNS services. It has forwarding, but I don't get the services of a full DNS client. My main difficulty with it is that I can't run a complete service. I need NTP. I need DNS. I need DHCP for my domain, but I only get forwarding. As far as I can tell, I don't get caching and the kinds of reporting and registration needed to host a DNS for a domain. I have to have a separate solution for that."
"What could use some significant improvement in WatchGuard Firebox would be its interface and policy management. An additional feature I'd like to see in the next release of WatchGuard Firebox is the ability to modify an existing policy instead of having to recreate a policy when changes are necessary. At the moment, there's no possibility to modify the policy. You have to delete the policy and recreate it."
"The few issues that we have had, such as not knowing where to go, they have been answered quickly."
"The VPN aspect of the WatchGuard Firebox is an area that could potentially benefit from improvement. We encountered difficulties while attempting to integrate Windows 11 laptops into the system, which resulted in unreliable connections. After some research, we discovered that this was primarily due to compatibility issues with Windows 11 and required a patch. However, it was still a challenge as it seemed that even when we tried to keep the laptops on Windows 10, they still exhibited the same issues as Windows 11 machines. Despite WatchGuard attributing the problem to Microsoft, we were eventually able to find a solution and all the machines are now functioning seamlessly."
"The level of support from WatchGuard is not as good."
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Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is ranked 8th in Firewalls with 121 reviews while WatchGuard Firebox is ranked 13th in Firewalls with 79 reviews. Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is rated 8.6, while WatchGuard Firebox is rated 8.4. The top reviewer of Check Point CloudGuard Network Security writes "Highly reliable, great visibility, and centralized management". On the other hand, the top reviewer of WatchGuard Firebox writes "Offers a streamlined deployment, intuitive interface and robust security features". Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is most compared with Azure Firewall, VMware NSX, Akamai Guardicore Segmentation, Cisco Secure Firewall and Fortinet FortiGate-VM, whereas WatchGuard Firebox is most compared with Netgate pfSense, Sophos XG, OPNsense, SonicWall TZ and Meraki MX. See our Check Point CloudGuard Network Security vs. WatchGuard Firebox report.
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