IRONSCALES vs Sophos Email comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

IRONSCALES
Average Rating
9.2
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (7th), Secure Email Gateway (SEG) (3rd)
Sophos Email
Average Rating
8.0
Number of Reviews
28
Ranking in other categories
Email Security (11th), Office 365 Protection (4th)
 

Featured Reviews

Tamunoibiton Adoki - PeerSpot reviewer
Jun 28, 2022
Saves a lot of hours, has good detection and remediation capabilities, and is worth the investment
Even though they have been continuously improving it, it is not 100% there. We have had a few incidents where legitimate emails were getting blocked, and we had to manually remove those emails from quarantine. It is 90% effective or accurate because, on rare occasions, some emails from customers were not getting delivered. In one or two instances, their emails got blocked by IRONSCALES, and we had to manually remove the emails from quarantine. I would like them to improve their algorithm to avoid flagging genuine emails as malicious. I would also like to be able to whitelist certain email addresses. I'd love to be able to whitelist a particular customer. It is good for user awareness, but I would love to have more content for our staff that is related to not only phishing but also general awareness. I don't know whether it is a functionality that is already available and we have not subscribed to it, but I would love to be able to send awareness emails to staff on different topics related to email security. They should provide us with more security awareness content. Based on the current trends in the security landscape, they can give us security content in emails that I can easily share with my staff to keep them aware. I use IRONSCALES' mobile app. The mobile app doesn't notify me about the incidents, but I get email alerts instantly, which are helpful when I'm on the move. I get them a lot on my mobile. I get notifications in the email that an incident has been automatically remediated. If an email doesn't have the specified threshold level, I can quickly log in to the IRONSCALES app and do a manual authentication. It helps a lot when I'm on the go, or I don't have my PC with me. Email alerts are fine with me, but it probably would be good to have push notifications from the mobile app. If someone doesn't have an email client on their mobile, they can get notifications through the app.
Adeyemi Adedokun - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 18, 2024
Ensures that there is maximum security enabled for our communication processes
There has been issues when I have interacted with the support in the past, especially regarding technical issues. I have found them responsive for basic queries, but when I have raised issues for complex issues, there is a delay in the response from the support team. During the initial setup, when I faced challenges, the support team took a lot of time to address the issue and escalate it to the required personnel. In another issue raised, I was trying to confirm the status of a domain name. The support team was not able to help me out and provide with the necessary information. I suggest that there should be improvement in the support team towards handling such complex issues and technical concerns.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The solution captures a bit more of the unknown, quantifies it, and applies intelligence to it to pick out and stop a lot of phishing emails that come through."
"For me, the mobile app is most valuable. All other features are also very useful, but the mobile app makes it really easy for me to manage on the go. I don't have to be at my desk. I could be at the shops, or it could be in the evening when I am out, and I can get a notification on my phone that there is an incident that has been raised. I can sort it out very quickly without having to be at my work PC."
"I would say the most valuable feature is what they call Themis. It's like a virtual analyst that uses the decisions that system admins make to generate a score for whether an email is legitimate, spam, or phishing. It gets better based on the decisions that we make over time. The automation piece is great as well. The integrated approach of email security combined with employee awareness training is excellent."
"Their anti-phishing platform is absolutely fantastic. The automated AI piece is amazing, and their technical support is fantastic."
"The stability is good."
"The biggest benefit is that we get fewer phishing and spam emails, so using IRONSCALES has made our environment much safer."
"For what was being offered with IRONSCALES, I feel like we got an incredible deal."
"There is buzz around phishing awareness training. When I make a campaign, all of a sudden people in our organization are talking, thinking, and wondering about it. Therefore, it keeps people on their toes. That is perfect because it does exactly what we want it to do."
"The solution's identity proxy feature is very good and reliable."
"The most significant aspect is the response filtering concerning attachments and links."
"It has enhanced our approach to tackling malware and spam. It is a reliable product with a good user interface."
"It is a stable solution...It is a scalable solution."
"The most valuable feature of Sophos Email is the sandbox. We're able to scan the file, isolate it, and look at it before it is delivered. It is highly effective."
"The platform is scalable when installed on server-based systems."
"Sophos Email provides both inbound and outbound filtering."
"When you say email security, it's about everything, incoming email, outgoing email, spam, phishing emails, unwanted marketing emails. You can set rules, but the main feature of Sophos Email is to make sure you don't get hacked. 95% of people who are hacked do not get hacked by typing the router password. They are hacked from the inside out, which means they send you a document that is a zero-day attack, you open it, nothing happens, but technically the attack is running in the background of your computer. This is how they gain access to your PC."
 

Cons

"IRONSCALES should bundle more features together instead of separating them and charging additional licensing fees."
"The integration with Google Suite needs to be better. it's something they can work on."
"Its UI could be improved. My pet peeve with a lot of these cloud-based systems is that a lot of times, the interface for the management is a little clunky. If you live and breathe IRONSCALES all day long, you'll obviously know where everything is just from muscle memory, but the system is not designed for people to be in it all day long. You're only supposed to occasionally look at it. When things get moved around, it is not necessarily that intuitive. I'm an IT guy, and I can pretty much take the worst UI and figure it out, but the menus and the options in the interface could be a little cleaner graphically. If you have a quick problem that you want to resolve, it takes a little bit of digging in the admin console, whereas it should take a few clicks up front."
"The simulation and training piece could be improved by having more granularity in terms of scheduling how campaigns are run and allowing people to directly take the training rather than having to go through an official campaign. That's not available yet."
"The only thing that I could say is that some of the reporting features could be better."
"Even though they have been continuously improving it, it is not 100% there. We have had a few incidents where legitimate emails were getting blocked, and we had to manually remove those emails from quarantine. It is 90% effective or accurate because, on rare occasions, some emails from customers were not getting delivered. In one or two instances, their emails got blocked by IRONSCALES, and we had to manually remove the emails from quarantine. I would like them to improve their algorithm to avoid flagging genuine emails as malicious. I would also like to be able to whitelist certain email addresses. I'd love to be able to whitelist a particular customer."
"There is a feature called Account Takeover, which isn't what I want it to be able to do. I know that they're working on that, but when they first started the Account Takeover feature in incident management, it didn't have much information. It didn't have any usability to it. I already had tools in place that were better."
"I would love to see the indication of compromise and how the solution utilizes open source resources. It would be good to see that included in the paid versions. It would be a small addition but add a lot of value for clients."
"The security of the solution could improve."
"The tool's integration becomes an issue when the internet connection is weak."
"Sophos Email could improve DLP features."
"The solution's technical support is slow and unresponsive. You need to book time in order to get support."
"Sophos Email can improve mail security."
"The solution has not found a way to block certain kinds of phishing emails."
"Enhancing rule creation and customization features would provide users with greater control over their email security settings."
"Lacks visibility into spam emails."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There is an installation cost. Since we have this as a managed service, we pay for licensing and the managed service itself. Other than that, there are no additional costs."
"We pay $3000 plus a little more a year for the number of employees we have, and we're not even that big. The solution is at the higher end in terms of cost. It's not the most expensive product, but I would say it's worth the price if you have a high volume of email traffic. In our case, the solution has inspected over 162,000 emails between three and four months. It saved us a lot of time and money. It's a worthwhile investment because a bad actor only has to succeed once; we must defend against everything in our business. IRONSCALES offers a sense of security and confidence from being well protected."
"As compared to everything else we looked at, it was good. It was the best value for the dollars."
"Considering the value it provides, it is definitely worth the cost. We don't have to do manual analysis and remediation of phishing emails, which saves us a lot of hours. Its licensing is based on the number of users being supported and the number of email addresses being protected. I'm not aware of any additional costs."
"I don't know about its pricing because I don't run the budget or pay the bills, but if it was extortionate, we probably would be looking to scrap it, and because we are not, I assume its price is okay."
"IRONSCALES is an expensive solution."
"They are pretty much the same as all the other competitors in the market."
"We use exchange licenses, for which we get immediate support from Sophos."
"The platform is inexpensive. It offers a cost-effective licensing model. We purchase its yearly license."
"The pricing is quite reasonable, with a fixed cost and no additional charges."
"I rate the product's pricing a seven out of ten."
"There is an additional fee for their central managed console."
"It is an expensive solution. On a scale of one to ten, where one is low price, and ten is high price, I rate the pricing a seven."
"The pricing could improve by having additional discounts. For example, when customers buy have more than 50 or more users, there should be additional discounts."
"Sophos Email is a little expensive for us, but it's necessary. We have a subscription and renew it every three years."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Outsourcing Company
6%
Computer Software Company
15%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Construction Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IRONSCALES?
The solution captures a bit more of the unknown, quantifies it, and applies intelligence to it to pick out and stop a lot of phishing emails that come through.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IRONSCALES?
IRONSCALES is an expensive solution. The solution has certain add-on features, and its pricing depends on how you scale it. You have to pay additional licensing fees for some specific features.
What needs improvement with IRONSCALES?
IRONSCALES should bundle more features together instead of separating them and charging additional licensing fees. The solution’s scalability could be improved.
What do you like most about Sophos Email?
The solution's identity proxy feature is very good and reliable.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Sophos Email?
We use exchange licenses, for which we get immediate support from Sophos.
What needs improvement with Sophos Email?
The solution's sandboxing and spam control features could be improved. I have faced a few issues with false positives because sometimes we get emails that are not legitimate.
 

Also Known As

No data available
Sophos Email Security
 

Learn More

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Allegheny Millwork, Ayrshire College, Nium, Orris, Paramount School District, Pres Les, PRT Staffing, Recovery Unplugged, Telit, WebHelp
Del Monte Foods, Terra Verde, spicerhaart, RIVERLITE, Dataprise, SureBridge, Reed's School, Sayfol International School
Find out what your peers are saying about IRONSCALES vs. Sophos Email and other solutions. Updated: January 2024.
787,226 professionals have used our research since 2012.