We performed a comparison between SonicWall NSa and SonicWall TZ based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: SonicWall TZ has an edge in this comparison. Unlike SonicWall NSa, its reviewers mention seeing an ROI.
"The customization potential is quite impressive."
"Fortinet FortiGate is a security device. It can optimize security on the networks of a company. It actually protects the company from attacks from outside. With FortiGate, you can categorize the users. You can create a group of users that can access all of the websites for their work. You can limit other users' access."
"The GUI is good."
"FortiGate firewalls are easy to manage through a user-friendly web interface. They also have advanced features like DDoS and DLP. However, I wouldn't recommend enabling all of these features on one device because it can cause performance issues."
"Fortinet FortiGate is easy to use. Anyone can easily maintain it."
"User-friendly and affordable security solution that's recommended for SMB customers. This solution has good technical support."
"Some of the valuable features are the firewall, IPS, web filter, and gateway capabilities. Additionally, it is easy to use and flexible."
"Consolidated our network environment at all locations, but mainly at our datacenter."
"The features that I have found most valuable are the firewalling, which is very good and the GUI which is very intuitive. It is easy to use, and provides great security."
"The most valuable features are the VPN, SSL VPN, and IPSec VPN."
"It has good reporting, the reporting is marvelous."
"Overall SonicWall NSa is a good solution for our use case."
"Easy to scale solution that provides advanced threat protection. Their technical support is very good, very knowledgeable, and easy to reach."
"We can do the hosting and security all under one box. The UTM is a good feature."
"Setup is easy. Anyone with basic firewall experience can do it."
"SonicWall NSA is easy to deploy, easy to maintain, and easy to configure."
"Ease of management and the VPN integration."
"The installation is straightforward and took approximately 30 minutes."
"With the main firewall routing there, we can do connectivity point-to-point. On the low bandwidth we can connect in all the branches with my corporate office."
"Good site categorization and application controls."
"The feature with SonicWall that I have found most valuable is that all the models have the same interface. We don't need to learn different interfaces in the smaller or bigger models."
"Once it's configured properly, the solution is unbreakable."
"It protects against intrusion while allowing needed access."
"Most of the features are useful. It is easy to configure and easy to troubleshoot. I can see the utilization of different networks, and there are also App control features."
"The room for improvement is about the global delivery time period. Usually I need to wait for almost one month to deliver it overseas. So if you can shorten the deliver time it'd be great."
"Its reporting capabilities can be improved. It should have some out-of-the-box reporting capabilities and some degree of customization. The basic reporting that it currently has is not sufficient to create more usable reports. It needs some sort of out-of-the-box reporting. They try to make customers purchase FortiAnalyzer for this kind of reporting, which is an additional cost. Other firewall vendors, such as SonicWall and Sophos, provide this sort of reporting without any additional cost."
"I need user-behavior analytics, to find threat scenarios from inside the organization, insider attacks. That would be very helpful for us. In addition, I would like next-generation features for small and medium businesses. These businesses require UTM, all in one product. Fortinet must include it."
"The way everything is set up could be easier. Currently, people need a lot of experience and knowledge to administer it and to link it to devices."
"Application management can be improved."
"It is stable, but its stability can 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."
"The UTM filtering needs improvement."
"It is not scalable. If your enterprise is growing hard then you have to buy another, bigger product. Maybe if you use it virtually it is more scalable."
"The only thing that we would want would be single-pane management, which it has, but the GMS is not very good. It's purely the management of multiple devices for multiple customers, that's the only thing that it's lacking."
"SonicWall NSa doesn't have a proxy. It also needs a quota management feature in specific scenarios where you must limit user bandwidth for a particular day."
"SonicWall NSa's reporting could be improved."
"I would like to have a built-in vulnerability scanner in the firewall. It would be great to have such functionality. Its price could also be better. It would also be good to have a local warehouse. It doesn't get damaged a lot, but if a customer needs a replacement, currently, it has to come from Miami or Mexico, which can take a few days. It would be better if they have a local warehouse from where we can just pick replacements and quickly solve a client's needs in terms of replacing equipment. It would be great to have it locally instead of waiting for it from Mexico or the USA."
"You can do zero-trust networking with them, but it's not easy."
"The product likely isn't a good fit for a large organization."
"Vendor support needs improvement. The frequency of time and support should be increased."
"The quality of tech support can vary."
"The stability could be a lot better."
"There is still room for improvement, and it's not advisable even if the organization has grown."
"The monitoring is a little bit confusing."
"The user support could be improved because you have to go outside to get that kind of support."
"If the operation increases and the bandwidth consumption increases, it does not perform as per the expectations."
"The price could be better for us in Bolivia."
"We require centralized monitoring of the network features, which they have but they are not to the level that we require."
SonicWall NSa is ranked 19th in Firewalls with 77 reviews while SonicWall TZ is ranked 12th in Firewalls with 78 reviews. SonicWall NSa is rated 7.8, while SonicWall TZ is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of SonicWall NSa writes "Great performance and security with reasonable pricing". On the other hand, the top reviewer of SonicWall TZ writes "Has efficient user access control feature and good technical support services ". SonicWall NSa is most compared with Meraki MX, Sophos XG, Cisco Secure Firewall, Netgate pfSense and WatchGuard Firebox, whereas SonicWall TZ is most compared with Sophos XG, Netgate pfSense, Meraki MX, WatchGuard Firebox and Cisco Secure Firewall. See our SonicWall NSa vs. SonicWall TZ report.
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Basically, the main difference is that the TZ series is intended for a Branch office since it has fewer ports and the speed is around 1 GB.
The NSA series has more processor power and more port where you can create subnets and zones (like DMZ). Also, it has ports with 10 Gb and a processor to support the demand.
I have read that an approximate number of users in the highest TZ series (TZ 670) is around 150 to 200 but that is just an estimate.
Hope this helps. You can get more details in SonicWall datasheets where you will find the speed, throughput and more technical specifications to select the one that fits your requirements.
In simple words,
TZ is for small businesses (less than 100, maximum 150 users).
TZ has fewer ports.
NSA is for medium and large enterprises: > 150 Users,
NSA has many ports to support large networks