We performed a comparison between Check Point CloudGuard Network Security and Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Features: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security provides a range of valuable features including VPN Blade, IPS Blade, URL filtering, and Applications Control Blade. Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls excel in areas such as embedded machine learning, robust security capabilities, and a unified platform.
Check Point CloudGuard Network Security has room for improvement in its support system, cluster creation on AWS, data protection visibility, DLP feature, user interface, integration, cost reduction, documentation, and flexibility in deployment. Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls could benefit from improvements in customization, network performance in the Middle East, advanced features, integration, usability, GUI interface, training materials, SSL inspection, and external dynamic list feature.
Service and Support: While some customers appreciate the technical support provided by Check Point, others are dissatisfied with the response time. Palo Alto Networks has customers who praise their knowledgeable support team, but there are also complaints about long wait times and issues with their support ticketing system. In summary, the customer service quality for both products differs among users.
Ease of Deployment: While some find it easy, simple, and straightforward, others mention that it may be complex and require technical expertise. Users generally consider the initial setup of Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls to be straightforward and not complex. They find it easy and user-friendly.
Pricing: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is known for its higher setup cost, however, it provides strong security measures and good value. Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls may have higher pricing compared to other options, yet it is regarded as dependable and offers high-performance capabilities.
ROI: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security delivers a significant return on investment, ranging from 80-85%. Users have experienced the advantages of this solution within a short timeframe. Palo Alto NG Firewalls provide enhanced visibility, reporting capabilities, and overall security measures, leading to a robust return on investment.
Comparison Results: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is the preferred option when comparing it to Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls. Users appreciate its user-friendly interface, centralized management, and ability to scale. It also focuses on cloud security and offers advanced threat prevention and detection. Additionally, it provides auto-scaling, malware prevention, and exploit resistance.
"We've found the solution to be pretty stable."
"The most valuable feature is the VDOM, which allows the customer to have multiple firewalls in a single campus."
"The solution is stable."
"Fortinet FortiGate is scalable for our users. Right now, we have almost 70 users. We do not have any plan to increase our usage of FortiGate. For maintaining the firewall solution, one staff member is enough."
"The SD-WAN feature is the most valuable. This feature evolved from link load balancing. It has helped us in terms of our uptime and privatizing applications whenever we experience an outage. The SD-WAN feature has been a plus for us. Two-factor authentication has allowed us to add more users in terms of remote working. We have two-factor authentication for remote workers to authenticate them before they get on the network."
"Fortinet offers the latest versions to cater to the needs of enterprises."
"The technical support in our region is excellent."
"Web filtering and two-factor authentication are great features."
"It offers remarkable flexibility in how we configure and utilize the resources."
"This software is great in overall performance since it can locate any trouble across the networking system and provide solutions before it affects workflows."
"The Capsule solution and application filters are the most valuable. It is pretty straightforward to implement, and it also has good stability and scalability. Their technical support is also really good."
"One of the main characteristics that Check Point CloudGuard Network Security has given us is granularity and visibility."
"The visibility, the one-pane-of-glass which allows me to see all of my edge protection through one window and one log, is great. Monitoring everything through that one pane of glass is extremely valuable."
"SSL/TLS traffic inspection features are used for advanced threat prevention against secure SSL traffic."
"The most valuable feature is the centralized dashboard, which is used for managing all of the Check Point Security Gateways."
"It is a good-to-use tool that is also flexible."
"Good functionality and features."
"Its flexibility is the most valuable."
"Identifying applications is very easy with this solution."
"The packet level inspection is the most valuable feature. The traffic restriction features allow us to restrict the sub-features of any platform."
"One of the key features for us is product stability. We are a bank, so we require 24/7 service."
"Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls enabled us to have better visibility overall."
"It is pretty important to have embedded machine learning in the core of the firewall to provide inline, real-time attack prevention, because all these different attacks and threats are constantly evolving. So, you want to have something beyond just hard pass rules. You want it to learn as it is going along. Its machine learning seems pretty good. It seems like it is catching quite a few things."
"The App-ID, Content-ID, User-ID, and encryption and decryption are valuable features."
"It does not have key authentication for admin access."
"Fortinet FortiGate could improve by adding enhancements to FortiMail, FortiSOAR, and FortiDeceptor."
"The cloud management and automation capability could be improved."
"I haven't had a single issue since using Fortinet."
"FortiGate support could do some improvements on their IPv6 configuration. Right now it's still in the very early stage for utilizing in an enterprise level network environment."
"There could be more integration between the logging and analytical platforms to make it more seamless and integrated."
"It should be more stable. There should be full integration within Fortinet products themselves as well as with other third-party products. Especially when you're not dealing with SIEM and the correlation of the security box, we want Fortinet to be able to share that information with as many other products as it can."
"Fortinet Fortigate could benefit by simplifying some of their processes."
"We miss full blade support for all blades that are compatible with the cluster. Especially notable is the lack of support for Identity Awareness in active standby environments for customers. In our setup, transitioning to Connective clusters would be preferable for maintaining connections during failover situations."
"People don't know about the tool's features. There's a lack of skill. Users require more knowledge on how to integrate it into the cloud environment and orchestrate routing. So, it's not necessarily a CloudGuard Network Security or Check Point issue but more about integration, knowledge, and understanding."
"Check Point Virtual Systems is a complete solution, but pricing can be better."
"There is room for improvement, especially concerning the integration with the management center. It would be beneficial if tasks that currently require scripts could be performed directly from the GUI."
"CloudGuard functions just like any other firewall. It functions very well. The only thing that could maybe be improved would be to integrate some tools that are not integrated with the SmartConsole, like the SmartView Monitor that we need to open on a different application to access."
"Some more built-in marketplace templates would be nice. It would be nice to see more vendor assistance in deployments and backup of recoveries versus having customers rely upon that themselves. That would make it a lot more seamless and aligned with the standard on-premise model that is there. Check Point can extend the same posture that they have to CloudGuard and make that transition very seamless."
"It is somewhat problematic in the area of the cloud."
"The solution needs to support more hypervisors."
"There is a bit of limitation with its next-generation capabilities. They could be better. In terms of logs, I feel like I am a bit limited as an administrator. While I see a lot of logs, and that is good, it could be better."
"I wish that the Palos had better system logging for the hardware itself."
"The only area I can see for improvement is that Palo Alto should do more marketing."
"The configuration part could be improved. It's very difficult to configure. It doesn't have a user-friendly interface. You have to know Palo Alto deeply to use it."
"There has been a recent change in the graphical interface. For the monitoring part, they could have a better UI."
"The scalability compared to other products is not good. You need to change the box whenever you want your number of connection sessions to increase."
"In my opinion, the training provided is satisfactory, but there is certainly room for improvement. It would be great to have more comprehensive training at a lower cost, or even for free."
"When there was change from IPv4 to IPv6, some of the firewalls still didn't support IPv6. In North America, we have seen most customers are using IPv6, as they are getting the IPv6 IPs from their ISPs. Sometimes, when they go through the firewall, it denies the traffic."
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Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is ranked 12th in Firewalls with 112 reviews while Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls is ranked 6th in Firewalls with 161 reviews. Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is rated 8.6, while Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls is rated 8.6. The top reviewer of Check Point CloudGuard Network Security writes "The solution has good threat emulation, threat extraction, and reporting features". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls writes "We get reports back from WildFire on a minute-by-minute basis". Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is most compared with Azure Firewall, VMware NSX, Cisco Secure Firewall, Palo Alto Networks VM-Series and Fortinet FortiGate-VM, whereas Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls is most compared with Check Point NGFW, Azure Firewall, Meraki MX, Sophos XG and Netgate pfSense. See our Check Point CloudGuard Network Security vs. Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls report.
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