SonicWall TZ vs WatchGuard Firebox comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary
Updated on Aug 11, 2023

We compared SonicWall TZ and WatchGuard Firebox across several parameters based on our users' reviews. After reading the collected data, you can find our conclusion below:

  • Ease of Deployment: Users found WatchGuard Firebox's setup to be relatively simple and straightforward, with most reviews stating that it was easy to deploy and configure. Some users did find SonicWall TZ's setup slightly complex, but overall, it took only a few minutes to a couple of hours.
  • Features: SonicWall TZ receives positive feedback for its easy-to-use interface, effective content filtering, and consistent upgrade policy. WatchGuard Firebox is recognized for its extensive features such as VPN setup, web blocker security, and dependable performance.
  • Room for Improvement: SonicWall TZ could enhance its reporting, licensing, scalability, user interface, features, price, and monitoring. WatchGuard Firebox has potential for improvement in its interface, web blocker feature, reporting, customer support, security, and integration with other solutions.
  • Pricing: Users have differing opinions on SonicWall TZ's cost, with some finding it pricey and recommending cost-effective component combinations. WatchGuard Firebox is generally regarded as reasonably priced and without any undisclosed charges. Nonetheless, a few users suggest that the price could be reduced for larger enterprises.
  • ROI: SonicWall TZ has proven to be effective in preventing attacks and providing benefits to clients, resulting in a positive return on investment. WatchGuard Firebox offers valuable services that enhance productivity and prevent unauthorized access. It is time-saving and considered to be worth its cost.
  • Service and Support: SonicWall TZ has been commended for its helpful and knowledgeable customer service, although there have been difficulties in reaching support online and language barriers. WatchGuard Firebox's customer service is generally satisfactory, with responsive and knowledgeable support. However, there have been instances of limited expertise in certain areas and slower response times for feature requests.

Comparison Results: SonicWall TZ is highly praised for its user-friendly interface, robust features, and cost-effectiveness. However, there are areas that need improvement such as reporting, licensing, scalability, and support. On the other hand, WatchGuard Firebox is commended for its comprehensive features, ease of use, and reasonable pricing. However, it also has areas that need improvement including the interface, web blocker feature, reporting, customer support, security, configuration options, scalability, and integration. 

To learn more, read our detailed SonicWall TZ vs. WatchGuard Firebox Report (Updated: March 2024).
763,955 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"It does a lot for you for intrusion protection and as an antivirus. The threat management bundle is worth the money. You don't need another company to monitor your web traffic for you. You can do everything yourself on the firewall. You restrict your own black list for people on the firewall. You don't need to pay some other company for another product to do that for you. The firewall can do that for you. So, it's an easy-to-use product for people to be independent. They don't need to rely on other vendors to do what the firewall can do. They can do everything.""The product is easy to use and is stable. The SV1 functionality is a benefit.""Web filtering and two-factor authentication are great features.""The IPS is good. It protect my network from attackers.""Allows for firewall rules to be programmed and named in a way that makes it “readable”""The stability and scalability of this solution are satisfactory. Its SD-WAN, VPN, and URL filtering features are very useful.""It's very good and very stable for businesses. It works very well.""Initial setup is straightforward. There weren't too many issues with setting it up. It takes one hour or so."

More Fortinet FortiGate Pros →

"Technical support is good.""I like the firewall product, the security server, and the content filter.""It lets me monitor in live time if someone is 'hogging' bandwidth.""It is a scalable solution.""We like the central interface and we like the security features. Additionally, we use SonicWall with VPN connectivity and we have had no problems with SonicWall all these years.""It's a stable solution.""The most common feature in the firewall, apart from that traditional firewall, would be the security services, like application control, URL filtering, Gateway Anti-Virus, and IPS protection. These are the essential features in the firewalls which I think, has to be enabled and properly used at every network infrastructure.""I have found the stability of this product to be excellent."

More SonicWall TZ Pros →

"Policy VPN, site-to-site VPN, traffic monitoring, anti-spam filters, and all other advanced features are valuable.""If you just plan to use WatchGuard Firebox in your office and not publicly, then it is okay to purchase it. With WatchGuard Firebox, you can manage your users and permissions while also taking care of the basic setup phase in your office.""It saves us time in the respect that we now have the template built for it so we can get in and get it done. We've had much less problem supporting Voice over IP technologies from different companies. Because our client base has grown over the years, we're probably saving 20 to 30 man-hours a month now that we've got this on a good stable level.""The most valuable features are the VPN and web blocker security.""Their support is excellent, and the stability is very good.""​Efficient to setup, run, and maintain. Saving man hours and cost in the process.""The most valuable feature of WatchGuard Firebox is the VPN. It's easy to connect to the VPN.""I like intrusion detection the most."

More WatchGuard Firebox Pros →

Cons
"They need faster serviceability and more security features.""Due to its higher cost, Fortinet FortiGate can lead to increased operational expenses.""Fortinet should focus on enhancing the capabilities of FortiGate by consolidating its various products, such as FortiGate Cloud, FortiManager, and FortiAnalyzer.""Maybe they could make some features more accessible, such as a way to translate directions between two networks that share the same subnets.""If they had better integration with security products, such as Cisco ISE or Rapid Threat Containment, then it would be an improvement.""The solution could be more user friendly.""To some degree, it's almost a question as to why some of this stuff isn't simpler. For example, for an AP deployment, while it's integrated, the number of steps that you have to go through in order to get the AP up, seems like a lot.""Fortinet FortiGate needs to improve the protection, it did not prevent us from being attacked. Additionally, Fortinet FortiGate could provide more features for WAF devices. I should not have to purchase two solutions, it would be a benefit to combine these features into one solution."

More Fortinet FortiGate Cons →

"The log sections could be done more clearly.""There is still room for improvement, and it's not advisable even if the organization has grown.""I'd like to have cloud management at no additional cost. Unfortunately, leveraging SonicWall's cloud management capabilities is cost-prohibitive, so we don't use it. They should have a reasonable subscription or offer it to us at no cost as an MSP.""Sonic Analyzer could be improved. It's difficult to manage and not very intuitive.""FortiGate has a client DNS in the firewall, but SonicWall doesn't have that. To create or configure a site-to-site VPN tunnel, we have to give a DNS name. Currently, we have to get the DNS name from a third party and then include it in SonicWall, whereas FortiGate has its own client DNS, so it provides a DNS name, and it does not require a third party. There should be a graphical option to view the network utilization and bandwidth usage.""The solution's pricing could be made cheaper.""An additional feature that I would like to see is reporting that includes metrics to give me more information about the number of viruses that it has actually detected and interrupted.""It needs more robust self-help documentation along with examples and things to watch out for."

More SonicWall TZ Cons →

"This is a great product and offers great protection but they don't hear the customers' needs. They don't make improvements as per the customers' requests.""The way Secure Sign-On authentication is happening needs to be improved. When the Secure Sign-On portal is turned on, anybody who comes into the campus, whether he or she is a staff member or a guest, has to go past the initial portal. One of the shortcomings is the username. It shouldn't allow permutations or combinations with upper or lower cases. For example, when there is a username abc, it shouldn't allow ABC or Abc. It should not allow the same username, but currently, two separate people can go in. Therefore, its authentication or validation should be improved, and the case sensitiveness should be picked up. If I have restricted someone to two devices, they shouldn't be able to use different combinations of the same username and get into the third or fourth device. It shouldn't allow different combinations of alphabets to be used to log in.""The only downside is that it is missing an API, that you can use to easily collect information from it.""Cloud-based central administration of all devices from one point would be nice""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.""I would like to have a little more control over access points and the ability to see the bandwidth that is passing through a specific access point. We are not able to see that. We can see what traffic is passing through the Firebox itself, but we can't identify if it is coming from a particular access point or not.""The solution needs to improve its accessibility.""The UI is not as user-friendly as the model that I had used before, which was from Check Point. The design of the Firebox UI is restricted and needs an experienced network guy to understand the format and settings."

More WatchGuard Firebox Cons →

Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "Fortinet has one or two license types, and the VPN numbers are only limited by the hardware chassis make."
  • "These boxes are not that expensive compared to what they can do, their functionality, and the reporting you receive. Fortinet licensing is straightforward and less confusing compared to Cisco."
  • "Go for long term pricing negotiated at the time of purchase."
  • "Work through partners for the best pricing."
  • "The value is the capability of having multiple services with one unique license, not having the limitation per user licensing schema, like other vendors."
  • "Easy to understand licensing requirements."
  • "​We saved a bundle by not needing all the past appliances from an NGFW.​"
  • "The cost is too high... They have to focus on more features with less cost for the customer. If you see the market, where it's going, there are a lot of players offering more features for less cost."
  • More Fortinet FortiGate Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "Getting licenses in our country, Ghana, is not easy. Though, once we have them, adding them is quick (about a day)."
  • "SonicWall has authorized distributors in our country. They have about two or three distributors in the country, so it makes it a bit easier. What we do is to request a quotation from these distributors, then we do a value for money analysis and see which one of them is giving us a competitive price."
  • "The pricing was a factor for us, and we felt that the price was good."
  • "The product pricing is relatively good, compared to other products, including the licenses."
  • "Licensing costs have been around $2,000. There are no other costs above the standard licensing fees."
  • "License renewals come in around $35,000 to $45,000."
  • "The price is high compared to some other solutions."
  • "Its pricing is okay as compared to other solutions."
  • More SonicWall TZ Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "Very competitive pricing regarding throughput compared to other alternatives."
  • "Cheap."
  • "The subscription that was purchased is for three years, but it is usually for one year at a time."
  • "The cheapest configuration, for maybe five people, is approximately $500."
  • "The price is so small that I don't pay attention to it anymore. I think we pay a few thousand dollars for two to three years, so about $100 per month. That's for all of our users. There is an additional cost if we want to go with a deeper licensing model, but we just pay for antivirus, IPS, and main product support."
  • "I haven't seen the pricing since 2017, but it was competitive. SonicWall, Barracuda, and WatchGuard were all about the same price when we did our last pricing."
  • "Each one, for the primary unit, was $8,600 and the High Availability unit was $2,000. That's with three years of subscription and support and the Total Security Suite."
  • "We only license our corporate one and the one we have at our DR site, we don't worry about the branches. It doesn't pay for us to license the ones at the branches. What they charge for what they call basic maintenance is extremely high for those little fireboxes."
  • More WatchGuard Firebox Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
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    Top Answer:As a solution, Sophos UTM offers a lot of functionality, it scales well, and the stability and performance are quite… more »
    Top Answer:I’ll say it depends on your needs. Fortinet FortiGate and SonicWall TZ are both next-gen firewalls (NGFW) with similar… more »
    Top Answer:The most valuable feature of SonicWall TZ is the double authentication, where it asks for one password and again asks… more »
    Top Answer:The solution is moderately priced, where it's neither cheap nor expensive.
    Top Answer:We are providing our services to all WatchGuard customers in the region. 
    Top Answer:We just use it as a secondary WiFi device. We're a small office and we needed to set up a WiFi device for a few of our… more »
    Top Answer:We're a hospital and we use it for developing our incoming and outgoing policies, and we also use it for VPN.
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    FortiGate 60b, FortiGate 60c, FortiGate 80c, FortiGate 50b, FortiGate 200b, FortiGate 110c, FortiGate
    Dell SonicWALL TZ
    Learn More
    Overview

    Fortinet FortiGate enhances network security, prevents unauthorized access, and offers robust firewall protection. Valued features include advanced threat protection, reliable performance, and a user-friendly interface. It improves efficiency, streamlines processes, and boosts collaboration, providing valuable insights for informed decision-making and growth.

    The secure, sophisticated SonicWALL TZ is widely deployed at small businesses, retail, government, remote sites and branch offices. It combines high-performance intrusion prevention, malware blocking, content/URL filtering and application control.

    WatchGuard Firebox is a versatile security solution primarily used for security purposes such as firewalling, VPN, and protecting networks from outside and inside threats. It is also used for routing, multi-factor authentication, vulnerability management, and segregating industrial networks from corporate networks. 

    The product is praised for scalability, stability, user-friendliness, reasonable pricing, and good technical support. Some users use it for web filtering and hosting web pages, while others – for remote access connections and mobile VPNs. Firebox offers great protection, good performance, and flexibility without licensing limitations.

    WatchGuard Firebox Features

    WatchGuard Firebox has many valuable key features, including:

    • Policy management
    • Strong security
    • High performance
    • Network configuration for multiple clients
    • Built-in SD-WAN
    • Application control
    • Threat detection and response
    • Network discovery
    • Intuitive interface

    WatchGuard Firebox Benefits

    Some of the benefits of using WatchGuard Firebox include:

    • IT administrators can create and implement policies for content filtering, VPNs, and network inspections.
    • The solution is easy to set up, manage, and maintain.

    Reviews from Real Users

    Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by WatchGuard Firebox users.

    PeerSpot user Kelly C., IT Manager at a hospitality company, mentions, “One of the most valuable features is the Gateway AntiVirus. We scan all traffic as it's coming through. We also use spamBlocker to scrub spam. We use content filtering, which is critical in any corporate environment to make sure that people don't surf things they're not supposed to. WatchGuard has a very easy VPN and branch office VPN setup, so we use those pretty extensively too.It's very easy to use. In terms of performance, WatchGuard has always worked well for us. 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.”

    A Director of Information Technology at a retailer says, “Among the most valuable features is the ease of use — love the interface — of both the web interface and of the WatchGuard System Manager. It's a stable platform. The devices are pretty rock-solid.”

    Jason M., IT Director at a healthcare company, explains, “The policy monitoring and allowing different traffic flows are the most useful features for us; regulating which traffic comes in and out. In terms of the throughput and performance, we don't have a problem or any bottleneck there. We downgraded the size of our appliance because we're a small facility, and what we had before was actually too big. The one we are now going with seems to be doing a great job.” He also adds, “The management feature is pretty nice.”

    Steve R., President and Owner at Peak Communication Systems, Inc., comments, "It saves us time in the respect that we now have the template built for it so we can get in and get it done. We've had much less problems supporting Voice over IP technologies from different companies. Because our client base has grown over the years, we're probably saving 20 to 30 man-hours a month now that we've got this on a good stable level."

    Sample Customers
    1. Amazon Web Services 2. Microsoft 3. IBM 4. Cisco 5. Dell 6. HP 7. Oracle 8. Verizon 9. AT&T 10. T-Mobile 11. Sprint 12. Vodafone 13. Orange 14. BT Group 15. Telstra 16. Deutsche Telekom 17. Comcast 18. Time Warner Cable 19. CenturyLink 20. NTT Communications 21. Tata Communications 22. SoftBank 23. China Mobile 24. Singtel 25. Telus 26. Rogers Communications 27. Bell Canada 28. Telkom Indonesia 29. Telkom South Africa 30. Telmex 31. Telia Company 32. Telkom Kenya
    AeroM_xico Delta TechOps, Unimat
    Ellips, Diecutstickers.com, Clarke Energy, NCR, Wrest Park, Homeslice Pizza, Fortessa Tableware Solutions, The Phoenix Residence
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Comms Service Provider16%
    Computer Software Company9%
    Financial Services Firm8%
    Manufacturing Company7%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Educational Organization20%
    Computer Software Company15%
    Comms Service Provider8%
    Manufacturing Company6%
    REVIEWERS
    Construction Company12%
    Healthcare Company12%
    Non Profit7%
    Computer Software Company7%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company18%
    Comms Service Provider9%
    Retailer6%
    Manufacturing Company6%
    REVIEWERS
    Manufacturing Company19%
    Construction Company11%
    Computer Software Company7%
    Real Estate/Law Firm6%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company18%
    Comms Service Provider11%
    Government6%
    Educational Organization5%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business48%
    Midsize Enterprise23%
    Large Enterprise30%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business27%
    Midsize Enterprise32%
    Large Enterprise41%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business64%
    Midsize Enterprise19%
    Large Enterprise17%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business43%
    Midsize Enterprise16%
    Large Enterprise41%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business65%
    Midsize Enterprise22%
    Large Enterprise12%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business42%
    Midsize Enterprise19%
    Large Enterprise39%
    Buyer's Guide
    SonicWall TZ vs. WatchGuard Firebox
    March 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about SonicWall TZ vs. WatchGuard Firebox and other solutions. Updated: March 2024.
    763,955 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    SonicWall TZ is ranked 11th in Firewalls with 19 reviews while WatchGuard Firebox is ranked 13th in Firewalls with 22 reviews. SonicWall TZ is rated 8.0, while WatchGuard Firebox is rated 8.4. The top reviewer of SonicWall TZ writes "Highly acceptable on a small scale, straightforward out the box installation, with a good price point". On the other hand, the top reviewer of WatchGuard Firebox writes "Rock-solid stability and easy to change the model". SonicWall TZ is most compared with Sophos XG, Netgate pfSense, Meraki MX, SonicWall NSa and OPNsense, whereas WatchGuard Firebox is most compared with Netgate pfSense, Sophos XG, OPNsense, Meraki MX and Cisco Secure Firewall. See our SonicWall TZ vs. WatchGuard Firebox report.

    See our list of best Firewalls vendors and best Firewalls vendors.

    We monitor all Firewalls reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.