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Avanan vs Barracuda Email Security Gateway comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 8, 2026

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
8.4
Avanan improved email security, reduced phishing, increased user trust, enhanced mobile protection, and boosted ROI and revenue growth.
Sentiment score
4.7
Barracuda Email Security Gateway reduces threats, saves costs, and offers a 30-50% ROI for companies with multiple domains.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
8.1
Avanan's customer service is highly responsive, professional, and proactive, with excellent communication and extensive support staff knowledge.
Sentiment score
7.4
Barracuda Email Security Gateway support is efficient and praised for responsiveness, though time zone differences can pose challenges.
From the vendor, I would give the technical support an eight out of ten.
Head of cloud service. at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
8.2
Avanan integrates with Office 365 and Google, praised for scalability, admin capabilities, and efficient email protection across diverse organizations.
Sentiment score
8.1
Barracuda Email Security Gateway is scalable and flexible, popular among various users, with cloud options enhancing capabilities.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.5
Avanan is highly praised for its stability, efficiency, security, minimal maintenance, seamless Microsoft 365 integration, and reliable AI-based scanning.
Sentiment score
8.2
Barracuda Email Security Gateway is stable and reliable, with excellent support, crucial configuration, and high user satisfaction ratings.
 

Room For Improvement

Users feel Avanan needs improvements in Active Directory dependency, email quarantining, AI logic, training, UI, performance, pricing, mobile app, and integrations.
Barracuda Email Security Gateway needs improvements in backup, DoS handling, integration, spam filtering, UI, scalability, and threat intelligence.
Some mails pass while others are dropped without any apparent logic, despite having the policy set for specific recipients or senders.
Graduate Student at ain shams
If it's considered a phishing email, it should be blocked for all users, not just some.
IT Administrator at a energy/utilities company with 201-500 employees
Sometimes there are false positive emails coming through, so they should improve further on detection technologies and techniques.
Head of cloud service. at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
 

Setup Cost

Avanan provides flexible pricing for Office 365, with straightforward setup and costs between $4 to $8 per user.
Barracuda Email Security Gateway offers competitive, cost-effective pricing, adaptable to business size, often cheaper than alternatives like Cisco IronPort.
Compared with others, Barracuda Email Security Gateway is cheaper.
Head of cloud service. at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
 

Valuable Features

Avanan provides advanced malware and phishing detection, 24/7 cloud protection, easy integration with Microsoft 365, and ensures secure communications.
Barracuda Email Security Gateway offers robust spam and threat protection with user-friendly interface and seamless integration, enhancing email security.
The real-time threat intelligence feature is particularly useful as it detects all kinds of threats identified by incoming mails.
Graduate Student at ain shams
The main benefit from Barracuda Email Security Gateway is better security for the email flow.
Head of cloud service. at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
 

Categories and Ranking

Avanan
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
Email Security (22nd), Data Loss Prevention (DLP) (40th)
Barracuda Email Security Ga...
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
55
Ranking in other categories
DMARC Authentication Software (2nd), Secure Email Gateway (SEG) (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Messaging and Collaboration solutions, they serve different purposes. Avanan is designed for Email Security and holds a mindshare of 1.9%, down 3.4% compared to last year.
Barracuda Email Security Gateway, on the other hand, focuses on Secure Email Gateway (SEG), holds 9.6% mindshare, up 6.2% since last year.
Email Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Avanan1.9%
Proofpoint Email Protection6.3%
Microsoft Defender for Office 3655.7%
Other86.1%
Email Security
Secure Email Gateway (SEG) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Barracuda Email Security Gateway9.6%
Proofpoint Email Protection18.3%
Microsoft Defender for Office 36514.8%
Other57.3%
Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
 

Featured Reviews

Robert Melendez - PeerSpot reviewer
Vice President Information Technology at Makeready
Enhances email security and has a very simple and easy-to-use UI
Spam protection is the most valuable feature. We have implemented the tool to enhance our email security. It helps prevent phishing attacks. The anomaly detection capabilities are baked into the security platform. The product integrates wonderfully with Microsoft 365. It's built right on a cloud platform and works almost natively. The solution has a very simple and easy-to-use UI. The tool appears extremely powerful and has a good solid feature set. It catches things that are bad for my environment. The user interface is good the way it is. If the solution continues down that path, I see no problems with the way it is going. It feels like a mature product.
MM
Graduate Student at ain shams
Secures email by identifying threats and managing email policies effectively
The intuitive management interface feature makes email security policies very easy to implement as it's all about features that need to be enabled or disabled. Our investigation in any incident or mail is very useful as it provides all details about incoming mails, enabling thorough review and detection. The real-time threat intelligence feature is particularly useful as it detects all kinds of threats identified by incoming mails. The Impersonation license utilizes AI tools. Sometimes some phishing mails are reported as phishing, but they are not actually phishing mails. They are detected due to certain words and languages that appear suspicious but were generated by AI tools. Everyone or an advisor may use it for their own purpose or learning, even though it indicates that the mail detected is phishing when it's not.
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910,956 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Construction Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise6
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business35
Midsize Enterprise12
Large Enterprise13
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Barracuda Sentinel?
Compared to the features and stability, Barracuda Email Security Gateway is affordable in terms of pricing, setup cost, and licensing.
What needs improvement with Barracuda Sentinel?
On technical aspects, I think Barracuda needs to provide a fast response to any vulnerability on the system and enhance Barracuda support. Customer support for Barracuda Email Security Gateway need...
What is your primary use case for Barracuda Sentinel?
My main use case for Barracuda Email Security Gateway is to protect our email and our email users, protecting our business from most of the sophisticated attacks like phishing attacks and spam. We ...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Barracuda Spam and Virus Firewall, Barracuda Sentinel
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Bethel School District, ServiceSource, Capital Caring
Evolution Recruitment Solutions, Evans Delivery Company, Osoyoos Credit Union, Synovis Life Technologies, Camden County Technical Schools, DEK, Evans Delivery Company, Colgate Rochester Crozer, Hemmera, South Carolina Heart Center, Ferma Corporation, Major League Baseball (MLB), Healy Brothers Automotive Group
Find out what your peers are saying about Proofpoint, Microsoft, Check Point Software Technologies and others in Email Security. Updated: August 2026.
910,956 professionals have used our research since 2012.