Azure Firewall Manager vs Cisco Security Cloud Control comparison

Microsoft and Cisco are both solutions in the Firewall Security Management category. Microsoft is ranked #10 with an average rating of 9.3, while Cisco is ranked #13 with an average rating of 8.0. Microsoft holds a 2.5% mindshare in Firewall Security Management, compared to Cisco’s 2.5% mindshare. Additionally, 85% of Microsoft users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Cisco users who would recommend it.

Azure Firewall Manager

Read 9 Azure Firewall Manager reviews

852 Views
503 Comparison Views

85% willing to recommend

Cisco Security Cloud Control

Read 15 Cisco Security Cloud Control reviews

806 Views
806 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Azure Firewall Manager

Cisco Security Cloud Control

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 2, 2025

Cisco Security Cloud Control and Azure Firewall Manager are leading security solutions in the market. Despite both offering robust features, Azure Firewall Manager appears to have the upper hand due to its comprehensive feature set, which many users find worth the higher cost.

Features: Cisco offers centralized management, efficient deployment across multiple devices, and cloud security with encrypted data. Azure boasts strong threat detection, centralized security management via a hub and spoke architecture, and seamless Azure Entra ID integration for enhanced authentication.

Room for Improvement: Cisco could improve its configuration clarity, expand third-party support, and enhance monitoring capabilities. Azure Firewall Manager would benefit from better NAT capabilities, simplified deployment processes, and reductions in hidden costs.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Cisco supports varied deployment models, catering to hybrid environments and providing responsive customer service. Azure focuses on public cloud environments, offers scalable deployments, but could improve support interaction and technical guidance.

Pricing and ROI: Cisco is seen as cost-effective, especially within its ecosystem, though some find it expensive relative to functionality integration. Azure's pricing is higher due to additional service reliance, but users justify it with powerful features like seamless scaling.

To learn more, read our detailed Azure Firewall Manager vs. Cisco Security Cloud Control Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Azure Firewall Manager vs. Cisco Security Cloud Control

December 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

Azure Firewall Manager

Ranking in Firewall Security Management

10th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

4.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Microsoft Security Suite (26th)

Cisco Security Cloud Control

Ranking in Firewall Security Management

13th

Average Rating

8.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Firewall Security Management category, the mindshare of Azure Firewall Manager is 2.5%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Security Cloud Control is 2.5%, up from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Firewall Security Management Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Azure Firewall Manager	2.5%
Cisco Security Cloud Control	2.5%
Other	95.0%

Firewall Security Management

Featured Reviews

Sikkander Batcha

DevOps Engineer at CloudIQ

Has managed traffic effectively but lacks visibility and advanced control features

Azure Firewall is typically behind other vendor firewalls because we don't see what kind of traffic is traveling through it. That is one drawback. The main drawback is that we need log support from Azure Firewall, which can be quite costly. There is no login feature in Azure Firewall because only the IAM feature is available in the Azure site; we manage it only through the Azure portal, not through any other portal. Other vendors, such as Palo Alto, provide GUI or CLI interfaces to manage their firewalls, whereas we only manage Azure Firewall through the Azure portal. In the future, I would like to see additional features in Azure Firewall Manager to make it more competitive, such as technologies like App-ID and User-ID that Palo Alto has. Azure Firewall currently only allows traffic based on layer four and sometimes layer seven, so they need to improve in those areas compared to other vendors.

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Francisco Delos Santos

Security Engineer at Metrobank

Automation reduces intervention and speeds up threat prevention

Our primary use case for Cisco Defense Orchestrator is the automation of playbooks. We primarily use it for this purpose to streamline processes The most valuable feature is the automation, as it reduces user intervention and allows us to focus on other tasks. Since the system is automated,…

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"From a traffic management perspective, it's a good firewall because it's automatically scalable based on the traffic availability."

"The solution is very easy to set up."

"It is easy to install and does not require any plugins for your browser."

"We are utilizing Azure Entra ID for group labeling, so Active Directory, or now it is Entra ID, securing our application for everyone who accesses it, and Azure Firewall Manager is definitely securing our projects and all its features are fine."

"The most valuable feature of Azure Firewall Manager is the testing and configuration."

"The tool's support is good."

"The best feature of Azure Firewall Manager is that it is easy to maintain and configure."

"The solution has improved our organization with its firewall."

More Azure Firewall Manager pros

"The most valuable feature is the automation, as it reduces user intervention and allows us to focus on other tasks."

"The most valuable feature is being able to do centralized upgrades on the ASAs. We can select all of those ASAs, and say, "Upgrade these ASAs at this scheduled time." It will copy down the ASA image, ASDM image, and then do the upgrade and failovers, and then put it all back into service as required at a scheduled time. It automates that process for us."

"The ability to see the uptimes on the different VPNs that we have configured for site-to-site."

"The ability to do operations on multiple firewalls at once is valuable because it saves time and mental effort. The solution's ability to make bulk changes makes it very convenient to manage things at once on multiple targets."

"If we have a firewall go down, I can hop into CDO, pull the latest configuration off and apply it. That's really good. It helps save time."

"If our server is blocked, this solution shows us why it is blocked and allows us to update the network routing."

"The most valuable feature is the Intrusion prevention."

"The most valuable feature is the automation, as it reduces user intervention and allows us to focus on other tasks."

More Cisco Security Cloud Control pros

Cons

"The solution can improve the integration with open-source tools."

"The tool's security features need to improve. It needs also to include a monitoring system for logs. It is also complicated to find a query on the Azure firewall."

"We could do only one-way NAT-ing, where the traffic comes from outside to internal, to Azure, which is fine. However, when we actually do NAT-ed traffic to hit the firewall, that way is not working."

"The configuration and settings require substantial time for learning, particularly for new users. Improvements in ease of configuration would benefit users significantly."

"The cost is a significant concern because we are in a region where the dollar is not our default currency, and converting to dollars makes it very expensive."

"The configuration and settings require substantial time for learning, particularly for new users."

"There should be a simple one-click deployment for a firewall, rather than a set of setup instructions that include steps such as the DNS configuration, et cetera."

"Azure charges for many aspects including scaling, automated scaling deployment, and traffic management, which leads to higher costs."

More Azure Firewall Manager cons

"If I make a change locally to the firewall, CDO gives an alarm or an error message and says there's a change in compliance: "The firewall has this configuration but the last time it was compiled it had that configuration." That view of new changes versus the old could be better... I had to log in manually, locally on the firewall, to check which version, which configuration was actually running. I couldn't see it in CDO."

"They need to work on the user interface. It needs to be improved to make it more user-friendly."

"CDO doesn't have a report, an official report that I can check daily. It has another module called FTD, but it doesn't have that specifically for ASA. In the reporting, there are a lot of things that aren't there. There is also room for improvement in the daily monitoring."

"It would be a better product if it incorporated device control for third-party products easily."

"I've found dozens of bugs over the year we've been using it. The more I use it for different things, the more problems I find... Most of the problems have to do with the user interface. A lot of thought and work has gone into the back-end component to make the product do what it's intended to do, but the way it is presented for use hasn't gotten nearly as much thought to make it smart and bug-free."

"Cisco Defense Orchestrator should be made more user-friendly overall."

"When logging into the device, we sort of had problems with it staying in sync. If somebody made a change onsite, it wouldn't do an automatic sync. It would have to wait, as you would have to do a manual sync up."

"The dashboard needs to be more customizable to provide better reporting for our network."

More Cisco Security Cloud Control cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is certainly expensive in comparison with other cloud services."

"The price of the solution is reasonable but it is reasonable for the features."

"It is about a $100 per year for an ASA 5506 firewall, and from there it keeps going up if you have a bigger box. For example, the 5516 is $200 to $300 per year."

"It is covered under the CIsco Enterprise License Agreement (ELA). So, it is licensed and ours."

"If you compare to what is available on the market, they are in the same range with respect to pricing."

"After our free trial was done we got a subscription for three years and it was under $3,000 or so. It's part of the EA we already paid for, so I don't know what it would be if it was a la carte."

"I work with a lot of clients, and the price or value of the Cisco Defense Orchestrator can vary from one client to another. If you have a lot of Cisco solutions, the price of the Cisco Defense Orchestrator is justified. Whereas if you have some security components from other vendors, such as Check Point or Palo Alto. This solution would be a pretty expensive proposition considering that they don't integrate with them well."

"It's around £500 per unit for a three-year license."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

20%

Computer Software Company

18%

Educational Organization

Retailer

Computer Software Company

33%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

Performing Arts

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	4
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	2

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	6
Midsize Enterprise	3
Large Enterprise	6

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Azure Firewall Manager?

The most valuable feature of Azure Firewall Manager is the testing and configuration.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Firewall Manager?

The pricing for Azure Firewall Manager is expensive. In our project, we have used both Palo Alto Firewall and Azure Firewall. Azure charges for many aspects including scaling, automated scaling dep...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Azure Firewall Manager?

See all answers

What needs improvement with Cisco Defense Orchestrator?

Cisco Defense Orchestrator should be made more user-friendly overall. Currently, to use it effectively, one must be specific with the rule set that needs to be set up. Additionally, I suggest impro...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Cisco Defense Orchestrator?

Our primary use case for Cisco Defense Orchestrator is the automation of playbooks. We primarily use it for this purpose to streamline processes.

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Cisco Defense Orchestrator?

Those who want to use Cisco Defense Orchestrator should build their own use case and see if it fits their environment. The most significant benefit for us is the response time because it automates ...

See all answers

Comparisons

FortiGate Cloud-Native Firewall (FortiGate CNF) vs Azure Firewall Manager

Compared 21% of the time

Azure Firewall vs Azure Firewall Manager

Compared 16% of the time

AlgoSec vs Azure Firewall Manager

Compared 14% of the time

Palo Alto Networks Panorama vs Azure Firewall Manager

Compared 12% of the time

FireMon Security Manager vs Azure Firewall Manager

Compared 9% of the time

More Azure Firewall Manager Competitors

Tufin Orchestration Suite vs Cisco Security Cloud Control

Compared 19% of the time

Palo Alto Networks Panorama vs Cisco Security Cloud Control

Compared 14% of the time

AlgoSec vs Cisco Security Cloud Control

Compared 12% of the time

Skybox Security Suite vs Cisco Security Cloud Control

Compared 11% of the time

FortiGate Cloud-Native Firewall (FortiGate CNF) vs Cisco Security Cloud Control

Compared 11% of the time

More Cisco Security Cloud Control Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Azure Firewall Manager

January 2026

Download Azure Firewall Manager product report

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Security Cloud Control

January 2026

Download Cisco Security Cloud Control product report

Also Known As

No data available

Cisco Defense Orchestrator, CDO

Interactive Demo

Demo not available

Microsoft

Cisco

Overview

Azure Firewall Manager is a security management service that provides central security policy and route management for cloud-based security perimeters.

To learn more about our solution, ask questions, and share feedback, join our Microsoft Security, Compliance and Identity Community.

Microsoft

Cisco Security Cloud Control offers centralized management, real-time visibility, and AI-driven automation for on-premises and cloud environments, simplifying scalability and deployment.

With a unified approach, Cisco Security Cloud Control enhances security posture by providing cross-platform insights across Cisco's ecosystem. It accelerates threat detection and optimizes policy enforcement through a blend of AI automation and natural language querying capabilities. The intuitive platform serves multiple devices, enabling comprehensive management of Secure Firewall, Secure Access, and other services with guidance from the Cisco AI Assistant. It also includes an AI Operations feature that identifies critical issues and provides real-time insights, enhancing response times while a policy analyzer improves security hygiene by detecting and closing security gaps. Its automation minimizes manual tasks, secures cloud-stored configurations, and supports two-factor authentication. However, it could benefit from improvements in navigation clarity, bulk change handling, and expanded third-party integrations.

What are the key features of Cisco Security Cloud Control?

Centralized Device Control: Streamlines management with bulk policy upgrades and automation.
AI-Driven Automation: Reduces manual tasks and enhances threat detection.
Network Visibility: Provides insights with valuable reporting and intrusion prevention.
Intuitive Configuration: Enables easy policy adjustments and restoration of secure connections.

What benefits can users anticipate?

Increased Efficiency: Reduces operational overhead with centralized management.
Improved Security: Enhances protection through automated policy enforcement and AI insights.
Time Savings: Simplifies management of multiple devices in cloud and on-premises environments.
Scalability: Supports growth with ease of deployment and policy consistency.

Industries implementing Cisco Security Cloud Control leverage its capabilities for tasks ranging from firewall management to intrusion prevention. Enterprises use it to streamline policy management, automate configurations, and integrate Cisco devices with cloud strategies, benefiting from simplified security orchestration and network segmentation.

Cisco

Sample Customers

Information Not Available

Insurance Company of British Columbia, Shawmut

Buyer's Guide

Azure Firewall Manager vs. Cisco Security Cloud Control

December 2025

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