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Azure Firewall vs Check Point NGFW comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 5, 2025

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

Fortinet FortiGate
Sponsored
Ranking in Firewalls
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
317
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (1st), WAN Edge (1st)
Azure Firewall
Ranking in Firewalls
20th
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
8.1
Number of Reviews
36
Ranking in other categories
Microsoft Security Suite (11th)
Check Point NGFW
Ranking in Firewalls
6th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
306
Ranking in other categories
Unified Threat Management (UTM) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 20.3%, up from 17.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Azure Firewall is 2.2%, down from 3.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Check Point NGFW is 3.1%, down from 3.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Firewalls
 

Q&A Highlights

NC
Feb 03, 2022
 

Featured Reviews

EhabAli - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient, user-friendly, and affordable
In the past, NSS Labs was utilized to test files and verify the numbers and datasheets. It would be beneficial to have an organization or testing lab that can verify the numbers in our datasheets since changes are frequently made, which can be inconvenient for review. For instance, when comparing different competitors such as Forcepoint, Palo Alto, and Check Point, the throughput or numbers in the datasheet may be lower than the actual numbers. Conversely, Fortinet typically reports very high numbers, but they cannot be replicated in the real world. Therefore, it would be advantageous for them to partner with a neutral testing organization such as NSS Labs to validate these numbers, thus providing more credibility and comfort to everyone regarding the accuracy of the datasheets. For the migration, everyone has a firewall in use and I am selling Fortinet. Typically, I am replacing another firewall. Previously, there was a tool available to convert configurations from one firewall, such as Palo Alto, to Fortinet, but this tool is no longer free. If it could be made free again, it would be very beneficial. This tool shows a lot of promise and is very good. Making it free would help many companies deliver their products in a more efficient and integrated way. It would also be more valuable to include the tool with the firewall package or license instead of having to pay extra for it. Paying extra puts more pressure on small companies to deliver the firewall and complete the configuration, especially if they have hundreds or thousands of policies. It's very painful to move through these policies line by line. The stability has room for improvement. When it comes to Secure SD-WAN, everything is fine. They are going the right way. SD-WAN is very promising. They can provide the SD-WAN solution separately, but they will not take this approach because even the smallest firewall can support the features, so there is no need to have a separate service or appliance. They are following the right steps, and there is nothing to be improved. Feature-wise, I'm really satisfied with the new release, and the features they have added. For now, it's fine.
Charan Kumar - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to use and configure but could be more robust
The cost of the solution has increased. The robustness of the software could be better. It should be able to cover host-to-host traffic or HTTP traffic. Configurations can be better. The workloads need to still have free access. The encryption and decryption process is not that seamless. It's a little heavy compared to a FortiGate or other firewalls.
Manikandan Kannan - PeerSpot reviewer
Streamlined management through dual-interface configuration capabilities with excellent support
We use Check Point NGFW for security purposes. Our clients use it for security reasons, as mentioned during the call The most valuable feature is the availability of two consoles. In the normal GA login, I can create interfaces and configure interface IPs, while in the SmartConsole, I manage the…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Fortinet FortiGate's most valuable features are ease of use, flexibility, and most of the configuration we can be done using the GUI. When we compare Fortinet FortiGate with other solutions the firewall policy are very easy to understand."
"With FortiClient, you can easily connect when you are home, check out what you want to do, and connect to your network when you are not at work. You can switch on servers and you can check what is wrong."
"Overall security features and performance routing is good."
"The next-generation firewall is great."
"There are great templates, so you don't have to customize them if you don't want to. You do have the option to custom create some folders and some reports, however, with what is there, you don't really need to go through extra effort, as they already give you a lot of predefined views of reports and so forth."
"It is very flexible to use."
"The ECC management and the GUI that offers single interface management are the most valuable features of Fortinet FortiGate."
"Using this product makes the VPN seamless and almost invisible to me in the sense that I don't have to think about it."
"Azure's cost-effectiveness is its major advantage."
"It is easy for me to protect certain ports or even the IP addresses, as well as do whitelisting, blacklisting, and the FQDN when we want virtual machines connected and to protect certain websites."
"Great security and connectivity."
"The product's value to my company stems from its ability to secure my organization."
"Network filtering is valuable. The scalability capability from the cloud-native service helps us a lot because it simplifies our day-to-day maintenance activity."
"Azure Firewall's feature that I have found most valuable is its scalability."
"The solution has many useful features. For example, the solution allows users to create virtual IP addresses."
"The most valuable feature is the integration into the overall cloud platform."
"The AntiSpam/Mail blade was also one of the main reasons we went with this product since we hosted our email server locally. This was an extra layer of protection on top of the existing solution."
"The Blades work fine and the performance optimization is great."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is the Quantum Intrusion Prevention System (IPS). I also like the solution's functionality, like autonomous threat prevention."
"The edge security posture has dramatically improved as we can now detect and prevent threats from the public internet."
"It secures my organization. With the application blade, I can make security as application based and the custom application is also very useful. With identity awareness blades we get insights on our local users who are accessing/passing through the respective rule as users. We also use the DLP, IPS, and VPN features."
"The QoS blade is very good for controlling traffic such as Windows patches, mail traffic and other stuff."
"SmartCenter and SmartLog are the best platforms to manage firewall rules. SandBlast Zero-Day is very useful when encountering any security leaks."
"The solution is easy to administer thanks to its dashboards. The monitoring is really useful."
 

Cons

"It should have a better pricing plan. It is too expensive. It should also have a more granular view of the attack. I don't have FortiAnalyzer, and it is difficult for me to have a complete view when there is an attack on my server."
"I would like to see more advanced developments of a wireless controller in the future."
"I would like some automated custom reporting."
"I think the only issue that needs improvement is the interface."
"One area for improvement is the performance on bandwidth demands for smaller devices, as well as better web filtering."
"Fortinet could improve the windows opener or the virtual IP solutions for opening windows. The virtual IP settings need improvement as firewalls are trending in new development directions."
"Bandwidth usage in reporting could be improved for Fortinet FortiGate."
"Fortinet FortiGate should improve the VPN tokens."
"The product could be made more customizable."
"You have to have a defined IP range within your network to associate it with your network. The problem is you have to plan ahead of time if you expect to use the firewall in the future so that you don't have to reconfigure your subnets or that specific IP range. Other than that, I don't any issues. I use it for basic configuration for a single application, so I really don't try to leverage it for multiple applications where I might find some complexity or challenges."
"Azure should be able to work better as a balancer also, instead of just being a firewall. It should have a wider mandate."
"It needs a lot of improvement, especially on intruder detection. They are working hard on that."
"It would be much easier if the on-premises, firewall rules, had some kind of export-import possibility in place, which is not the case right now."
"There are a number of things that need to be simplified, but it's mostly costs. It needs to be simplified because it's pretty expensive."
"I would appreciate it if Azure Firewall included built-in VPN capabilities."
"It has fewer features than you can get from other firewalls, like anti-spam and anti-phishing. Those kinds of things are not included. It only includes IDS and IDB."
"VMware is not supported by the platform."
"There is room for enhancement in the support system in India."
"The SmartUpdate interface is a little bit crowded if your company has a lot of software items."
"It could be easier to manage the licenses on blades and contracts."
"They have few predefined reports and it would be nice to increase them since the logs are excellent."
"Sometimes, the firewall doesn't pick up on certain things. If an attacker is clever and uses a low-profile indicator, the firewall might flag an anomaly but not give enough information to decide if it's worth investigating. The threat intelligence component also has challenges. It doesn't always tie alerts to active campaigns or threat actor groups. We often have to do extra work and use other products to figure these out."
"I would like to see an improvement of built-in monitoring capabilities such as throughput. Practically visualization of CPview outputs into beautiful pink GUI will do it."
"The number of physical network ports on the device should be increased to allow for greater capacity."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Our licensing costs are on a yearly basis."
"Fortinet FortiGate as a less expensive solution than Palo Alto."
"The license of Fortinet FortiGate should be reduced."
"For the price, I'd rate it a ten because it's very cost-effective."
"It is quite affordable for our customers. There is a separate cost for IPS, antivirus, web filtering, and other features. They have a great choice of licenses. You can go for the license that you want, which is quite useful."
"I had to pay for the license for the firewall, but it is guaranteed to have updates. I expect a good service for it. It was about €1000 for a year, and there was no additional cost."
"Its pricing is competitive with other solutions."
"It is cost-effective, and provides a good value for your money. The pricing, and license renewal, is very reasonable for us."
"Azure Firewall is quite an expensive product."
"Azure Firewall is expensive."
"It is pay-as-you-go. So, you pay based on the usage. If I remember it well, there is a basic fee, and there is a traffic fee. It is not per month. It is per hour or something like that. It is not so expensive."
"I rate the product pricing a five out of ten."
"The total cost of ownership is much less than Palo Alto, Cisco, or any other brand."
"The solution is cheaper than other brands. My company has an enterprise contract and we finally got a good price with Azure."
"It is expensive, especially with the premium functions. For one of the clients, it was very expensive. You have to use it more at an enterprise level, and there, it was not at an enterprise level. So, it was very costly, but security-wise, it was a very wise decision to use it that way."
"The licensing module is good."
"In terms of quality versus price, Check Point is very balanced."
"The pricing is high compared to competitors."
"The licensing fees are paid on a monthly basis and I am happy with the pricing."
"Cisco pushes clients to purchase their hardware, and this is not the case with Check Point. This helps to easily manage costs."
"I have done licensing and contracts for multiple firewalls. The license and contract configuration is completely fine, but if it is possible to make them cost a bit less, then this would be better."
"Its cost is a little higher than other products."
"Though we did not take issue with the price of Check Point NGFW, we felt that it was providing us with inadequate support here in Uganda."
"Licensing issues may be confusing at times."
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Answers from the Community

NC
Feb 3, 2022
Feb 3, 2022
Azure Firewall is easy to use and provides excellent support. Valuable features include integration into the overall cloud platform, autoscaling, and the ability for users to create virtual IP addresses. The cost of the solution is also competitive. Check Point NGFW solution offers zero-day protection and provides absolute in-depth visibility with a multi-layer, multi-blade approach. This solut...
See 2 answers
Oct 24, 2021
Azure Firewall is easy to use and provides excellent support. Valuable features include integration into the overall cloud platform, autoscaling, and the ability for users to create virtual IP addresses. The cost of the solution is also competitive. Check Point NGFW solution offers zero-day protection and provides absolute in-depth visibility with a multi-layer, multi-blade approach. This solution has a Smart Controller that allows you to manage all firewalls from one single location. It also has good antivirus protection and knowledgeable, responsive support. Check Point NGFW is cost-effective and provides valuable support to get through required compliance audits. For Azure Firewall you have to specify each IP address used. We also found Azure to be challenging to implement from region to region, as it does not currently offer a universal approach across regions. Support can be very slow to respond and has caused us some downtime, affecting productivity and overall satisfaction. Check Point NGFW VPN can be very complex to set up. The deployment can be more challenging than many other solutions on the market. Although once fully deployed, things do get easier. Debugging can also be very difficult and makes it seem less stable than other solutions out there. Training and support could be better overall. Conclusion Azure is great, especially since almost everyone is part of the Azure ecosystem. However, it may not be the best solution for larger enterprises, as stability is limited, and the scale-up scale-out approach needs improvement. Check Point can be very challenging to set up and deploy, but the unique multi-layer, multi-blade approach gives greater flexibility and transparency, which makes it a great option for larger enterprises with more complex, intricate needs.
Anil Redekar - PeerSpot reviewer
Feb 3, 2022
Check Point firewall does a deep inspection of packets till Layer 7 and is more compatible with the organizational environment.  The Azure firewall is also a cloud-based security solution that also provides Advance Threat Protection. 
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
22%
Computer Software Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Educational Organization
58%
Computer Software Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
4%
Government
3%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Which is the better NGFW: Fortinet Fortigate or Cisco Firepower?
When you compare these firewalls you can identify them with different features, advantages, practices and usage a...
What is the biggest difference between Sophos XG and FortiGate?
From my experience regarding both the Sophos and FortiGate firewalls, I personally would rather use FortiGate. I know...
What are the biggest technical differences between Sophos UTM and Fortinet FortiGate?
As a solution, Sophos UTM offers a lot of functionality, it scales well, and the stability and performance are quite ...
What is a better choice, Azure Firewall or Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls?
Azure Firewall Vs. Palo Alto Network NG Firewalls Both solutions provide stellar stability and security. Azure Firew...
How does Azure Firewall compare with Palo Alto Networks VM Series?
Both products are very stable and easily scalable. The setup of Azure Firewall is easy and very user-friendly and the...
Which would you recommend - FortiGate VM or Azure Firewall?
Both of these solutions are excellent options that provide flexible scalability and solid security. Fortinet Fortigat...
How does Check Point NGFW compare with Fortinet Fortigate?
I have experience on both from Disti and channel experience. Please find below my comments (nothing new as such). -Ch...
Which would you recommend - Azure Firewall or Check Point NGFW?
Azure Firewall is easy to use and provides excellent support. Valuable features include integration into the overall ...
What do you like most about Check Point NGFW?
Check Point NGFW provides essential security, featuring no-obligation access for secure connections, strong intrusion...
 

Also Known As

FortiGate 60b, FortiGate 60c, FortiGate 80c, FortiGate 50b, FortiGate 200b, FortiGate 110c, FortiGate, Fortinet Firewall
No data available
Check Point NG Firewall, Check Point Next Generation Firewall
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Dell, HP, Oracle, Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Vodafone, Orange, BT Group, Telstra, Deutsche Telekom, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, CenturyLink, NTT Communications, Tata Communications, SoftBank, China Mobile, Singtel, Telus, Rogers Communications, Bell Canada, Telkom Indonesia, Telkom South Africa, Telmex, Telia Company, Telkom Kenya
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