Azure Firewall vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall comparison

Microsoft and Zscaler are both solutions in the Firewalls category. Microsoft is ranked #14 with an average rating of 8.1, while Zscaler is ranked #24 with an average rating of 8.6. Microsoft holds a 2.1% mindshare in Firewalls, compared to Zscaler’s 0.4% mindshare. Additionally, 79% of Microsoft users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 92% of Zscaler users who would recommend it.

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 16, 2024

Azure Firewall and Zscaler Cloud Firewall are two prominent cloud-based firewall solutions. Zscaler Cloud Firewall appears to have the upper hand due to its comprehensive security coverage and effective global deployment.

Features: Azure Firewall users value its seamless integration within the Azure ecosystem, robust analytics capabilities, and ease of management. Zscaler Cloud Firewall users highlight advanced threat protection, global reach, and scalability. Zscaler is preferable for extensive security features, while Azure Firewall excels in integration within the Azure platform.

Room for Improvement: Azure Firewall users indicate a need for enhanced reporting, better documentation, and improved policy management. Zscaler Cloud Firewall users suggest improvements in network performance, increased flexibility, and more granular control options. While Azure Firewall faces challenges in providing detailed insights, Zscaler could benefit from more efficient network handling.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Azure Firewall is praised for its straightforward deployment process within the Azure environment but has mixed reviews regarding customer service responsiveness. Zscaler Cloud Firewall offers easier deployment on a global scale, with users generally satisfied with the support, noting quicker resolutions.

Pricing and ROI: Azure Firewall users find the pricing reasonable but note that the ROI is heavily dependent on their existing Azure usage. Zscaler Cloud Firewall users perceive it as expensive but justify the cost with the extensive features and security benefits. Azure Firewall offers cost efficiency for Azure-centric operations, while Zscaler Cloud Firewall is considered worth the premium for its superior security features.

To learn more, read our detailed Azure Firewall vs. Zscaler Cloud Firewall Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Azure Firewall vs. Zscaler Cloud Firewall

April 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 848,207 peers since 2012

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

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 21.1%, up from 17.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Azure Firewall is 2.1%, down from 2.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zscaler Cloud Firewall is 0.4%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Firewalls

Featured Reviews

EhabAli

Sr. Cybersecurity Solutions Architect at BMB

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.

Read full review

AnvarSadique

Information Technology Architect at GMS INC

Easy setup and effective traffic routing enhance security

In terms of improvements, I think the price could be a concern as Azure ( /products/microsoft-azure-reviews ) services are often more expensive compared to other firewalls. However, the functional aspects of Azure Firewall met our needs. While I found the interface not particularly user-friendly, this is a common issue across vendors.

Read full review

Bhaskar Rao

Network manager admin at Yamaha

Though it helps deal with web traffic or any malicious traffic, it needs to work on its DC performance issues

The product's initial setup phase is moderate in level, so it is neither very complex nor very easy. For the deployment, my company first needs to gather all the requirements of the users and the domain names and consider how many users there are in the company. In the implementation and planning part, my company needs to consider what kind of policies we will create while ensuring that the policies are created based on the requirements of the users. There is a need to segregate the users' requirements since there are separate departments in the company, like the HR department, sales department, IT department, and manufacturing department, so that our company can create policies depending on their requirements. On-site, if you want a GRE tunnel, our company can handle GRE tunnel traffic routing and Zscaler Cloud Firewall, after which Zscaler will take action based on the policies created by our organization. For the deployments and maintenance, a team of five members consisting of two managers and three engineers is required.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The product is easy to use and is stable. The SV1 functionality is a benefit."

"We use the filtering feature the most. It has filtering and inbuilt securities. We can create customized rules to define which users can access a particular type of site. We can create policies inside the firewall."

"The reporting and monitoring are very good."

"The performance is good."

"It is a one box solution, which covers most of the edge device’s requirements."

"Fortigate is very scalable to serve our customers' needs. We have scaled already from fifty to more than a hundred instances of Fortinet FortiGate. Around 20 staff are required for deployment and maintenance, mostly engineers."

"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."

"The user interface (UI) is very, very good."

More Fortinet FortiGate pros

"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."

"One of the notable advantages of Azure Firewall is its user-friendly interface, which closely resembles or shares similarities with other Azure components."

"Azure Firewall is integrated well with Microsoft ecosystem."

"The solution can autoscale."

"With Azure products, customer support is really good."

"We secure the entry point to the virtual data center with the firewall."

"The most valuable feature is the integration into the overall cloud platform."

"The firewall policy control, URL content control, and antivirus are all the most valuable aspects. Threat prevention is as well quite good."

More Azure Firewall pros

"If malicious traffic attacks our on-premises servers, then it gets blocked by Zscaler Cloud Firewall."

"Once you have Zscaler running you have access to configure it however you want."

"The product’s firewall and VPN package are fantastic compared to any other solution."

"The scalability is okay. We have around 2200 people using this solution."

"The solution offers good sandboxing."

"Most of the features that Zscaler has to offer, we will deploy."

"The visibility and log availability offered are highly valued for troubleshooting purposes, and this is a key factor driving customer interest in the firewall module."

"It is a stable solution."

More Zscaler Cloud Firewall pros

Cons

"It would be ideal if they had some sort of GUI interface for troubleshooting and diagnostics."

"There can be more security in hybrid implementations. When a customer has a hybrid environment where some parts are in the cloud, we need a consistent security solution for such scenarios."

"The performance could be a bit better. Right now, I find it to be lacking. Having good performance is very important for our work."

"Fortinet FortiGate needs to improve the logging and reporting. Additionally, the next-generation application's policies should be improved. When they were released they had bugs."

"Its customer service could be better."

"FortiGate can improve its token system, as it requires a purchase before use."

"Some of the software stability could improve."

"It claims it does DLP, but the degree and level of controls are very basic."

More Fortinet FortiGate cons

"Right now, with Azure Firewall, we cannot have a normal inbound traffic flow. For inbound, Microsoft suggests using application gateways, so the options are very limited. I cannot use this firewall as an intermediate firewall because of the limitations, and I cannot point routing to another firewall. So if I want to use back-to-back firewall architecture in my environment, I cannot use Azure Firewall for that type of configuration either."

"We find it's different implementing it region-to-region. It might help if it was universal across all regions."

"Azure should be able to work better as a balancer also, instead of just being a firewall. It should have a wider mandate."

"I would like the premium and standard features to be available on the basic package. Additionally, it lacks some functionalities when compared to competitors like Check Point and Fortinet, such as WAF or load balancing."

"Azure Firewall definitely needs a broader feature base. It should be able to go all the way up to layer 7 when looking at applications and things like that."

"I would appreciate it if Azure Firewall included built-in VPN capabilities."

"For large organizations, a third-party firewall would be an added advantage, because it would have more advanced features, things that are not in Azure Firewall."

"The threat intelligence aspect of this particular firewall is not at par with other providers."

More Azure Firewall cons

"They do not provide a few components that are fundamental to differentiate the products"

"It would be better if they improved their policy, package visibility, and flexibility while we're creating rules for inspection. It could also be cheaper or more things could be included in the basic package. In the next release, I would like better coverage in the Asia Pacific region and better quality of service."

"Apart from the issues associated with the product in areas like the DC performance issues and DC failover, Zscaler Cloud Firewall's IP should not have a proxy IP."

"It would be nice to have some sort of a form factor, a physical form factor perhaps, or virtual machine that you could install on devices or on a cloud, and have some cloud computing."

"Instead of the standard license, they should certainly provide customers with the visibility to access and view the logs."

"Certain criteria need to be met if you want to scale this solution."

"There are some areas it could improve when it comes to blocking, we have to block some things manually. For example, if we block a top-level domain we have seen that the new IPs come through, the IPs are not blocked. There should be some more granular way of doing it. My only request is if you're blocking something at a top level, the sub-level sub-domains and all those other IPs should be blocked too automatically."

"When it comes to customer support, there is room for improvement in Zscaler's service."

More Zscaler Cloud Firewall cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Fortinet's pricing is more straightforward than other solutions. If Fortinet doesn't stick out when you're searching for a solution, you are a glutton for punishment. You only need to know two things when purchasing a Fortinet solution: your total bandwidth and bandwidth at the site. You need to estimate the future bandwidth with other solutions if your customer plans to upgrade."

"It is more affordable than Check Point and Palo Alto. Another thing is that all the features and the OS remain the same irrespective of the size of the device. Pricing-wise, Fortinet typically provides one-year support with the firewall appliance. There is also an option for three years which is how their licensing works."

"Its pricing is competitive with other solutions."

"Licensing for Fortinet FortiGate is on a yearly basis. Pricing for it is a bit high. It could be cheaper."

"We are on an annual license to use Fortinet FortiGate."

"The price is highly competitive when compared to other brands that offer similar functionality."

"In the Asian economy in which we operate, FortiGate is expensive."

"The pricing is perfect."

More Fortinet FortiGate pricing and cost advice

"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."

"Azure Firewall is expensive."

"Before choosing this solution, we evaluated others, and we found this to be the most cost-effective."

"The pricing of Azure Firewall is pay-as-you-go. Fortinet also has a pay-as-you-go model, but Azure's pricing is higher and, with FortiGate, you also have the license."

"Azure Firewall is quite an expensive product."

"Azure Firewall is more expensive. If Microsoft can make Azure Firewall cheaper, I can see that all clients will think of using it. One client used FortiGate because it is much cheaper. Some clients ask me for Cisco, but in the cloud estimate, I found its cost is the same as Azure Firewall."

"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."

More Azure Firewall pricing and cost advice

"It comes at a significantly reduced cost while ensuring control and effectiveness."

"There is an annual license required for the use of the Zscaler Cloud Firewall."

"Zscaler is priced too high compared to the cost of Fortinet."

"The licensing is on a yearly basis. It is somewhere around 30 or 40 pounds per user for our organization."

"It is not the most budget-friendly solution, but it's important to consider its overall value."

"It is expensive for small businesses."

"The product is a bit expensive compared to the solutions offered by its competitors, like Palo Alto. There is a need to make yearly payments towards the license in charges associated with the product."

"There are different subscription models available."

More Zscaler Cloud Firewall pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Firewalls solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

848,207 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

21%

Computer Software Company

14%

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

16%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Government

10%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

13%

Computer Software Company

13%

Manufacturing Company

Government

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...

See all answers

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...

See all answers

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 ...

See all answers

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...

See all answers

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...

See all answers

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...

See all answers

Which lesser known firewall product has the best chance at unseating the market leaders?

Netscope, Zscaler if they continue route they are on now. FIrewalls needs great deal of automation on each end, datac...

See all answers

What do you like most about Zscaler Cloud Firewall?

The product’s firewall and VPN package are fantastic compared to any other solution.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zscaler Cloud Firewall?

The product is a bit expensive compared to the solutions offered by its competitors, like Palo Alto. There is a need ...

See all answers

Comparisons

Sophos XG vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 22% of the time

Netgate pfSense vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 13% of the time

Cisco Secure Firewall vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 11% of the time

WatchGuard Firebox vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 5% of the time

SonicWall TZ vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 5% of the time

More Fortinet FortiGate Competitors

Fortinet FortiGate-VM vs Azure Firewall

Compared 19% of the time

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls vs Azure Firewall

Compared 16% of the time

Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs Azure Firewall

Compared 6% of the time

Palo Alto Networks VM-Series vs Azure Firewall

Compared 6% of the time

Netgate pfSense vs Azure Firewall

Compared 2% of the time

More Azure Firewall Competitors

OPNsense vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall

Compared 11% of the time

Check Point NGFW vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall

Compared 9% of the time

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall

Compared 7% of the time

Cisco Multicloud Defense vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall

Compared 6% of the time

Cisco Secure Firewall vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall

Compared 5% of the time

More Zscaler Cloud Firewall Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Fortinet FortiGate

April 2025

Download Fortinet FortiGate product report

Buyer's Guide

Azure Firewall

April 2025

Download Azure Firewall product report

Buyer's Guide

Zscaler Cloud Firewall

March 2025

Download Zscaler Cloud Firewall product report

Also Known As

FortiGate 60b, FortiGate 60c, FortiGate 80c, FortiGate 50b, FortiGate 200b, FortiGate 110c, FortiGate, Fortinet Firewall

No data available

Overview

Fortinet FortiGate offers comprehensive network security and firewall protection across multiple locations. It effectively manages data traffic and secures environments with features like VPN, intrusion prevention, and UTM controls.

Organizations rely on Fortinet FortiGate for its robust integration with advanced security policies, ensuring significant protection for enterprises, cloud environments, and educational sectors. It facilitates network segmentation, application-level security, and authentication management, securing communication within and between locations such as branches and data centers. Its efficient SD-WAN and UTM features enable streamlined data management and enhanced threat protection capabilities. Users appreciate its centralized management, facilitating seamless operations across diverse environments.

What are the key features of Fortinet FortiGate?

VPN Capabilities: Ensure secure remote access for users and seamless site-to-site connections.
Intrusion Prevention System (IPS): Detect and prevent security threats and vulnerabilities.
Advanced Firewall: Offers robust firewalling with application control and web filtering.
SD-WAN: Optimizes application performance and enhances bandwidth management.
SSL VPN: Provides reliable and secure access for remote workers.

What benefits should users expect from Fortinet FortiGate?

High-performance Security: Delivers effective threat mitigation with high availability.
Centralized Management: Simplifies network operations with cloud-based management tools.
Detailed Analytics: Provides comprehensive insights into network activity and security threats.
Load Balancing: Ensures optimal resource distribution and traffic management.

Fortinet FortiGate is crucial in sectors like education, offering robust networks for secure data flow between campuses and facilitating remote learning. In enterprise environments, it allows efficient management of application traffic and security across multiple branches, while in the cloud, it seamlessly integrates with diverse platforms to enhance security infrastructure.

Fortinet

Azure Firewall is a user-friendly, intuitive, cloud-native firewall security solution that provides top-of-the-industry threat protection for all your Azure Virtual Network resources. Azure Firewall is constantly and thoroughly analyzing all traffic and data packets, making it a very valuable and secure fully stateful firewall as a service with built-in high availability and unrestricted cloud scalability. Azure Firewall allows users to create virtual IP addresses and provides for secure DDoS protection for the virtual machines on your network. It also provides fast and efficient east-west and north-south traffic security.

Azure Firewall is a managed, cloud-based network security service built to protect your Azure Virtual Network resources. It is a fully stateful firewall as a service with built-in high availability and unrestricted cloud scalability.

Azure Firewall has two significant offerings, Standard and Premium.

Azure Firewall Standard works directly with Microsoft Cyber Security and supplies excellent L3-L7 filtering and threat awareness. The proactive real-time threat awareness will quickly alert you and immediately deny all traffic to and from any known problematic or suspicious domains or IP addresses. Microsoft Cyber Security is updated continually to protect against all new and known potential threats at all times. To learn more about Azure Firewall Standard, click here.

Azure Firewall Premium provides everything the standard version does, and additionally adds extra levels of data encryption, network intrusion detection, extended URL filtering, and Web category filters. To learn more about the added features of Azure Firewall Premium, click here.

Key Benefits and Features of Azure Firewall:

High availability - You do not need load balancers with Azure Firewall; it's already built in and ready to go.
Self-scalability - Azure Firewall is intuitive and will auto-scale as needed based on traffic flow to be ready for peak traffic times.
Threat awareness - Using Microsoft Cyber Security to filter traffic, Azure Firewall will deny any known problematic threats to keep your network safe.
Additional IP addresses - You can securely add up to 250 public IP addresses with Azure Firewall
Improved web category filtering - You can set up specific protocols to allow or deny categories within websites that are deemed inappropriate for use within your network. You have the ability to organize categories based on a defined set of descriptions.

What our real users have to say:

Many PeerSpot users found Azure Firewall to be very user-friendly and easy to use. They liked that it offers seamless integration to the cloud and were especially pleased with the threat filtering options.

Regarding integration and threat intelligence, our users wrote:

“The most valuable feature is the integration into the overall cloud platform.”

“The most valuable feature is threat intelligence. It is based on filtering and can identify multiple threats.”

“I think that one of the best features is definitely the premium version, along with the IDPs in terms of the intrusion detection and prevention system.”

Microsoft

Zscaler enables the world’s leading organizations to securely transform their networks and applications for a mobile and cloud first world. Its flagship services, Zscaler Internet Access and Zscaler Private Access, create fast, secure connections between users and applications, regardless of device, location, or network. Zscaler services are 100% cloud-delivered and offer the simplicity, enhanced security, and improved user experience that traditional appliances or hybrid solutions are unable to match. Used in more than 185 countries, Zscaler operates the world’s largest cloud security platform, protecting thousands of enterprises and government agencies from cyberattacks and data loss.

Check more details: https://www.zscaler.com/produc...

Zscaler

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

Information Not Available

Zenith Live, Azure, Carlsberg Group

Buyer's Guide

Azure Firewall vs. Zscaler Cloud Firewall

April 2025

Free Report: Azure Firewall vs. Zscaler Cloud Firewall

Find out what your peers are saying about Azure Firewall vs. Zscaler Cloud Firewall and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

848,207 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our Azure Firewall vs. Zscaler Cloud Firewall report.

See our list of 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.