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Barracuda Email Protection vs Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 19, 2026

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

Cloudflare One
Sponsored
Ranking in Email Security
20th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (12th), Data Loss Prevention (DLP) (21st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (13th), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (8th), Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (12th), Access Management (11th), Bot Management (3rd), ZTNA as a Service (9th), ZTNA (4th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (10th), Remote Browser Isolation (RBI) (3rd)
Barracuda Email Protection
Ranking in Email Security
6th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
26
Ranking in other categories
Email Archiving (3rd), Security Incident Response (6th), Office 365 Protection (4th)
Cisco Secure Email Threat D...
Ranking in Email Security
19th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
16
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Email Security category, the mindshare of Cloudflare One is 1.6%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Barracuda Email Protection is 2.8%, down from 2.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is 1.1%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Email Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Barracuda Email Protection2.8%
Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense1.1%
Cloudflare One1.6%
Other94.5%
Email Security
 

Featured Reviews

CV
Network Architect at IP Dimension
Cloud security has improved remote access and has reduced costs for smaller client sites
I have used Cloudflare One's Identity-Aware Proxy, and it is quite straightforward from what I have seen so far. The app registration on the Azure side integrates fully into Cloudflare, and I am very satisfied with that part because it is easy to set up. The integration of Cloudflare One's Secure Web Gateway and Zero Trust Network Access works without any issues. That part is pretty automatic, and if you complete the rest of the setup, it comes together by itself with no issues from my side. What makes it nice is that we can actually start replacing on-site firewalls at this stage for the smaller clients because it does not matter if they go to a coffee shop or work from home; they are still secured by the same connection. The hops get shorter and you get better latency. We have done testing to see if it is better. One thing that we did notice with our proof of concept with our current client is that they have people connecting from the UK. When they used their previous VPN solution, uploading CAD drawings and other files to the server took a long time. They mentioned that it is much quicker on Cloudflare One's solution. I definitely believe that is part of the improved performance, and I am satisfied with that as well. What is nice about Cloudflare One is that it makes the setup easier and also easier to train technicians to maintain it. Compared to legacy systems, we do not need to get fancy firewalls in place that are costly. That is definitely also a cost-saver with Cloudflare One.
Xavie Simons - PeerSpot reviewer
Business Development Manager at Procter & Gamble
Improved email security has reduced spam, simplified encrypted mail, and strengthened user trust
The best features Barracuda Email Protection offers include good spam filtering and very good sandboxing of all links, as well as good encryption. It also has integrated logging for user management of their own spam. It has better filtering technology, so few are false positives as well, with excellent anti-spam engines and logging. It is extremely easy to install, configure, and set up, and there is excellent message tracking for folks that say they have not received an email they were expecting. Integrated logging and user management make my daily work easier because it is very easy to log in and to manage this tool, hence making it a very good tool for email protection. It also has excellent, easy-to-add designated users as site administrators, and it is competitively priced. It has a user-friendly portal, strong cloud-based features, and no additional maintenance cost, along with responsive support. Barracuda Email Protection has positively impacted my organization by handling encryption better than any other tool I have used before, which has increased our email protection significantly. Our security has also increased from forty percent to sixty-five percent, especially when dealing with all the threats that come through emails. It has been a great tool because we can handle email delays and delays on file scanning. When our partners are happy, we are very happy, and it has helped us have less time chasing bad emails. The fast implementation of encrypted mail keeps employees working with less interruption since they are happy, satisfied, and secure.
reviewer2541525 - PeerSpot reviewer
Principal Cyber Prevent and Defense Engineer at a comms service provider with 1,001-5,000 employees
Clawback feature performs well but analytics and integration capabilities need improvement
The integration capability with other threat intelligence platforms is not optimal, as I have experienced difficulty in sending logs to our SIEM. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense's flexibility could be enhanced while it mostly integrates with cloud solutions, but not on-premise. The behavioral analysis capability of Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is not particularly helpful for identifying new, evolving threats within my company, as it keeps flagging legitimate emails as malicious. Regarding room for improvement, the significant number of false positives should be addressed. The solution does not adapt to behavioral analytics and does not make changes when it sees a pattern.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution has different options that can be used to differentiate DDoS attacks."
"Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform removes the risk of exposing the applications to the public."
"It will take the blow rather than our applications should an attack occur."
"Using Cloudflare One makes my work quite easy because for DDoS protection, all I need to do is understand the OSI model and click; it makes it easier than trying to write a command line or use a Linux command."
"Enables me to work from two locations."
"Cloudflare Access is a stable solution."
"It's the endpoint exposition. We don't need to expose our VPN server to the internet and need a zero-test solution. I can apply some conditional access to the endpoint that's connecting to our network to check their security policies or the security condition of their workstation. Once the workstation is trying to connect to my internal network, then I would like to check the discrete condition of these endpoints that are trying to access my internal network. We created some conditional access. We have CrowdStrike, to check if the CrowdStrike is installed, to check if it's updated, and to check for Windows updates. We created some conditional policies to check it."
"Cloudflare DDoS is better than its competitors for its security, deployment, and scalability."
"The most valuable feature is the gateway."
"The best feature of Barracuda Email Protection is that it provides protection for Microsoft 365."
"The most valuable features of Barracuda Essentials are it's a trusted name and is rated very high on review sites. It blocks high percentages of spam and junk email and it's in the cloud. They have hardware appliances, but this is in the cloud. The solution is very effective at blocking malware and blocking spam and this is what we are looking for. There's not a whole lot of complexity, you want a solution that is very good at blocking out all of the unwanted emails."
"The solution is straightforward to set up."
"The main benefits Barracuda Email Protection provides for us are saving time and money because we don't run into any kind of attack or disruption in the mail service that we may face, including ransomware attacks."
"We check the reports sometimes to see that frequent attacks and malicious emails are being blocked by the solution."
"The archiving and search features are very good."
"I don't see any other email security solution that stacks up against them."
"Regarding stability, Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is very stable."
"Cisco has a threat mechanism called cloud-based Talos, where all the threats are inbuilt."
"I highly recommend it as one of the best choices."
"Overall, it's certainly a very good idea to integrate another layer on top of Microsoft Advanced Threat Protection."
"This solution is easy to use."
"Currently, the ease of deployment is the low-hanging fruit for Cisco email security."
"The advanced threat analytics and URL filtering in threat detection are good features that are working well."
"I would say it's very comprehensive, with multiple antivirus OEMs, virus encrypt features, encryption, and more."
 

Cons

"Cloudflare One is not very powerful, but for what we require, it is basic and sufficient."
"Feedback could be enhanced. While I work efficiently with Clover as a partner in Mexico City, sometimes the information and requests are easier to manage with more concrete solutions."
"For the topic of improvement, providing some training material is one of my suggestions."
"The tool should provide on-premise versions. Currently, all versions are cloud-based."
"Feedback could be enhanced."
"When there are any dynamic changes in complex applications, the tool takes a lot of time, making its analytics-related area a major matter of concern where improvements are needed."
"They don't have a person to provide support for customers using the solution under their free plan."
"The response time for support must be reduced."
"Two to three months back, we got fraudulent emails in which someone in the organization was being blamed."
"The solution's reporting mechanism is a little poor and could be improved."
"Sometimes it is somewhat laggy, especially on the Archiver side. It should have improved performance on their Message Archiver."
"The product must enable bulk user management."
"Regarding the price, I find it pretty expensive. It is not even reasonable; it is pretty expensive because we are dealing with the South African market and our currency is not as powerful as the dollar."
"There is room for improvement, particularly in reaching out to technical support during deployment."
"Barracuda Email Protection can be improved by enhancing the reporting feature."
"Considering it integrates with Azure, I would like to be able to effectively set up policies where people are by default included in certain settings."
"The tool gives false positives and it needs to be more accurate. I would like to see AI as a new feature."
"I wouldn't recommend Cisco to others because I think Fortinet is better."
"The physical appliance has been discontinued, although the platform still exists."
"The pricing could always be better."
"We encounter issues while searching for missing emails."
"The search area has room for improvement. When you go to the next page, it remains at the bottom of the current page that you're on. Also, under the reports section, it allows you to see any "convictions," but if you want to search for those convictions you have to remember when they all came in and go back and edit the search accordingly. You cannot click on the list of convictions to actually see if you had a spike at a certain time."
"This solution could be improved by integration with Sandbox."
"From a technical point of view, Cisco is far behind in terms of cybersecurity, and it has to improve very much."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The prices are slightly expensive."
"The pricing is somewhere in the middle. I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten."
"My company has to make yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to the solution. There are no hidden charges apart from the licensing costs of the solution."
"The pricing of the solution is cheap. The licensing cost is also very low. I rate the cost and pricing a three out of ten."
"The price tag is no longer $200,000, but rather $300,000 to $400,000. It's twice."
"The solution's pricing lacks transparency."
"The solution is not that expensive."
"Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform's pricing is good."
"We pay annually. They never charged us for anything else. And they were quite a bit under that $20,000 mark. It was $19,074. And they've been pretty good about not skyrocketing the price or anything like that. It has gone up. It's gone up to $24,000 in 2020."
"Barracuda licensing model is good."
"The price of Barracuda Essentials is better than some of the competing products."
"Despite a list price possibly around $40 per user, their market price allows customers to easily buy the solution."
"The solution's pricing is moderate, where it is neither cheap nor expensive."
"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a seven out of ten."
"We didn't have to pay a lot for the solution because we got it from a good vendor with a good user volume."
"The product is expensive."
"The solution’s pricing is manageable."
"The feedback from vendors and customer is that it is expensive."
"It is expensive compared to other vendors."
"Cisco Secure Email Cloud Mailbox does not have any competition with Sophos, Trend Micro, or other vendors of the world. However, there is a pricing premium for the solution. One has to look at it from that angle that while they are buying Cisco, there will be a premium, and Cisco justifies that premium value. That's why they're charging a high price."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
19%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Marketing Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
7%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise12
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise13
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise7
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access has strong integration with Microsoft, among other platforms. However, when it comes to Kaspersky, ...
What is your primary use case for Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access provides secure access to internal applications for employees, external members of the organization...
What advice do you have for others considering Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access is one of the best integrations available. While about two hundred vendors offer similar services, ...
What do you like most about Barracuda Email Protection?
Barracuda Email Protection is easy to deploy and maintain. It doesn't require a specialized resource to manage this t...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Barracuda Email Protection?
I would say the price for Barracuda Email Protection is very nice; the solution is not expensive.
What needs improvement with Barracuda Email Protection?
Considering it integrates with Azure, I would like to be able to effectively set up policies where people are by defa...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Secure Email Threat Defense?
Comparatively with other products, the pricing of Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is normal. As a technical guide, ...
What needs improvement with Secure Email Threat Defense?
We have deployed Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense in two customer environments. It is still in development as a new ...
What is your primary use case for Secure Email Threat Defense?
We are working with Cloud Mail Gateway and on-premise mail gateways. We have worked with Cisco Secure Email Threat De...
 

Also Known As

Cloudflare Area 1 Email Security, Cloudflare Bot Management, Cloudflare Gateway, Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform, Cloudflare DDoS, Cloudflare SASE & SSE Platform
Barracuda Essentials, Barracuda Forensics and Incident Response
Cisco Secure Email Cloud Mailbox, Cisco CMD, Cisco Cloud Mailbox Defense
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

23andMe
ACT Government, Acumen Group, AGIP, Delta Dental Plans Association, Desai/Nasr Consulting Engineers, Inc., Equinox Information Systems
Luiss University, Lone Star College, T-Systems, Magyar Telekom
Find out what your peers are saying about Barracuda Email Protection vs. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
899,125 professionals have used our research since 2012.