Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Barracuda Email Protection vs Proofpoint Email Protection comparison

 

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

Barracuda Email Protection
Ranking in Email Security
13th
Ranking in Office 365 Protection
4th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
Email Archiving (2nd), Security Incident Response (7th)
Proofpoint Email Protection
Ranking in Email Security
2nd
Ranking in Office 365 Protection
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
55
Ranking in other categories
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (4th), Digital Risk Protection (3rd), Secure Email Gateway (SEG) (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Email Security category, the mindshare of Barracuda Email Protection is 3.3%, up from 2.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Proofpoint Email Protection is 7.9%, down from 8.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Email Security Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Proofpoint Email Protection7.9%
Barracuda Email Protection3.3%
Other88.8%
Email Security
 

Featured Reviews

Sherif Fouad - PeerSpot reviewer
Group ICT Manager at a mining and metals company with 501-1,000 employees
Have raised concerns about scanning engines and automation while continuing to rely on layered protection strategies
Incident response is something that requires more development from Barracuda's side. Regarding room for improvement for Barracuda Forensics and Incident Response, for the product, developing or improving the scanning engine is important, but it's a bit tricky. I know that they are working on it heavily. The difference between Barracuda and Sophos is Sophos focused heavily on cybersecurity while Barracuda tried to increase their product portfolio. Sometimes, in some cases, this might end up with their teams being unfocused or a bit thin and stretched and super busy. However, there is room for improvement. The product is great. The teams that are supporting are great. But there is always room for improvement. Even if you have a product that you would give a rating of 10 out of 10, there is always room for improvement. The day we stop improving is the day we die. Regarding the scanning engine, Barracuda Forensics and Incident Response has a very good feature where you can create automated flows for how to handle specific emails that are detected as incidents. This needs a bit of an improvement. That's the only component of Barracuda Forensics and Incident Response that I believe requires improvement.
Steve Bradbury - PeerSpot reviewer
Consultant at Exelixis Inc
Email defenses have blocked advanced threats and provide deep visibility into risky users
The areas that have room for improvement in Proofpoint Email Protection include their cost of ownership, which is fairly high. To manage and run all their products, I have to list and manage administrators in seven or eight different places. That is too many places to keep track of since for this tool I have to go to one location, and for another tool I have to go to a different location. They need to simplify the administration management of administrators and consolidate that into one place for all their products. Access to all the different products is very scattered. For some products I go to one URL, and for different products I go to a different URL. They have a threat URL that has most of their products in it, but not all. They need to simplify the interface to show all the products I have access to in one location.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I'm quite satisfied with the graphical user interface for Barracuda products."
"The archiving and search features are very good."
"When we got the service, it included the email archiver with unlimited storage."
"I would rate the solution nine out of ten."
"The most helpful aspect for me is the out-of-the-box configuration, which is fairly good."
"The solution's most valuable feature is impersonation detection."
"We check the reports sometimes to see that frequent attacks and malicious emails are being blocked by the solution."
"The most valuable features are security and ease of use."
"The most valuable feature of Proofpoint Email Protection is the blocking capabilities, it blocks a lot of potential threats."
"The setup was easy."
"Proofpoint Email Protection is a good product, and its most beneficial feature is the Threat Response Auto-Pull. I also like that it's an integrated email security solution."
"Proofpoint Email Protection's initial installation is straightforward. It took us less than a day to complete the implementation."
"The solution offers very good flexibility. You can blacklist or whitelist with ease."
"The solution has very strong detection for most of the phishing and malicious emails received from the outside."
"Proofpoint Email Protection is the best solution from the perspective of email security."
"The most valuable features are the business email compromise protection and targeted attack prevention."
 

Cons

"The solution's reporting mechanism is a little poor and could be improved."
"There is room for improvement, particularly in reaching out to technical support during deployment."
"I would like to see better integration with other products."
"The platform's pricing needs improvement."
"They could simplify the licensing and the pricing."
"Barracuda Email Protection needs better reporting and more robust integration with security awareness training platforms and third-party solutions."
"The product must enable bulk user management."
"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."
"Some use cases haven't been dealt with yet."
"The stability and UI are the two areas of the solution with certain shortcomings that need improvement."
"Proofpoint has a lot of false alarms."
"The false positives are an issue."
"Integration for reporting needs to be improved, it's too complex."
"The setup requires expertise. It needs someone with experience on managing it, and I would rate the implementation as needing someone experienced."
"They do not have an on-demand scan for the internal viruses and internal users, and they don't have a scan for the exchange server against viruses and spam as Symantec does."
"The solution could lower its price."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price is similar to that of Microsoft 365."
"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."
"The solution's pricing is moderate, where it is neither cheap nor expensive."
"The product is 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."
"Barracuda licensing model is good."
"We didn't have to pay a lot for the solution because we got it from a good vendor with a good user volume."
"Price-wise, this product is middle-of-the-road."
"Proofpoint Email Protection has comparable pricing."
"I rate the product price a seven on a scale of one to ten, where one is low price and ten is high price."
"In general, the pricing is competitive."
"The solution charges per user per month to use it. There are not any additional fees in addition to the standard living fees."
"We sell annual licenses for this solution."
"The tool's pricing depends on the customer's preference, offering options for an annual license or a monthly subscription. The cost varies based on factors such as the number of users and specific requirements. Overall, the pricing is competitive."
"Proofpoint is fairly expensive."
"The end customer is buying our solution, which can be for monthly or annual usage depending on our payment and business model."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Email Security solutions are best for your needs.
881,227 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Construction Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise5
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business21
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise18
 

Questions from the Community

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 tool.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Barracuda Email Protection?
Their list price is too high, but in India, the selling price is affordable at around $10 per user per year. Despite a list price possibly around $40 per user, their market price allows customers t...
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 default included in certain settings. For instance, for email quarantine, I can't se...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Proofpoint Email Protection?
In terms of pricing, it is okay compared to others. I would say it is normal. Additional costs do come in, but it enhances security.
What needs improvement with Proofpoint Email Protection?
I believe they still need to improve by consolidating some portals, as currently, you have to log in separately to a few of them.
 

Also Known As

Barracuda Essentials, Barracuda Forensics and Incident Response
Proofpoint Enterprise Protection, Proofpoint Digital Protection
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ACT Government, Acumen Group, AGIP, Delta Dental Plans Association, Desai/Nasr Consulting Engineers, Inc., Equinox Information Systems
Blocket, University of Waterloo, Lincoln Memorial University, WellSpan Health, U-Haul, Carestream Health, Westinghouse
Find out what your peers are saying about Barracuda Email Protection vs. Proofpoint Email Protection and other solutions. Updated: January 2026.
881,227 professionals have used our research since 2012.