Barracuda Email Protection vs SonicWall Email Security comparison

Barracuda Email Protection vs. SonicWall Email Security

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Helped 879,425 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

Barracuda Email Protection

Ranking in Email Security

13th

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Email Archiving (2nd), Office 365 Protection (4th)

SonicWall Email Security

Ranking in Email Security

30th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

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 SonicWall Email Security is 0.6%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Email Security Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Barracuda Email Protection	3.3%
SonicWall Email Security	0.6%
Other	96.1%

Email Security

Featured Reviews

LeeMiles

Director, Information Technology at St Albans High School For Girls

Very good threat protection, spam filtering, and cloud backups

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 set up a global setting. Users must go through an induction session where I guide them in configuring quarantine alerts rather than having default settings based on group membership. This seems like an oversight since they already use Active Directory details. They should assign policies based on group membership, which configures these settings by default.

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Swapnil Kulkarni

System Administrator at Ador Powertron Ltd.

Has consistently supported security needs for mid-sized teams with affordable deployment

I do not work with Cloud Secure Edge, CSE, or SMA apart from SonicWall NSA. I am not satisfied with phishing protection, as it falls completely under the email domain security. The customizable policy configuration does not help to tailor email security overall because our systems are not integrated with SonicWall Email Security. We are not using reporting and analytics because it requires completely different software. While all required features are available in SonicWall Email Security for SMBs and startups, we lack analytics features. They provide an option to purchase a complete separate product for analytics, but despite initially having purchased the paper license, due to technical limitations or changes, we cannot use that product. Now they require additional fees to access the analytics feature.

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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

"The beauty of Barracuda Email Protection is that it is easy to manage and simple to deploy."

"The most valuable aspect includes attempts to spoof or compromise domains from external sources."

"When we got the service, it included the email archiver with unlimited storage."

"The best feature of Barracuda Email Protection is that it provides protection for Microsoft 365."

"Barracuda email protection is stable. I would give it a nine because of its strong cybersecurity features."

"I would rate the solution nine out of ten."

"The product is easy to deploy and maintain."

"The most helpful aspect for me is the out-of-the-box configuration, which is fairly good."

More Barracuda Email Protection pros

"There are no wasted extras and the interface is really simple."

"We always get ROI from the product we are using; it is completely flexible and acceptable according to our security requirements over the last four years and currently."

"SonicWall Email Security uses multi-layer cloud security."

"The most valuable feature is that it protects from spam."

"The pricing for SonicWall Email Security is reasonable and budget-friendly."

"Setup was easy. It took about 30 minutes."

"The most valuable features are the anti-spam, anti-phishing, anti-virus, and anti-spoofing."

"Beside a few issues with specificity in the email protection controls, this product is very good at handling email security."

More SonicWall Email Security pros

Cons

"The policies are set up in Barracuda by default; we don't have any control over them."

"Barracuda Email Protection needs better reporting and more robust integration with security awareness training platforms and third-party solutions."

"The platform's pricing needs improvement."

"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 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."

"Sometimes it is somewhat laggy, especially on the Archiver side. It should have improved performance on their Message Archiver."

"I would like to see some additional functionality in terms of employee monitoring, as part of a work-from-home security solution."

More Barracuda Email Protection cons

"SonicWall Email Security could improve by making the file blocking and the release feature easier to use"

"The technical support from the company is not always very good at solving issues, but they offer access to a good community of users where problems are easily solved."

"The pricing could be improved."

"There could be definition updates included in the subscription."

"The pricing could be improved."

"Updates could be released more frequently."

"I am not satisfied with phishing protection, as it falls completely under the email domain security."

"We would like to see more information on a dashboard about what is happening when it comes to spamming and malware."

More SonicWall Email Security cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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."

"We didn't have to pay a lot for the solution because we got it from a good vendor with a good user volume."

"Despite a list price possibly around $40 per user, their market price allows customers to easily buy the solution."

"The product is expensive."

"Price-wise, this product is middle-of-the-road."

"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."

"The price is similar to that of Microsoft 365."

More Barracuda Email Protection pricing and cost advice

"I rate the application’s pricing a five out of ten."

"Our customers purchase the solution's yearly license."

"We have a two-year license subscription and the price is very high."

"When compared with Cisco, it is very well priced. Cisco is very expensive."

"The platform offers a yearly license."

"The overall price of SonicWall Email Security should be reduced and there should be an option to purchase one or two licenses more instead of their current policy of bulk increases only. There should be more flexibility in the licensing model. Each license cost approximately $33 annually."

"The cost is cheaper than Sophos. I would rate it as five out of ten."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

14%

Manufacturing Company

Construction Company

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

Construction Company

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	12
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	5

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	11
Midsize Enterprise	3
Large Enterprise	3

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?

What do you like most about SonicWall Email Security?

According to our customers, the product's most valuable feature is the ability to detect spam and reduce phishing emails.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SonicWall Email Security?

The solution is affordable.

What needs improvement with SonicWall Email Security?

Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs Barracuda Email Protection

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Cisco Secure Email vs SonicWall Email Security

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Barracuda Email Security Gateway vs SonicWall Email Security

Compared 16% of the time

Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration vs SonicWall Email Security

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Product Reports

Barracuda Email Protection

Download Barracuda Email Protection product report

SonicWall Email Security

Download SonicWall Email Security product report

Also Known As

Barracuda Essentials

Dell SonicWALL Email Security Platform, SonicWall Hosted Email Security

Overview

The popularity of Microsoft 365 means criminals test and design their attacks to bypass its native security features. And that means you need additional layers of defense. With Advanced Threat Protection enabled, Barracuda uses multiple layers of detection, including signature, static, and behavioral analysis, along with CPU-emulation sandboxing to accurately detect and block zero-hour targeted attacks and ransomware.

Traditional email gateways use static rules and policies—reputation analysis, block lists, and malicious payloads—to determine if an email is malicious.

Barracuda protects your Microsoft 365 inbox against evasive threats with a powerful AI engine that learns the unique communication patterns within your organization through access to internal and historical emails. Once it understands what legitimate emails looks like for each user, it can detect anomalies that signal malicious intent. This context-based detection is more effective at blocking targeted attacks, which are designed to bypass traditional rule-based email security.

Barracuda Networks

SonicWALL Email Security Platform offers powerful protection to keep email threats out. And sensitive data in. With innovative protection techniques for both inbound and outbound email plus unique management tools, the Email Security platform delivers superior email protection today while standing ready to stop the new attacks of tomorrow.

SonicWall

Sample Customers

ACT Government, Acumen Group, AGIP, Delta Dental Plans Association, Desai/Nasr Consulting Engineers, Inc., Equinox Information Systems

Star Kay White, Locala Community Partnerships

Barracuda Email Protection vs. SonicWall Email Security