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Barracuda Email Protection vs Sophos Email comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 3, 2024

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
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
Email Archiving (2nd)
Sophos Email
Ranking in Email Security
10th
Ranking in Office 365 Protection
1st
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
34
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 Sophos Email is 2.0%, down from 2.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Email Security Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Sophos Email2.0%
Barracuda Email Protection3.3%
Other94.7%
Email Security
 

Featured Reviews

LeeMiles - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
Kalyan  Chowdhury - PeerSpot reviewer
Founder at Computech infosysetm
Stronger email and mobile security has protected users from ransomware and simplified management
Price is obviously a challenging part, and I think it is the biggest problem we have suffered from over the last two or three years due to a 7 to 8% hike per year, twice a year, which is why we have some renewals on Sophos Email, Sophos XDR, EDR, and the firewall, but due to price hike, they are unable to renew it. The price is going to be very high. It would be better if Sophos can provide a more flexible pricing model for different types of businesses. Price could be lower. The main competitor for Sophos in the market is Palo Alto, which has reduced their price by more than 35 to 40%, making it a very challenging part to sell this product. Palo Alto provides the same functionality for email security, which adds to the challenge because the price is going very high.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"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 most valuable features of Barracuda Email Protection are flexibility and customization."
"The most helpful aspect for me is the out-of-the-box configuration, which is fairly good."
"The product is easy to deploy and maintain."
"The archiving and search features are very good."
"We now have a secondary backup of Office 365 that's much easier to retrieve compared to Microsoft. If someone deletes something in Office 365, we can get it back within Office 365, but it's difficult. Barracuda is much easier. There is a lot less management needed using Barracuda. The management becomes much easier for Office 365 and it's no longer on-prem, so there are fewer hours managing on-prem devices, servers, and things of that nature. We don't have network appliances anymore for the backup of our information."
"I'm quite satisfied with the graphical user interface for Barracuda products."
"Our client recently received many emails, and their employees didn't realize these emails were phishing attempts. Consequently, they clicked on them and fell victim to the attack. Therefore, it is important to secure their system with Sophos Email Security."
"The deployment is very easy. It's quite straightforward."
"Sophos already has Sandbox, and if any issues are identified, Sophos blocks that particular mail and site instantly, which is why customers are very happy and safe from other attacks."
"There are many features that are important, but among those, the spam protection feature is very valuable. It help us to safeguard the email against phishing and ensures that there is maximum security enabled for our communication processes. It has a huge role in protecting our emails from potential threats."
"The tool is a good solution for protecting against email attacks and monitoring networks. It supports our compliance efforts and is easy to use and stable."
"The anti-malware, risk scanning has been pretty spot on."
"Sophos Email offers encryption and malware protection, provides visibility into emails, has 99% accuracy in catching spam, enhances organizational safety, integrates with various vendors like Microsoft, is deployable with any email service, prevents data loss, features authentication rules, synchronizes with Active Directory and Azure, and includes a self-service portal. The product is very flexible."
"Sophos Email is in the cloud and integrated with its firewall."
 

Cons

"I would like to see better integration with other products."
"The solution's reporting mechanism is a little poor and could be improved."
"The solution's graphical user interface (GUI) could be improved visually."
"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."
"There is room for improvement, particularly in reaching out to technical support during deployment."
"The product must enable bulk user management."
"Two to three months back, we got fraudulent emails in which someone in the organization was being blamed."
"The platform's pricing needs improvement."
"The solution's sandboxing and spam control features could be improved."
"Sophos Email could improve DLP features."
"Sophos Email has few improvements to implement, including the handling of incoming emails in the systems. It needs to add additional feature that helps in enhancing the scanning processes of these emails. While adding these features, it should work towards improving the current features also."
"The main drawback is regarding the technical support."
"The security of the solution could improve."
"However, the setup was tricky, particularly with the DNS routing between Microsoft Exchange Online and Sophos cloud services. It took me about four attempts to get it working correctly. Despite that, Sophos Email does everything we need, so we don't require any additional capabilities now."
"A lot of legit emails get quarantined."
"It was sometimes hard to find the settings in the solution's interface."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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."
"The price is similar to that of Microsoft 365."
"Despite a list price possibly around $40 per user, their market price allows customers to easily buy the solution."
"The product is 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."
"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 price of Barracuda Essentials is better than some of the competing products."
"The tool's price is reasonable. On a yearly basis, there is a 20 percent increase in prices, but it is not an issue."
"The pricing is quite reasonable, with a fixed cost and no additional charges."
"I rate the price of Sophos Email a four out of five."
"Sophos Email is a little expensive for us, but it's necessary. We have a subscription and renew it every three years."
"Sophos Email is neither cheap nor expensive."
"I would rate the pricing of Sophos Email as a six. It is considered affordable as a standalone product, and there are no additional costs besides licensing. The pricing is fixed."
"The product is cheaper compared to other solutions."
"There is an additional fee for their central managed console."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Construction Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise5
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise5
 

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 do you like most about Sophos Email?
The solution's identity proxy feature is very good and reliable.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Sophos Email?
Regarding Sophos Email pricing, I would rate it between six or seven out of ten.
What needs improvement with Sophos Email?
Price is obviously a challenging part, and I think it is the biggest problem we have suffered from over the last two or three years due to a 7 to 8% hike per year, twice a year, which is why we hav...
 

Also Known As

Barracuda Essentials
Sophos Email Security
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ACT Government, Acumen Group, AGIP, Delta Dental Plans Association, Desai/Nasr Consulting Engineers, Inc., Equinox Information Systems
Del Monte Foods, Terra Verde, spicerhaart, RIVERLITE, Dataprise, SureBridge, Reed's School, Sayfol International School
Find out what your peers are saying about Barracuda Email Protection vs. Sophos Email and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,853 professionals have used our research since 2012.