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Check Point CloudGuard Network Security vs Cisco Secure Workload comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 12, 2025

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

Check Point CloudGuard Netw...
Ranking in Cloud and Data Center Security
6th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
152
Ranking in other categories
Firewalls (8th), Managed Security Services Providers (MSSP) (1st), Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (3rd), WAN Edge (3rd), Unified Threat Management (UTM) (6th)
Cisco Secure Workload
Ranking in Cloud and Data Center Security
7th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (14th), Microsegmentation Software (4th), Cisco Security Portfolio (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Cloud and Data Center Security category, the mindshare of Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is 1.4%, down from 2.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Secure Workload is 14.0%, up from 12.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud and Data Center Security
 

Featured Reviews

Martin Raška - PeerSpot reviewer
Unification of security features strengthens network protection
The overall network security is good. It's big-picture, all in one bundle. It's valuable to have everything in one place instead of spreading across different products. Unified security management positively affects a company's security operations. They have one unified view of the security. I can connect multiple gateways to the management and have it in one place. I can have reporting and views in a single pane of glass on the consolidated platform. It's easy to use. The management is the best on the market. It's very easy to work with, read, understand, and navigate. It helps increase our customer's security posture. We can see in some cases CloudGuard improves our customers' posture overall.
Raj Metkar - PeerSpot reviewer
Discover internal application dependencies and create a dependency map
We actively seek improvements in integrating the Infoblox DDI platform with Cisco Secure Workload. This integration allows Cisco Secure Workload to learn about our networks and network tags, providing valuable insights into vulnerabilities related to the operating system and various applications installed on our servers. Recently, Cisco announced a new product called HyperShield, an AI-based autonomous micro-segmentation solution. While Cisco has not stated that HyperShield will replace Cisco Secure Workload, it represents a natural evolution for the company. HyperShield features dynamic policy discovery and enforcement; however, once policies are enforced, they do not change until a discovery occurs, requiring a re-enforcement process. This new platform operates autonomously, minimizing the need for user or security engineer intervention. I would have expected Cisco to incorporate more automatic discovery and enforcement features within the existing Cisco Secure Workload product. Instead of enhancing the current product, they have introduced a new solution. Cisco plans to honor existing Tetration licenses, allowing users to transition to HyperShield without additional costs, reflecting the investment enterprises have already made. From Cisco’s perspective, this represents a natural progression in their product line. While the product name changes, it seems more of a rebranding effort. The enhancements are greater autonomy, improved discovery, and automatic enforcement, which are now being introduced in HyperShield. Cisco Secure Workload offers automatic policy enforcement but cannot adjust policies dynamically as the application needs to change. Having used the platform for the past five years, the recent announcement has been reassuring. Cisco has confirmed that our investment in the platform will not go to waste. They will honor our existing licenses, providing a natural migration path to the new solution without any disruption

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 feature for me is that you have just one license. You can test and implement everything you need with one license. You do not need to pay for separate module licenses when you want IPS or other features."
"It enabled us to move to cloud workloads safely while having the same level of security as we have on-prem."
"We get good insights into security, and we are more secure because we have more insights than we would get from other products."
"Check Point CloudGuard technical support is good."
"There's a whole range of functions that make up prevention against malware and everything. It’s not just one aspect that garners my attention - the whole application is being used to defend."
"The security configuration features have enhanced the reliable coordination of programs and data safety."
"It makes my life easier. I have on-prem and cloud firewalls. I can use the same policies in both places."
"Additionally, the centralized reporting and management, accessible through a single pane of glass, offer consistency and efficiency across multi-cloud environments."
"The solution offers 100% telemetry coverage. The telemetry you collect is not sampled, it's not intermittent. It's complete. You see everything in it, including full visibility of all activities on your endpoints and in your network."
"Scalability is its most valuable feature."
"The only use case I can see that makes sense is micro-segmentation. I think there are other use cases for it. The main purpose of the product is to do micro-segmentation by collecting IP. That could be done by installing an agent, and then you have all the communication coming in and out. You could also use some flow sensors installed in the network that receive a copy of the traffic and then report that back to the system."
"Secure Workload's best feature is that it's an end-to-end offering from Cisco."
"The product offers great visibility into the network so we can enforce security measures."
"By using Tetration insight, we are able to get the latency on our level accounts and we can determine whatever the issue is with the application latency itself."
"The most valuable feature is micro-segmentation, which is the most important with respect to visibility."
"Generally speaking, Cisco support is considered one of the best in the networking products and stack."
 

Cons

"The relationship between AWS and Check Point could be better. We had issues related to the type of instance and how it interconnects with AWS or cloud-native solutions. We overcame the pain points that we had, and now, AWS is evolving in a way that will facilitate how Check Point works. Our pain points were minimized, but they were there."
"There is room for improvement, especially concerning the integration with the management center. It would be beneficial if tasks that currently require scripts could be performed directly from the GUI."
"It needs to cover additional kinds of infrastructure, like containers and serverless options. It's somewhat limited in that area."
"I believe that presentations on artificial intelligence indicate that analyzing logs via SmartEvent and SmartLog Security Event Information Management can offer insights into emerging trends and potential next steps. By correlating logs related to BYOD, BYOL, and Shadow IT, it will become easier to manage and hopefully mitigate or understand risks."
"They are coming out with more SD-WAN express route support from a firewall perspective. That would be great."
"Check Point CloudGuard is not a feature-centric product because Check Point concentrates on security."
"From the policy optimization point of view, they can do better. This is not just for CloudGuard. CloudGuard is one little piece managed by Check Point. They can also integrate a third-party policy management solution to improve that. For example, Tufin is focused on policy optimization and management."
"The operations require skilled manpower with extended experience of working with networking systems for better results."
"The interface is really helpful for technical people, but it is not user-friendly."
"It is highly scalable, but there is a limitation that it is only available on Cisco devices."
"There was a controversy when Cisco reduced the amount of data they kept, and the solution became quite cost-intensive, which made its adoption challenging….Although they have modified it now, I preferred the previous version, and I wish all the functionality were back under the same product."
"It is not so easy to use and configure. It needs a bunch of further resources to work, which is mainly the biggest downside of it. The deployment is huge."
"Secure Workload is a little complicated to use, and the dashboard isn't intuitive, so it takes a while to learn how to use it."
"The product must be integrated with the cloud."
"I'd like to see better documentation for advanced features. The documentation is fairly basic. I would also like to see better integration with other applications."
"The multi-tenancy, redundancy, backup and restore functionalities, as well as the monitoring aspects of the solution, need improvement. The solution offers virtually no enterprise-grade possibility for monitoring."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price could be better."
"I know that we have an enterprise agreement with Check Point. That gives us some benefits, but I do not have more information about that."
"The price of Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is very high compared to other solutions, such as Fortinet FortiMail. For the over 2,000 mailboxes we use with the solution it is very expensive."
"Licensing is simply by the number of hosts that you are looking to protect within your environment. It makes it much easier to ensure that you are covering your environment."
"CloudGuard Network Security's pricing is fine."
"It is not expensive, but it is a little bit above the middle range. There are other solutions that are a little more expensive than this, but they also have some interesting features."
"We have a pretty good partnership with Check Point. We have a global subscription and agreement. They give us a pretty good corporate discount."
"As a partner and solution provider for the last fifteen years, I have distanced myself from specific numbers. However, customer trust in the product is evident due to its comprehensive protective capabilities."
"Pricing depends on the scope of the application and the features. Larger installations save more."
"The pricing is a bit higher than we anticipated."
"It is not cheap and pricing may limit scalability."
"Regarding price, Cisco Secure Workload can be expensive if you don't have a budget. If you're not doing micro-segmentation, every extra security measure or enforcement you're putting on top of your existing environment will be an extra cost. It's not a cheap solution at all. But from my point of view, if you need to do micro-segmentation, this is one of the best tools I've seen for it. I can't compare that to Microsoft's solution because I haven't looked into it. I've looked into VMware and Cisco. Those are the only two that I know of. I didn't know that Microsoft could do micro-segmentation at all. Maybe they can, but I haven't heard anything about it."
"The price is based on how many computers you're going to install it on."
"The cost for the hardware is around 300k."
"The price is outrageous. If you have money to throw at the product, then do it."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
20%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Retailer
6%
Computer Software Company
26%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Check Point CloudGuard Network Security?
The tool's most valuable feature is its management console.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Check Point CloudGuard Network Security?
Pricing in Jamaica is a major issue, with users often citing it as a reason for not using Check Point.
What needs improvement with Check Point CloudGuard Network Security?
They could improve the documentation. The interface is fine for me since I have been using it for some time.
What do you like most about Cisco Secure Workload?
The product provides multiple-device integration.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Secure Workload?
CloudStrike offers antivirus capabilities and firewall features for servers and VDI but lacks automatic policy discovery. This raises questions about the resources required to discover and write po...
What needs improvement with Cisco Secure Workload?
We actively seek improvements in integrating the Infoblox DDI platform with Cisco Secure Workload. This integration allows Cisco Secure Workload to learn about our networks and network tags, provid...
 

Also Known As

CloudGuard IaaS, Check Point vSEC, CloudGuard IaaS, Check Point Virtual Systems, Check Point CloudGuard Network Security
Cisco Tetration
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Physicians Choice Laboratory Services, Helvetica Insurance
ADP, University of North Carolina Charlotte (UNCC)
Find out what your peers are saying about Check Point CloudGuard Network Security vs. Cisco Secure Workload and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.