We performed a comparison between Check Point CloudGuard Network Security and Fortinet FortiGate-VM based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Features: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security offers a range of important capabilities including VPN Blade, IPS Blade, URL filtering, and Applications Control Blade. Fortinet FortiGate-VM is highly regarded for its robust security features such as geofencing, firewalling, IPS, antivirus, and intrusion prevention systems.
For Check Point CloudGuard Network Security, there is a need for improvements in the support system, cluster creation on AWS, data protection visibility, DLP feature, user interface, integration, cost reduction, documentation, and flexibility in deployment. Fortinet FortiGate-VM needs enhancements in key activation, throughput, web application firewall integration, technical support, integration simplicity, customization, pricing model, and web-filtering configuration.
Service and Support: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security has received both positive and negative feedback regarding its customer service. Some customers commend the technical support provided by the company, while others express dissatisfaction due to slow response times. Fortinet FortiGate-VM also has a combination of positive and negative reviews regarding its customer service. Some customers are content with the support they receive, while others believe that it requires improvement.
Ease of Deployment: Check Point's setup is user-friendly and straightforward, although some mention that it may require technical expertise and can be complex. The initial setup for Fortinet is generally easy and straightforward. The deployment time ranges from a few hours to a week, depending on the complexity and size.
Pricing: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is regarded as costly to set up, however, it provides excellent security and value. Fortinet FortiGate-VM is competitively priced and more affordable than certain alternatives. That said, expenses may rise when scaling or incorporating additional functionalities.
ROI: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security offers a notable ROI range of 80% to 85% and delivers enhanced benefits and performance. Fortinet FortiGate-VM ensures stability and heightened security, garnering positive ratings for ROI from users. It is crucial to exercise caution while sizing to prevent any potential financial losses.
Comparison Results: Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is the preferred product compared to Fortinet FortiGate-VM. Users find the initial setup of Check Point CloudGuard Network Security simple and user-friendly. Check Point CloudGuard Network Security offers valuable features such as VPN Blade, IPS Blade, URL filtering, and Applications Control Blade, along with advanced threat prevention capabilities.
"LinkGreat firewall capabilities"
"Fortinet FortiGate protects against internet-based threats, both internal and external. It is scalable, stable, easy to use, and easy to install."
"Whenever we raise a complaint with FortiGate, their response and resolution times are minimal."
"Using this product makes the VPN seamless and almost invisible to me in the sense that I don't have to think about it."
"I like how we can achieve total integration."
"The notable features that I have found most valuable are that it includes the antivirus, and also IPS, and even SD-WAN."
"The most valuable feature of Fortinet FortiGate is load balancing. It can provide central management and VPNA. Additionally, it has enhanced our security environment."
"Overall security features and performance routing is good."
"It matches what we have on-prem. We kept the same management and the same functionality that we were having on-prem. It has simplified things for us because there is no new dashboard to touch."
"The scalability is very good; again, very user-friendly. I wouldn't even say "user-friendly" because, as long as you deploy it properly, you can kill an EC2 and it will spin up another one right away, within about a minute and a half. And it will be ready for production right away."
"We are using gateways, and I appreciate the high-availability gateways they have. They stand out more than the competitors."
"Monitoring using SmartConsole and all its features is extremely easy, and I find SmartEvent an excellent monitoring tool for spotting threats and user behaviour."
"Check Point is one of the few solutions that pay attention to cloud security. Many others mostly focus on providing on-premises solutions."
"The tool's most valuable feature is its scalability. You will only have to pay less for scaling up. Its notable benefit is deployment complexity. Regional deployment is simpler compared to on-premise setup."
"Any kind of cloud environment anywhere can be protected through this effortlessly."
"The most valuable feature for us is the ability to run the gateways as virtual machines in our virtual data center. The tool protects the virtual data centers."
"The most valuables features are the ease of use and deployment."
"The pricing of the solution is good."
"The user interface is the most valuable aspect of the solution."
"The dashboards are a good feature."
"It’s easy to integrate the solution with our network infrastructure."
"FortiGate integrates well."
"It is highly scalable because it has a mesh architecture that allows consistent policies."
"FortiGate is a nice and very good product."
"Fortinet FortiGate could improve by having better visibility. Palo Alto has better visibility."
"Its reporting capabilities can be improved. It should have some out-of-the-box reporting capabilities and some degree of customization. The basic reporting that it currently has is not sufficient to create more usable reports. It needs some sort of out-of-the-box reporting. They try to make customers purchase FortiAnalyzer for this kind of reporting, which is an additional cost. Other firewall vendors, such as SonicWall and Sophos, provide this sort of reporting without any additional cost."
"To some degree, it's almost a question as to why some of this stuff isn't simpler. For example, for an AP deployment, while it's integrated, the number of steps that you have to go through in order to get the AP up, seems like a lot."
"FortiGate support could do some improvements on their IPv6 configuration. Right now it's still in the very early stage for utilizing in an enterprise level network environment."
"With FortiGate, the main complaint that I have heard is about the technical support."
"A lack of integration between our data centers."
"One area for improvement is the performance on the bandwidth demands for smaller devices, as well as better web filtering."
"The main aspect of FortiGate that could be improved is load balancing. Our management team does not want to buy another appliance for only load balancing."
"I would like to see a step-by-step initial installation of the firewall. That would be really helpful. Like in Oracle appliances, when you start it asks you, what's your current IP address? An initial setup should be a step by step and intuitive process. You click on "begin," it asks you some simple questions. You fill in the blanks - your current IP address, what you want to do, you want to set up a site to site VPN, for example, that kind of thing. That would be the smartest thing to have."
"The price of the solution could be reduced, it is expensive."
"In the next release, including VRF support would be highly beneficial."
"Greater automation would reduce the need for manual configuration and management."
"The costs are high."
"The product can still grow."
"The solution's integration with cloud providers has seen significant development in the past months, but there is room for improvement for better integration."
"Check Point CloudGuard Network Security needs to improve the management of the actual firewalls. Improvement is also needed for the consolidated UI of different security aspects."
"Some issues with connecting to the VPN from home after firmware updates."
"I have worked on some of the largest and smallest solutions that Fortinet sells and they all scale really well."
"We have encountered certain issues with the bandwidth in respect of the security layer."
"They should keep us up to date about the latest version. That's the biggest thing. Currently, we have to go looking for the latest version. We should get notified about what's going on with the versions. I would like to see easier dual-factor authentication."
"The key activation is very complicated at times."
"The tool is expensive."
"The one thing that could be improved is the integration with the exchange. The gateway level controls can be enhanced a bit more. For example, it's still little here and there. You do get malicious attacks and suspicious emails like spam. It's not like Sophos where we got a lot of spam email, and yet, it's still relatively vulnerable. It can be upgraded, maybe with a fifth-generation firmware that it is ready for unknown threats."
"We haven't attempted to scale the solution just yet. If we want to scale this solution we may have to look at other models. With certain requirements, we probably wouldn't be able to scale it so well as it is right now."
More Check Point CloudGuard Network Security Pricing and Cost Advice →
Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is ranked 8th in Firewalls with 121 reviews while Fortinet FortiGate-VM is ranked 9th in Firewalls with 113 reviews. Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is rated 8.6, while Fortinet FortiGate-VM is rated 8.4. The top reviewer of Check Point CloudGuard Network Security writes "Highly reliable, great visibility, and centralized management". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Fortinet FortiGate-VM writes "An easy-to-manage and configure tool that provides ample documentation to help with the setup phase". Check Point CloudGuard Network Security is most compared with Azure Firewall, VMware NSX, Akamai Guardicore Segmentation, Cisco Secure Firewall and Palo Alto Networks VM-Series, whereas Fortinet FortiGate-VM is most compared with Azure Firewall, Palo Alto Networks VM-Series, Fortinet FortiOS and OPNsense. See our Check Point CloudGuard Network Security vs. Fortinet FortiGate-VM report.
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