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Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN vs Prisma SD-WAN comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 16, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
7.3
Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN reduces WAN expenses, improves efficiency, and enhances reliability, with ROI in three years for most users.
Sentiment score
8.5
Prisma SD-WAN reduced costs by 50%, improved efficiency and security, and achieved ROI in two years.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.5
Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN support is highly rated for expertise and responsiveness, despite occasional delays and redirection challenges.
Sentiment score
6.9
Prisma SD-WAN support quality declined under Palo Alto, with slower response times and difficulty reaching experienced engineers reported.
Cisco's ongoing reorganizations have affected the quality of technical support, which varies depending on the engineer handling cases.
Since we are at a premium level, customer service is rated at eight or 8.9 out of ten.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.6
Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is praised for its scalability, suitable for diverse industries and enterprises, despite some technical expansion limits.
Sentiment score
7.7
Prisma SD-WAN provides scalable, efficient network solutions for enterprises, supporting easy expansion and high user satisfaction across locations.
Cisco SD-WAN is highly scalable and can be expanded to more than 10,000 sites.
The ease of configuration and features like zero-touch provisioning enhance the scalability of Cisco SD-WAN, especially in disaster recovery situations.
I rate it a ten out of ten since we can easily scale by just paying for additional licenses as needed.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.6
Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is stable and reliable, but complex setups and new deployments may face minor issues and bugs.
Sentiment score
8.2
Prisma SD-WAN's stability has greatly improved under Palo Alto, with minimal issues and high user satisfaction ratings.
While some software-related issues and bugs were encountered, they did not cause the whole environment to crash.
Stability is high, I rate it 9.8 out of ten.
 

Room For Improvement

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN needs cost efficiency, better interface, enhanced security, simplified licensing, and improved support and scalability.
Prisma SD-WAN needs improved documentation, support, security features, and better pricing, impacting usability, scalability, and connectivity.
Including more features like integrating with Splunk for monitoring vulnerabilities would help eliminate the need for other SOC solutions.
If there were an option to extend management to other firewalls, users could perform staggered migrations.
 

Setup Cost

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is costly compared to competitors, with complex licensing but offers comprehensive solutions and performance benefits.
Prisma SD-WAN offers advanced features and security, appealing to financial firms despite its higher cost compared to competitors.
Its pricing is justifiable due to the comprehensive solution it offers.
It is also relatively cost-effective for smaller businesses when using the Meraki version.
The price for Prisma is a bit high.
 

Valuable Features

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN offers centralized management, security, scalability, cloud integration, and enhances network performance and cost savings.
Prisma SD-WAN provides seamless VPNs, deep visibility, automation, and AI-driven analytics for efficient, secure, and flexible network management.
Security is standard compliant, eliminating config drift that was prevalent before manual configurations.
Integration with Cisco ISE, Cisco Firewalls, and other Cisco solutions is beneficial.
Prisma is a mature platform in terms of security.
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN
Ranking in Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
2nd
Ranking in WAN Edge
2nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
92
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (5th)
Prisma SD-WAN
Ranking in Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
4th
Ranking in WAN Edge
4th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (8th)
 

Featured Reviews

Igor Van Den Ouden - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables secure and flexible branch connectivity with application-aware routing
The valuable features of Cisco SD-WAN include its security policies and zone-based firewall that are applied to every site, as well as application-aware routing. Security is standard compliant, eliminating config drift that was prevalent before manual configurations. Application-aware routing offers flexibility in using different lines for traffic, depending on the policy implemented.
Libin Joseph - PeerSpot reviewer
Administration is very flexible for devices and policies; everything is in a single portal
In some areas, compared to other SD-WANs, Prisma SD-WAN has fewer features. First of all, sometimes, if one device is down, the other device will not come up. When there are two devices and we have created HA, that means one device gets a priority of 100 and the other is given 90. The 100 priority is active and the 90 is the backup. In some cases, the primary device is down, but the secondary device is not becoming active. In that case, we have to reboot the devices, causing an outage. I would also like to see improvement in the product training for customers. Palo Alto has not initiated very much training but they have to do so because this is a new product. If you have experience in a legacy environment, and you are moving to Prisma SD-WAN, you don't have a training framework. That is one of the disadvantages. Although they have a training portal, it is a read-only platform. They need training for engineers so that engineers can work very quickly and properly. And with software upgrades, sometimes the device does not come up and we have to do a manual restart. It doesn't happen every time, maybe one or two times out of 100. It's minimal but it does happen.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
44%
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Manufacturing Company
4%
Educational Organization
27%
Computer Software Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco SD-WAN?
When considering the most valuable features of Cisco SD-WAN, the decoupling of self-monitoring stands out significantly.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco SD-WAN?
The pricing for Cisco SD-WAN is rated eight out of ten, with some variability depending on the reseller discounts and the size of the enterprise. It is also relatively cost-effective for smaller bu...
What needs improvement with Cisco SD-WAN?
The main area for improvement in Cisco SD-WAN is the lack of documentation, which often lags behind the software releases. This is especially notable since Cisco acquired the solution and is still ...
What do you like most about Prisma SD-WAN?
The product's initial setup phase is straightforward.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Prisma SD-WAN?
The price for Prisma is a bit high, but it is a premium service. The higher tier provides flexibility and scalability benefits.
What needs improvement with Prisma SD-WAN?
If Palo Alto could open the platform to manage other SD-WANs, it would be beneficial. Currently, it only manages Palo Alto. Also, if there were an option to extend management to other firewalls, us...
 

Also Known As

Cisco SD-WAN
CloudGenix
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Doyle Research, Ashton Metzler & Associates
Open Networking User Group, Columbia Sportswear Company, Coca Cola
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN vs. Prisma SD-WAN and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
831,020 professionals have used our research since 2012.