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Cisco DNA Center vs Fortinet FortiManager comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

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

Customer Service

Sentiment score
8.5
Cisco's customer service experiences range from excellent to inadequate, highlighting issues with expertise, communication, and support consistency.
Sentiment score
7.4
Fortinet FortiManager's support is satisfactory but challenged by slow responses and varying technician expertise, needing regional improvement.
After that, I was allowed to work with another engineer who was very good. He was very good both technically and his methods.
We've found them to be very helpful and have been satisfied with their level of support.
We get our support from Fortinet in Belgium, so we can communicate directly with a technician in Belgium.
 

Room For Improvement

Sentiment score
5.0
Cisco DNA Center struggles with compatibility, pricing, training, and features, impacting user experience and system performance.
Sentiment score
4.3
Fortinet FortiManager needs better documentation, support, stability, integration, and performance, especially in configurations, GUI, and monitoring.
There are many features that are not mentioned in the documentation.
If I'm defining a subnet, I need to define it in two different locations.
Instead of paying separately and having all of these licenses, it would be nice to centralize everything and maybe reduce the price for a bundle.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.6
Cisco DNA Center offers scalable, flexible network management, praised for ease of configuration despite costly licensing and limited IPv6 support.
Sentiment score
7.7
Fortinet FortiManager is highly scalable for managing many devices, though costs can rise with increased scalability needs.
We can add a new instance of FortiGate with a simple click.
If they have, for example, 50 devices and suddenly need 100, they just need to scale up.
It has been designed for a large environment.
 

Setup Cost

Sentiment score
2.6
Enterprise buyers should consider Cisco DNA Center's high cost and potential licensing fees, but promotions may lower expenses.
Sentiment score
6.3
Fortinet FortiManager is competitively priced, scalable for large deployments, with varying perceptions on costs and additional feature fees.
Fortinet products are the least expensive on the market in the category of firewalls.
Although there is a cost associated with Fortinet FortiManager, its price is undoubtedly justified by the value it provides in terms of the purpose it serves.
It isn't like other solutions where you need to pay for SD-WAN or additional bandwidth.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.5
Cisco DNA Center is generally stable, rated highly by users, despite occasional minor issues with logs and database errors.
Sentiment score
8.1
Fortinet FortiManager is highly rated for stability and reliability, though occasional reboots and minor bugs are reported.
There are no bugs or glitches.
On a scale from one to ten, I would give stability a ten.
I rate the solution's stability ten out of ten.
 

Valuable Features

Sentiment score
8.1
Cisco DNA Center offers analytics, AI-driven insights, centralized management, and automation, enhancing network operations with scalability and ease of use.
Sentiment score
8.3
Fortinet FortiManager excels in automation, centralized management, and ease of use, enhancing network security and performance efficiently.
FortiManager also delivers the industry’s best scalability to manage up to 100,000 Fortinet devices.
With Fortinet FortiManager, we can manage multiple firewalls and devices from a central point.
The most valuable feature is having one object on all networks, which allows for implementation only once.
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco DNA Center
Ranking in Network Management Applications
1st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
40
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (18th), Network Automation (2nd)
Fortinet FortiManager
Ranking in Network Management Applications
2nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
63
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2024, in the Network Management Applications category, the mindshare of Cisco DNA Center is 29.7%, up from 27.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortinet FortiManager is 5.0%, down from 5.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Management Applications
 

Featured Reviews

AvrahamSonenthal - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficiently manages our wireless network and provides valuable monitoring features
The platform's biggest benefit has been in managing our wireless network. Having a single pane of glass to control all wireless controllers and access points and to monitor activity has been a significant advantage. We're a small federal agency with around 300 network devices, so automation is a minor focus. It's more relevant for larger networks. The main benefits we've seen are in inventory management and the potential for configuration automation. However, I recommend using the DNA Centre only for larger networks with over a thousand devices; otherwise, it may not be cost-effective. Before proceeding, ensure that your devices are compatible with DNA Center, as not all Cisco devices are supported. Also, investing in proper training is different from plug-and-play. I rate it an eight.
HamedWasel - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to set up with good integration capabilities but we've had troubles when moving devices
We've faced an issue when we need to move devices. Templates need to be recreated instead of having the policies, et cetera, cut and pasted over. Everything should just move over when we need to move devices instead of recreating everything from scratch. For the IPSEC tunnels, Fortimanager doesn't have all of the features that are available on Fortigate.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
19%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
University
6%
Computer Software Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
9%
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 Cisco DNA Center?
The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that it gives some kind of ease in operations, especially since our company is moving from CLI to GUI-based configuration.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco DNA Center?
I would rate the pricing a six out of ten, with ten being expensive.
What needs improvement with Cisco DNA Center?
One area that needs improvement is the upgrade process. The time required for downloading and installing packages during upgrades is too long, often taking around ten hours. This is a significant i...
What do you like most about Fortinet FortiManager?
The most valuable feature is the centralized management console.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiManager?
FortiGate offers the same features as Palo Alto yet at a more reasonable price. The ROI justifies the investment.
What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiManager?
FortiManager needs to handle different firewall versions more efficiently. If FortiGate devices have different versions, managing them is challenging. There's also a need to upgrade firewalls or ch...
 

Also Known As

DNA Center
No data available
 

Learn More

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco DNA Center vs. Fortinet FortiManager and other solutions. Updated: December 2024.
823,875 professionals have used our research since 2012.