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Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) vs Cisco SecureX [EOL] 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:
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Identity Services Eng...
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
144
Ranking in other categories
Network Access Control (NAC) (2nd), Cisco Security Portfolio (4th)
Cisco SecureX [EOL]
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
8.2
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Featured Reviews

NF
Network and Technology Information Manager at Akkodis
Has improved authentication management and simplified visitor network access
The log capacity in Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) could be enhanced because today natively on the ISE can only have a look at the logs from the day before. You cannot search into the oldest logs; you have to use another tool for that. This can be blocking if you don't have any log consolidation solution. To do a search for an issue or something that happened two days ago, you cannot search directly in there. The capacity of Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) could be enhanced. Something between one week and one month for the log capacity would be nice.
Alon K - PeerSpot reviewer
CTO & VP of Cyber Solutions, Israel at Rockwell Automation
Gives our customers visibility and they don't have to go multiple management consoles anymore
One of the examples is related to forensics. The forensics are amazing because when you have enrichment, and the solutions talk with each other, when you need it, you have the ability to know everything in the organization: when, why, whatever. With just one click you have information from email, from the endpoint, from the web. Let's say that tomorrow morning, you have a ransom[ware] attack in your organization and you would like to know from which email it came, or where the customer saved the file, even though the incident didn't occur at the same moment. With SecureX, you have Cisco Threat Response inside. [With] one click, you get all of the flow. That's amazing value. That also releases resources for our customers. The customers don't have to connect many systems and try to register the event on each system, or to go to the SIEM and do a correlation. That's the one-stop shop for the customers, and that's amazing.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Our clients like Cisco ISE because they already use various Cisco solutions. It's easy for them to use this solution because they have an engineer with Cisco certifications."
"Member Access Control and the ability to integrate all Cisco wireless, Cisco networking, switches, routers, and firewalls."
"Not having to trust devices and being able to set those levels of trust and more finely control our network is a benefit."
"The authorization and accounts inside of ISE are very useful for us."
"The way we can trust this solution is the most valuable, we have no issue with this product, it is a competitive product, you need to have a very good and deep knowledge of the product to take the full benefits of all the features, but it is a good product."
"My impression of Cisco ISE for helping to support an organization across a distributed network is that it's invaluable."
"Authentication is the most valuable feature because it puts our company at another level of security."
"The core point is that Cisco ISE is the same globally compared to FortiAuthenticator, and whether I deploy in China, the US, South Africa, or wherever, I can get all the capabilities, plus it allows me to directly integrate with 365, which is a good capability from a communications point of view."
"The SecureX solution has the best impact for the customer because it has all the visibility of my applications and my users' applications."
"It is one of my favorite things that has ever been built."
"SecureX takes all the separate pieces of security within your company, adds in intelligence from different sites and services on the internet, and makes them work together."
"The most valuable feature is its ability to manage all the applications and visibility. For example, if there is malware, spam, or another component that wants to attack the company in my servers, network, or applications, then SecureX will react to the problem."
"If management wants to ingest reports at a high level from all of the different products, they would only need one login to SecureX to view this information as opposed to separate logins for each of the integrated products."
"One of the most valuable features is the simplicity of deploying SecureX. It's very easy to do that and then you gain very detailed visibility into everything that's going on in your network and, obviously, at the device level. There's just a wealth of information that you can pull from all of these products that are part of SecureX. You know exactly if you have an issue or not."
"Using SecureX, a tool provided by Cisco, we can easily integrate it with many of our other Cisco products such as Cisco ISE and many networking devices."
"I like that I don't have to jump around to five different products and log into five different places to view the data that it returns."
 

Cons

"It does a good job of establishing trust for every access request. We have had a little bit of a challenge with profiling, but we are probably about 80% there."
"They should improve the upgrades. It's not easy to upgrade the solution."
"The area where things could be improved is education. It's complicated to deploy initially because you have to know what you're getting into."
"Cisco ISE integration with Cisco ACI is something that can be done in a less complex way. And the simplification in that area may help us do better."
"There are issues with respect to the posture assessment function. It's been observed that customers are not receiving total access to the network because the assessment agent is glitchy and malfunctions from time-to-time."
"It would be ideal if Cisco could provide some short training videos or documentation to customers to help them understand how to use the product."
"The templates could be better. When you have to do certs, especially with X.500 certs, it isn't very intuitive."
"The UI and UX could be more seamless and easier to use."
"I'm not sure that I would call it a bug, but sometimes the solution is a little slow."
"They could put in more third-party [integrations]... also more playbooks, out-of-the-box, for automation [would be helpful]."
"One of the improvements the product needs is more integration with collaboration platforms."
"The playbooks provided with the product are great, although I would appreciate having more playbooks available. Threats are constantly evolving, so having access to updated playbooks is crucial."
"what's missing right now is the multi-tenant capability."
"The automation and orchestration could be simpler. It could be that all the other parts are that easy to use so that these stick out as a negative, but that's the trickiest part for us. The workflows within the orchestration are just a bit more difficult."
"If they could make the Cisco Umbrella piece a little bit more advanced or easier to manage, that would help."
"I would rate this solution 7 out of 10. It's a great idea if it worked consistently, but it has to be way more mature than when I used it."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Cisco ISE's licensing can get pricey."
"Over the years, licensing has been confusing and complicated because there are so many different licenses for each different product and each different iteration of the product."
"I would rate the pricing an eight out of ten, one being cheap and ten being expensive."
"The licensing is subscription-based and based on the user account."
"Its licensing could be improved. It used to be perpetual, but now they are moving away from that."
"Our customers pay for the license of Cisco ISE (Identity Services Engine). They have an annual subscription, rather than a monthly subscription."
"Cisco ISE is not inexpensive, but the solution is well-built and worth the expense."
"If you consider money only, Cisco ISE is not a cheap solution."
"The product is absolutely free to any customer. As such, the only thing one must keep in mind is that as long as he already has one Cisco security product, irregardless of what that product is, SecureX is available for free."
"It would be nice if they had a different pricing model. Most of our budget for projects goes towards Cisco."
"It comes free with all Cisco products. So, it is a good price."
"The pricing is competitive, especially for education institutions. Licensing can be a little bit difficult to navigate, especially with resellers with Cisco, but for us it has been pretty easy."
"It is free. It can't get any better than that."
"The pricing is the best part of this solution. It is free if you buy Umbrella or Duo Security. It is also a good solution."
"For the value you get, the pricing of the solution is excellent."
"You can spend less money for another solution, but if you really want to have a good solution you have to pay. We are happy that we are getting such a good solution for what we are spending."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
7%
Construction Company
11%
Marketing Services Firm
10%
Computer Software Company
10%
Outsourcing Company
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business45
Midsize Enterprise32
Large Enterprise91
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise3
 

Questions from the Community

Which is better - Aruba Clearpass or Cisco ISE?
Aruba ClearPass is a Network Access Control tool that gives secure network access to multiple device types. You can adapt the policies to VPN access, wired, or wireless access. You can securely ...
What are the main differences between Cisco ISE and Forescout Platform?
OK, so Cisco ISE uses 802.1X to secure switchports against unauthorized access. The drawback of this is that ISE cannot secure the port if a device does not support 802.1x. Cameras, badge readers, ...
How does Cisco ISE compare with Fortinet FortiNAC?
Cisco ISE uses AI endpoint analytics to identify new devices based on their behavior. It will also notify you if someone plugs in with a device that is not allowed and will block it. The user exper...
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Also Known As

Cisco ISE
Kenna.AppSec, Kenna.VI
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Aegean Motorway, BC Hydro, Beachbody, Bucks County Intermediate Unit , Cisco IT, Derby City Council, Global Banking Customer, Gobierno de Castilla-La Mancha, Houston Methodist, Linz AG, London Hydro, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Molina Healthcare, MST Systems, New South Wales Rural Fire Service, Reykjavik University, Wildau University
NHS, Rackspace, UNC Pembroke, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Missing Piece
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco and others in Cisco Security Portfolio. Updated: April 2026.
896,467 professionals have used our research since 2012.