Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs Fortinet FortiWLM comparison

Cisco and Fortinet are both solutions in the Wireless LAN category. Cisco is ranked #3 with an average rating of 8.8, while Fortinet is ranked #12 with an average rating of 8.7. Cisco holds a 10.5% mindshare in Wireless LAN, compared to Fortinet’s 2.4% mindshare. Additionally, 92% of Cisco users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 96% of Fortinet users who would recommend it.

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Read 121 Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN reviews

10,528 Views
9,370 Comparison Views

92% willing to recommend

Fortinet FortiWLM

Read 30 Fortinet FortiWLM reviews

1,970 Views
1,793 Comparison Views

96% willing to recommend

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Fortinet FortiWLM

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 28, 2025

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN and Fortinet FortiWLM compete in the wireless network management category. Cisco Meraki has the upper hand due to its cloud-managed solution which simplifies management and configuration efforts.

Features: Cisco Meraki provides centralized management through a cloud-based dashboard that allows for easy network monitoring and configuration. The system is user-friendly, making it ideal for organizations with limited IT resources. It supports various deployment models across public, private, and hybrid clouds. Fortinet FortiWLM excels in security features and seamless integration within its Security Fabric, offering a single-pane management interface for controlling network devices. It supports features like centralized wireless management and deployment efficiency through its integrated controller system.

Room for Improvement: Cisco Meraki could enhance its security measures, improve advanced routing capabilities, and streamline support services. Feedback suggests addressing variable support quality and simplifying licensing terms. Fortinet FortiWLM could improve its reporting capabilities, make configuration more user-friendly, and adjust its pricing to be more attractive to smaller businesses. Enhancing support and software updates to address any stability issues could also be beneficial.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Cisco Meraki offers flexible deployment in public, private, and hybrid clouds and is noted for its responsive technical support. However, support quality can vary. Fortinet FortiWLM mainly operates in on-premises environments and offers effective technical support, appreciated for rapid problem resolution in on-site management situations.

Pricing and ROI: Cisco Meraki is priced at a premium, with value seen in its robust cloud features and ease of deployment, though the cost is a consideration for some users. Fortinet FortiWLM provides competitive pricing, offering a cost-effective solution in complex environments and supporting investments in enhancing end-user experience. Both solutions demonstrate reasonable ROI, with Cisco Meraki providing long-term licensing benefits and Fortinet enabling cost-saving measures.

To learn more, read our detailed Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. Fortinet FortiWLM Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. Fortinet FortiWLM

December 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 880,954 peers since 2012

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

1.0

Cisco Meraki offers cost-effective features for small businesses, but larger enterprises find capital expenditure and licensing costly.

Sentiment score

1.0

Fortinet FortiWLM offers ROI in 6-12 months, enhances profitability, simplifies management, and provides valuable retail customer insights.

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN report

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the Fortinet FortiWLM report

Customer Service

Sentiment score

4.9

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN customer service is praised for responsive, knowledgeable support and 24/7 availability, despite minor knowledge base issues.

Sentiment score

6.6

Fortinet FortiWLM customer service receives mixed reviews, praised for engineer support but criticized for average response times and escalation needs.

I would rate Cisco support a 10, as the response time and process via the dashboard are easy, and response times are always within the SLA.

MiguelDe Bique

Independent Information Technology and Services Professional at a non-profit with 1-10 employees

It would be better if the SLA of technical support was less than four hours.

RezaPradipta

Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN report

The local support we receive from our distributor is perfect.

Chamara Waidyathilaka

Network Specialist at Metropolitan Communications Pvt Ltd

Fortinet provides excellent customer support.

LuayHlaleh

Information Technology Team Lead at TechnoPeak

If we encounter any bugs, they inform us of the recommended configuration and firmware to resolve our problems.

Ahmed Auf

Cybersecurity SNB Technical Manager at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

For more quotes and insights, download the Fortinet FortiWLM report

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score

5.0

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is ideal for medium enterprises, offering scalability and seamless integration despite large deployment limitations.

Sentiment score

6.5

Fortinet FortiWLM offers high scalability, efficiently managing numerous access points and integrating seamlessly into diverse environments.

Meraki is not scalable enough since it straightforwardly maps its products to segmented specifications.

RezaPradipta

Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN report

Now, with any simple FortiGate 60F or newer model, you can manage more than 64 access points.

LuayHlaleh

Information Technology Team Lead at TechnoPeak

Fortinet's solutions are integrated into many standard frameworks, allowing for good scalability and interaction with other vendors' products.

Ferdi Haider

Product Owner at a financial services firm with 501-1,000 employees

For more quotes and insights, download the Fortinet FortiWLM report

Stability Issues

Sentiment score

3.9

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is reliable but may experience minor issues during updates or high network demand.

Sentiment score

8.3

Fortinet FortiWLM is highly stable, with minimal operational issues and high user satisfaction despite minor initial software bugs.

We have experienced many instances where we have experienced a lag in our network, and I am not sure if it is due to their devices or our network.

Ken Dishon

Manager, Information Technology at a performing arts with 11-50 employees

Stability is not an issue for me because it comes with Cisco's proven manufacturer quality.

RezaPradipta

Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN report

This is a stable solution.

LuayHlaleh

Information Technology Team Lead at TechnoPeak

For more quotes and insights, download the Fortinet FortiWLM report

Room For Improvement

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN needs feature and interface improvements, flexible licensing, WiFi 6 support, and better integration for enterprise users.

Fortinet FortiWLM needs better management features, integration, pricing, support, usability, reporting, and enhanced automation and mobile app capabilities.

The most important improvement needed is to eliminate the limitation of uplinks.

RezaPradipta

Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk

Some of the newer models of the Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN access point have encompassed the new wireless protocols and increased the strength of their antennas.

Ken Dishon

Manager, Information Technology at a performing arts with 11-50 employees

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN report

Firmware upgrades and bug improvements need to be tested well.

Ahmed Auf

Cybersecurity SNB Technical Manager at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

Enhanced features for the application would be an improvement.

LuayHlaleh

Information Technology Team Lead at TechnoPeak

Regarding the integration with other vendors, we try to buy only products from a single vendor to avoid problems of compatibility from devices of different vendors.

reviewer1232469

Responsabile ced at a manufacturing company with 1-10 employees

For more quotes and insights, download the Fortinet FortiWLM report

Setup Cost

Consider Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN's high cost justified by features, with possible discounts through negotiation, but requires active subscription.

Fortinet FortiWLM offers competitive, all-inclusive pricing, despite some concerns with enterprise licensing and recent price increases.

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is on par with other devices in that category, offering competitive pricing.

Ken Dishon

Manager, Information Technology at a performing arts with 11-50 employees

The pricing of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is not competitive enough for the SMB market compared to other brands.

RezaPradipta

Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk

My experience with the pricing of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is that it is competitive with other providers offering paid subscriptions.

MiguelDe Bique

Independent Information Technology and Services Professional at a non-profit with 1-10 employees

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN report

Fortinet's pricing is different from Aruba, as Aruba has solutions for small business and enterprise in different categories.

Chamara Waidyathilaka

Network Specialist at Metropolitan Communications Pvt Ltd

While the pricing of Fortinet FortiWLM is a bit high, it remains effective.

Mohammad Talha Talkin Alam

Assistant Manager - IT at PDS Limited

The price is competitive.

Ahmed Auf

Cybersecurity SNB Technical Manager at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

For more quotes and insights, download the Fortinet FortiWLM report

Valuable Features

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN offers centralized cloud management with excellent security, ease of deployment, and seamless integration into existing infrastructures.

Fortinet FortiWLM offers centralized management with features like security and scalability, enhancing wireless network deployment and performance.

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN has helped optimize network traffic very effectively, as we do prioritization for streaming and web conferencing apps, resulting in a clear, visible improvement in performance.

MiguelDe Bique

Independent Information Technology and Services Professional at a non-profit with 1-10 employees

It also manages security clients and switches, providing a single dashboard to manage multiple network infrastructures.

RezaPradipta

Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk

The ability to program all access points from the Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN dashboard, view the status of all of them, and examine the individual devices connected to each access point is very valuable.

Ken Dishon

Manager, Information Technology at a performing arts with 11-50 employees

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN report

The solution is controlled from one device and one GUI for all devices.

Ahmed Auf

Cybersecurity SNB Technical Manager at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

Fortinet FortiWLM is recognized easily, and it is easy to recognize for any device to add to the network.

Zied-Ben Rached

IT Technical Support at GIAS-DISTRIBUTION

The most useful aspect of Fortinet FortiWLM is that you can manage all the Fortinet products from one portal, from one device.

LuayHlaleh

Information Technology Team Lead at TechnoPeak

For more quotes and insights, download the Fortinet FortiWLM report

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Ranking in Wireless LAN

3rd

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

4.5

Number of Reviews

121

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Fortinet FortiWLM

Ranking in Wireless LAN

12th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Wireless LAN category, the mindshare of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is 10.5%, down from 13.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortinet FortiWLM is 2.4%, up from 2.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Wireless LAN Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN	10.5%
Fortinet FortiWLM	2.4%
Other	87.1%

Wireless LAN

Featured Reviews

MiguelDe Bique

Independent Information Technology and Services Professional at a non-profit with 1-10 employees

Provides robust remote configuration and reliable support for managing wireless networks

The best features of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN include the excellent reporting; the dashboard reporting aids us a lot in troubleshooting issues, and the platform is very robust. Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is very stable, and the performance is there, as we normally do throughput tests that align with the manufacturer's specs. We use Meraki's Layer 7 application traffic shaping. Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN has helped optimize network traffic very effectively, as we do prioritization for streaming and web conferencing apps, resulting in a clear, visible improvement in performance. The capability to configure network policies remotely is the most important aspect for our organization, as we are an MSP providing remote support for all our clients. We monitor network performance with Meraki's real-time analytics. We find client performance metrics most useful to know how the wireless clients are receiving service and the quality of service.

Read full review

LuayHlaleh

Information Technology Team Lead at TechnoPeak

Offers robust network management with cost considerations for large deployments

Large enterprises typically invest in FortiAnalyzer, though our company and SMB clients don't require this analysis tool. We use Ekahau for floor planning and Wi-Fi coverage analysis rather than Fortinet FortiWLM's built-in features. Ekahau helps us perform site surveys and plan access point placement. Fortinet FortiWLM is a flexible and common solution in Dubai. It's one of the best-selling products, with Etisalat, the largest ISP, installing Fortinet FortiGate for approximately 70-80% of their clients. The solution offers different series to accommodate various needs. The triple radio model costs around $1,000 (3,500 dirham) and supports 40-50 connected devices. The 231F model suits smaller deployments of 20-25 devices. I rate Fortinet FortiWLM a seven out of ten. While it's an excellent solution, Cisco remains the market leader.

Read full review

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Wireless LAN solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

880,954 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

13%

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Educational Organization

Comms Service Provider

Healthcare Company

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	69
Midsize Enterprise	26
Large Enterprise	31

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	19
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	5

Questions from the Community

What are pros and cons of Aruba 515 Series AP vs. Cisco Meraki or Extreme Networks?

Depends. I have personally used both Cisco and Aruba so I am familiar with them. Extreme I am not, so unless they have some feature that I need or want, I wouldn't consider them. Do you have expe...

See all answers

Which is better - Cisco Wireless or Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN?

Cisco Wireless is very robust, very rugged, and can handle indoor and outdoor coverage extremely well. We found it to be very reliable and to consistently run very efficiently. Cisco Wireless helpe...

See all answers

How does Ruckus Wireless compare to Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN?

Cisco’s Meraki Virtual MX is a virtual instance of the Meraki SD-WAN appliance. We liked the Meraki. The Wifi APs are a great feature. The dashboard is a simple interface and easy to learn. It feat...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiWLM?

Regarding functionality, a lower price for Fortinet FortiWLM would be better, but it's difficult. Regarding the integration with other vendors, we try to buy only products from a single vendor to a...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiWLM?

The price could be reduced by 20%. In Dubai, UniFi costs 700 dirham for the UniFi Pro 7th generation. For Fortinet FortiWLM, a similar model would cost around 1,300 dirham. If this price was reduce...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Fortinet FortiWLM?

Our customers' main use cases for Fortinet FortiWLM come from three classes. We have clients that pay attention to the cost, and we have customers that pay attention to security, such as in the DIF...

See all answers

Comparisons

Aruba Wireless vs Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Compared 32% of the time

Ruckus Wireless vs Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Compared 12% of the time

Juniper Mist Wireless Access Points vs Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Compared 10% of the time

Fortinet FortiAP vs Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Compared 6% of the time

Aruba Instant On Access Points vs Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Compared 2% of the time

More Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN Competitors

Aruba Wireless vs Fortinet FortiWLM

Compared 18% of the time

Cisco Wireless vs Fortinet FortiWLM

Compared 13% of the time

Ruckus Wireless vs Fortinet FortiWLM

Compared 8% of the time

Cambium Networks Wireless LAN vs Fortinet FortiWLM

Compared 6% of the time

Huawei Wireless vs Fortinet FortiWLM

Compared 5% of the time

More Fortinet FortiWLM Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

January 2026

Download Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN product report

Buyer's Guide

Fortinet FortiWLM

January 2026

Download Fortinet FortiWLM product report

Also Known As

MR18, MR26, MR32, MR34, MR66, MR72, Meraki Wireless LAN, Meraki WLAN

FortiWLM, FortiAP, Fortinet AP/OAP, Meru Wireless LAN

Overview

Cisco Meraki access points are built from the highest grade components and carefully optimized for a seamless user experience. The outcome: faster connections, greater user capacity, more coverage, and fewer support calls. The Cisco Meraki dashboard gives visibility into the network users, their devices, and their applications. Armed with rich analytics, administrators can quickly create access control and application usage policies, optimizing both the end-user experience and network security.

Cisco

Consolidate security and wireless LAN management with our integrated wireless solutions. Single-pane-of-glass management for security and access without the need to add point products simplifies deployment and reduces management complexity. These solutions are highly scalable to support even the largest organizations and distributed enterprises.

Fortinet

Sample Customers

Advanced Medical Transport, Banco de Guayaquil, Baylor Scott & White Health, BH Telecom, Bowling Green State University, Calligaris, Children's Hospital Colorado, City of Biel, Del Papa Distributing, Department of Justice, Dimension Data, Dualtec Cloud Builders, Electricity Authority of Cyprus, Grupo Industrial Saltillo (GIS), Hertz, K&L Gates , LightEdge, Lone Star College System, Management Science Associates, Mindtree, NBC Olympics, Quest, Sony Corporation, The Department of Education in Western Australia, Valley Proteins

Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. Fortinet FortiWLM

December 2025

Free Report: Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. Fortinet FortiWLM

Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. Fortinet FortiWLM and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

880,954 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. Fortinet FortiWLM report.

See our list of best Wireless LAN vendors.

We monitor all Wireless LAN reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.