No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Cisco Prime [EOL] 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:
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Prime [EOL]
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
35
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Fortinet FortiManager
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
74
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (3rd)
 

Featured Reviews

AR
Network Engineer at Edmonton Catholic School Board
Has an easy implementation process, but the performance monitoring feature could be more intuitive
The project implementation was easy overall. Adapting Cisco's solutions to our specific environment required effort, as their documentation only covers some network scenarios. The deployment didn't happen all at once; it was staged and controlled to ensure a smooth transition. We started with a small test environment before gradually rolling it out to all campuses. This gradual approach helped mitigate the risk of any issues arising across multiple locations simultaneously, especially on a critical day like Monday morning. We have a team of three executives working on the process. Their job roles included network specialists and a manager. It requires maintenance, which is included in the annual cost. We receive updates and support as part of the renewal process.
SudeepMaydeo - PeerSpot reviewer
Global Head of IT Infrastructure at EPL Americas
Ensures seamless integration and centralized visibility for network security operations
The version upgrade from a single dashboard for all the firewalls in one click is the beauty of Fortinet FortiManager as the most impactful feature in managing our network security. Fortinet FortiManager's policy management enhances our security protocols by enabling us and giving integrated centralized visibility, which has proven to be very healthy. Because of this, we have identified some of the vulnerabilities in our systems, and we mitigated them through Fortinet FortiManager. The central dashboards and the visibility are what appealed to us to go with Fortinet FortiManager. Fortinet FortiManager has adapted to changes in our network scale and complexity as we have geographically 18 international locations, all equipped with firewalls and some cybersecurity initiatives and IT infrastructure initiatives.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Technical support is great, and we find them to be helpful and responsive."
"The most valuable feature of Cisco Prime is its excellent audio and video conferencing with clear quality and no interruptions."
"We use this solution to troubleshoot our wireless systems, specifically regarding signal strength."
"I have found the solution to be scalable."
"The dashboard is a valuable feature. It's very clear, and the metrics make it easy to see the current network situation."
"The most valuable feature of Cisco Prime is the heat maps."
"The VLAN mapping function has been most impactful in simplifying our network management tasks."
"Operationally, Prime is quite easy to use and I like the wireless heatmap and search management features."
"The centralized policy management helps with the creation of policies because it is easy to monitor and facilitates installation."
"The product is easy to use and manage."
"The initial setup was straightforward."
"It would normally take us a handful of days to install one FortiGate instance on one site. But with this technology, zero-touch deployment, we need just one hour or maybe as little as 30 minutes to install one site. It is much more efficient."
"The centralized management of policies and certificates, coupled with the capability to handle multi-site deployments effectively, provides streamlined operations."
"There is something called zero-touch provisioning, where you can add a new device without any configuration. You just add it to FortiManager and then forget about it."
"FortiManager's best feature is the integration of administrator users."
"FortiManager is for the syncing of devices, and when companies are using multiple devices from Fortinet, such as FortiGate, FortiSwitches, and FortiAP, it is required so that a single person can centrally manage all of the devices, making it a very useful application."
 

Cons

"There is room for improvement in the Access layer."
"That is unacceptable and it's the biggest downfall of the solution."
"The overall management capabilities of Prime need to be improved."
"Cisco Prime's initial setup is complex."
"This is not a scalable solution."
"Cisco Prime could improve the notifications in the system. Having more details about what is happening would be useful, such as traffic numbers or who is connected. We can see them through the firewall controller, but it would be better if you can see them from one place."
"If you think about a centralized monitoring system, Cisco Prime is not good because it does not support third-party vendors like Palo Alto or FortiGate."
"We would like to see the inclusion of detailed alerts."
"It's a difficult process to transfer one interface from one virtual domain to another."
"The SD-WAN solution is difficult to manage on FortiManager because you need to share some configurations on the firewall side. Sometimes you lose all connectivity with the firewall, so it is challenging to apply the default configuration to the SD-WAN solution."
"Performance issues should be improved. We have problems when we have more mobile connections than local devices. Most of us have two to three devices."
"When I installed it, I found it somewhat difficult to set up."
"There are a lot of bugs that need to be fixed, for example, the ZTP."
"It would be better if it were easier to run a routing protocol. In the next release, I would like them to enhance some features in the GUI rather than CLI or OSP. For example, whenever a customer generates an ISP directly on the firewall, it's complicated to configure the routing protocol."
"In the next release, FortiManager should include more protection features."
"Can be difficult to configure."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We update the license every five years."
"Cisco Prime is an expensive solution."
"If we have a license for Cisco DNA, we can use the same license for Cisco Prime."
"The product's performance monitoring feature could be more intuitive."
"The solution is not inexpensive but is worth it for large-scale environments."
"I would rate the pricing of Cisco Prime a seven out of ten."
"I would rate the solution's pricing an eight out of ten."
"I rate the solution's pricing an eight out of ten."
"The solution requires you to have a license for every device, as well as for any advanced features being used, which makes it costly for high-volume users. However, for a large-scale environment with a lot of customers we have found it to be a worthwhile investment."
"For us, it is a little bit expensive."
"FortiManager isn't expensive, but its cost is dependent on which services are required."
"Fortinet FortiManager is not expensive at all if you compare it with other vendors like Check Point and Cisco. Fortinet products are the least expensive on the market in the category of firewalls."
"In comparison with other products, the price of FortiManager is reasonable."
"Fortinet FortiManager can be expensive."
"If you compare Fortinet and Palo Alto, Fortinet is cheaper, but if you compare Cisco and Fortinet, sometimes Cisco is cheaper because Cisco gives us more discounts because of the size. Cisco isn't cheap, but sometimes, we get a big discount from them."
"The price of Fortinet FortiManager is inexpensive."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Network Management Applications solutions are best for your needs.
904,928 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
13%
Government
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Healthcare Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Construction Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise24
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business34
Midsize Enterprise17
Large Enterprise21
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiManager?
I am satisfied with the licensing cost, and I would rate it an 8.5.
What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiManager?
I think Fortinet FortiManager can be improved as the web page loading is slightly slow.
What is your primary use case for Fortinet FortiManager?
My main use case for Fortinet FortiManager is to manage multiple FortiGate devices. I can confirm that I use Fortinet FortiManager perfectly in my main use case.
 

Also Known As

Cisco Prime Infrastructure
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Mohawk Industries, Universidad EAFIT, Halton Healthcare
Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco, Fortinet, Skyline Communications and others in Network Management Applications. Updated: July 2026.
904,928 professionals have used our research since 2012.