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

Cisco Secure Email vs SonicWall Email Security comparison

Why PeerSpot?
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 3, 2024

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 Secure Email
Ranking in Email Security
4th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
63
Ranking in other categories
Cisco Security Portfolio (6th)
SonicWall Email Security
Ranking in Email Security
26th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Email Security category, the mindshare of Cisco Secure Email is 4.5%, down from 5.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SonicWall Email Security is 0.8%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Email Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco Secure Email4.5%
SonicWall Email Security0.8%
Other94.7%
Email Security
 

Featured Reviews

KS
Technical Associate Network Security at Valuepoint Systems
Email security has protected financial data and provides clear tracking for every branch message
The areas of Cisco Secure Email that could be improved or enhanced are the slowness in the console. I don't think it was a database error or something, but we feel some slowness in configuring DLP and other content filters compared to other consoles. It may have been due to on-premises, but it was much noisy at some times while configuring DLP. When we tried to configure a DLP policy, the console became much slower. In that case, we cannot see what had happened in the mail which was blocked at that time. It may take nearly an hour to get back to normal while configuring policies. That is the major issue in the product.
Swapnil Kulkarni - PeerSpot reviewer
System Administrator at Ador Powertron Ltd.
Has consistently supported security needs for mid-sized teams with affordable deployment
I do not work with Cloud Secure Edge, CSE, or SMA apart from SonicWall NSA. I am not satisfied with phishing protection, as it falls completely under the email domain security. The customizable policy configuration does not help to tailor email security overall because our systems are not integrated with SonicWall Email Security. We are not using reporting and analytics because it requires completely different software. While all required features are available in SonicWall Email Security for SMBs and startups, we lack analytics features. They provide an option to purchase a complete separate product for analytics, but despite initially having purchased the paper license, due to technical limitations or changes, we cannot use that product. Now they require additional fees to access the analytics feature.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Overall, the ease of migration to Cisco's cloud email security from the on-prem solution was a positive experience."
"The logs are easily readable and help diagnose problems, although they can be difficult to find initially. The solution addresses our email security, but for the rest of our security, we would use multiple vendors. It covers everything through email, like antivirus, IDS, and IPS."
"I love the Advanced Malware Protection feature. It works very well... The appliance has more security such as SDF, DKIM, DMARC, and encryption."
"Cisco Secure Email has strong inbound services."
"Compared with other mail security things, Cisco Secure Email was much better and easy to deploy also."
"This solution provides some benefits, like comfortable access to TAC support. You get prompt support when working directly with Cisco."
"Overall, it is a very good product, and I'm very happy with it."
"Administration of the email domains and custom filters are easily done via the web interface."
"The most valuable features are the anti-spam, anti-phishing, anti-virus, and anti-spoofing."
"The product is easy to manage in terms of configurations."
"It is a very scalable solution."
"Behind the reason we chose SonicWall for my company is it has excellent packet analysis of normal and SSL encrypted traffic, application intelligence visualization and control, multiple Gigabit Ethernet LAN and WAN ports, flexible configuration and redundancy options."
"SonicWall Email Security uses multi-layer cloud security."
"SonicWall Email Security has benefited the company by preventing attacks, protecting us from threats such as ransomware and phishing, and notifying the IT team when phishing emails have been blocked."
"Setup was easy. It took about 30 minutes."
"The anti-spam aspect of the solution is its most valuable feature."
 

Cons

"The user interface could be updated."
"It takes time to harmonize information from the email log events with higher level reporting tools."
"One of the things that Cisco could improve on with IronPort is the support. Cisco doesn't really have enough engineers who have full, hands-on knowledge of IronPort. Knowledge of it is not something you can find easily compared to other security appliances."
"That's why I wouldn't give it anywhere near a perfect score, because the artificial intelligence just isn't there yet."
"The hardware is not up to the mark. Two to three times a year we have complete downtime."
"We didn't get any malware, but a few phishing emails, maybe one or two, slipped in."
"The initial setup was complex because I have two sites with physical clusters."
"The interface is dated. It has looked pretty much the same for 15 years or so. It would be helpful to be able to do everything from one spot. The centralized quarantine and reporting are completely separate from policy administration."
"The after-sale support needs improvement. They don't have representation in my country."
"SonicWall Email Security is scalable, but the price per license is expensive."
"Policy deployment could be time consuming and represents an area for improvement in SonicWall Email Security."
"The platform's control panel needs enhancement."
"Load balancing is not stable."
"SonicWall Email Security could improve by making the file blocking and the release feature easier to use"
"Other than that, really I think the features are perfect, but attachment controls are so important it hurts the usability of the product."
"They need well-trained partners in Nigeria."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is expensive. I would rate it 2 out of 10, where 1 is the most expensive and 10 is the cheapest."
"There are additional fees for adding features."
"It is a reasonably priced solution."
"We were using Proofpoint and then we switched to Cisco... reportability was one of the main reasons we switched, but the biggest one was cost. If you can get an equivalent functionality for a better price it's wise to do so. That's what our primary decision came down to: We could get equivalent functionality at a lower price point."
"The solution is expensive."
"Cisco Secure Email is not expensive, and licensing costs are yearly."
"I would rate the pricing a ten out of ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive."
"It's adapted to the market. It's similar to other vendors. We at least don't have many problems regarding that because Cisco is adaptable on that side. When we present the solutions to the customers, we tend to achieve the goals that the customer has in terms of the budget for such implementations."
"I rate the application’s pricing a five out of ten."
"We have a two-year license subscription and the price is very high."
"The cost is cheaper than Sophos. I would rate it as five out of ten."
"The overall price of SonicWall Email Security should be reduced and there should be an option to purchase one or two licenses more instead of their current policy of bulk increases only. There should be more flexibility in the licensing model. Each license cost approximately $33 annually."
"Our customers purchase the solution's yearly license."
"The platform offers a yearly license."
"When compared with Cisco, it is very well priced. Cisco is very expensive."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Email Security solutions are best for your needs.
911,602 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
7%
Construction Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Marketing Services Firm
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business22
Midsize Enterprise18
Large Enterprise27
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise3
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Secure Email?
The pricing structure is good as it is user-based or email client-based, which is positive for clients.
What needs improvement with Cisco Secure Email?
The areas of Cisco Secure Email that could be improved or enhanced are the slowness in the console. I don't think it was a database error or something, but we feel some slowness in configuring DLP ...
What is your primary use case for Cisco Secure Email?
We are using Cisco Secure Email to monitor the outgoing and incoming mail traffic in our financial institute. We have nearly 900 branches all over India. We have an on-premises mail server in which...
What needs improvement with SonicWall Email Security?
Policy deployment could be time consuming and represents an area for improvement in SonicWall Email Security.
What is your primary use case for SonicWall Email Security?
SonicWall Email Security was used for security purposes, which aligns with the product's core function.
 

Also Known As

Cisco Email Security, IronPort, Cisco Email Security, ESA, Email Security Appliances
Dell SonicWALL Email Security Platform, SonicWall Hosted Email Security
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

SUNY Old Westbury, CoxHealth, City of Fullerton, Indra
Star Kay White, Locala Community Partnerships
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Email vs. SonicWall Email Security and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
911,602 professionals have used our research since 2012.