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Cisco Secure Endpoint vs Microsoft Defender for Endpoint comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 9, 2024

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
7.4
Cisco Secure Endpoint enhances productivity and reduces costs by streamlining threat detection, integrating tools, and minimizing manual intervention.
Sentiment score
7.1
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint offers significant ROI with cost savings, seamless integration, and real-time protection against ransomware attacks.
Without detection and protection measures, organizations would face substantial payments and reputational damage, including the necessity to inform customers about data breaches, potentially leading to loss of business.
We have seen a return on investment when using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, as it saves labor by reducing the need for staff to focus on it.
The biggest return on investment for me when using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is the time saving.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.1
Cisco Secure Endpoint support is praised for responsiveness and expertise, providing quick issue resolution and valuable user guidance.
Sentiment score
6.6
Many users find Microsoft Defender for Endpoint reliable, but support experiences vary, with premium support offering quicker assistance.
Cisco has good technical support, especially considering these are newer solutions compared to traditional routing and switching products.
The level-one support seems disconnected from subject matter experts.
I rate Microsoft support 10 out of 10.
Due to our size, we don't have access to direct technical support, but the knowledge base, Microsoft Learn, and the articles available are really good.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
8.4
Cisco Secure Endpoint is scalable, integrates with SecureX for efficient management, and supports diverse industries without extra resources.
Sentiment score
7.7
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is scalable and integrates well with Microsoft’s ecosystem, despite needing improvements for handling massive data.
Cisco Secure Endpoint is definitely scalable.
We managed to scale it out in a short amount of time, with two months of planning and three months of implementation on 10,000 computers.
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is scalable enough to handle various devices across environments, whether they are laptops, Android devices, or operating in hybrid environments.
Compatibility is its main feature.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
6.5
Cisco Secure Endpoint is highly stable, reliable, and trusted for performance, earning high ratings from users in various enterprises.
Sentiment score
7.9
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is praised for its reliability and stability, with minor concerns about resource intensity and performance.
We have not encountered any problems.
I haven't seen any outages with Microsoft.
I rate Defender 10 out of 10 for stability.
Defender for Endpoint is extremely stable.
 

Room For Improvement

Cisco Secure Endpoint requires better integration, reporting, and UI enhancements, alongside improved pricing, AI capabilities, and IoT support.
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint faces interface complexity, slow detection, high CPU usage, integration issues, and seeks improvements in multiple areas.
The forensic capabilities need enhancement, especially for deep forensic data collection.
Repeated interactions are necessary due to Level One's lack of tools and knowledge, hindering efficient problem-solving and negatively impacting our experience with Microsoft support.
In contrast, competing products offer reduced pricing for long-term commitments, which makes it difficult for us in that environment.
We use Microsoft partners to help govern the platform, and as part of an alliance, we want to gather data from each tenant and combine them for a complete view.
 

Setup Cost

Cisco Secure Endpoint offers competitive and flexible pricing with value-rich features, despite some complexity in licensing.
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint offers flexible pricing, making it competitive and cost-effective compared to standalone security products.
Cisco is aggressive in pricing, making it competitive and sometimes even cheaper than other good products like CrowdStrike, Microsoft Defender, or SentinelOne.
Given our extensive Microsoft licensing, transitioning to Defender for Endpoint did not affect licensing costs.
It costs $15 per VM for the P2 plan, which is seen as affordable for customers.
The pricing, setup, and licensing were very easy and simple.
 

Valuable Features

Cisco Secure Endpoint provides advanced security features, cross-platform support, and ease of use with strong threat intelligence and support.
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint excels with seamless integration, advanced threat intelligence, AI-driven protection, and continuous cloud-based security management.
Cisco Secure Endpoint is very good in machine learning, which allows it to secure offline contents even if not connected to the internet.
Defender for Endpoint's coverage across different platforms in our environment is pretty good. We have devices running Linux, Mac OS, Windows, iOS, and Android. It covers all of them.
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint provides a unified management interface allowing customers to manage their on-premises and hybrid infrastructures from a single pane.
One of the best features of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is its database for identifying zero-day attacks or malware attacks.
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Secure Endpoint
Ranking in Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
26th
Ranking in Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)
20th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
49
Ranking in other categories
Cisco Security Portfolio (6th)
Microsoft Defender for Endp...
Ranking in Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
1st
Ranking in Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
198
Ranking in other categories
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (3rd), Anti-Malware Tools (1st), Microsoft Security Suite (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) category, the mindshare of Cisco Secure Endpoint is 1.5%, down from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is 10.0%, down from 13.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint10.0%
Cisco Secure Endpoint1.5%
Other88.5%
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
 

Featured Reviews

Mark Broughton - PeerSpot reviewer
Tighter integration with Umbrella and Firepower gave us eye-opening information
We were using a third-party help desk. One of the ways that they were fixing problems was to delete the client and then add the client back if there was an issue where the client had stopped communicating. Any improvement in the client communicating back to the server would be good, particularly for machines that are offline for a couple of weeks. A lot of our guys were working on a rotation where the machine might be offline for that long. They were also terrible about rebooting their machines, so those network connections didn't necessarily get refreshed. So, anything that could improve that communication would be good. Also, an easier way to do deduplication of machines, or be alerted to the fact that there's more than one instance of a machine, would be useful. If you could say, "Okay, we've got these two machines. This one says it's not reporting and this one says it's been reporting. Obviously, somebody did a reinstall," it would help. That way you could get a more accurate device count, so you're not having an inflated number. Not that Cisco was going to come down on you and say, "Oh, you're using too many licenses," right away. But to have a much more accurate license usage count by being able to better dedupe the records would be good. I also sent over a couple of other ideas to our technical rep. A lot of that had to do with the reporting options. It would be really nice to be able to do a lot more in the reporting. You can't really drill down into the reports that are there. The reporting and the need for the documentation to be updated and current would be my two biggest areas of complaint. Also, there was one section when I was playing with the automation where it was asking for the endpoint type rather than the machine name. If I could have just put in the machine name, that would have been great. So there are some opportunities, when it comes to searching, to have more options. If I wanted to search, for example, by a Mac address because, for some reason, I thought there was a duplication and I didn't have the machine name, how could I pull it up with the Mac address? When you're getting to that level, you're really starting to get into the ticky tacky. I would definitely put the reporting and documentation way ahead of that.
NaySan @ Suraj Verma - PeerSpot reviewer
Has effectively blocked sophisticated attacks and malicious activities while providing excellent support
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is very good, but one suggestion is that in some products, we may need to configure security-related settings, whereas Microsoft Defender for Endpoint works completely differently, providing automatic recommendations and actions that we may need to perform ourselves. Regarding the pricing of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, during the last three years, we set up the product and sold it, but we faced difficulties because Microsoft pricing is always the same. For example, whether I purchase Microsoft Defender for Endpoint for one year or for the next three years, the pricing remains constant with no discounts available. In contrast, competing products offer reduced pricing for long-term commitments, which makes it difficult for us in that environment. Microsoft should consider this option to remain competitive, but otherwise, everything else is fine.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
21%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business21
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise21
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business79
Midsize Enterprise34
Large Enterprise87
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco Secure Endpoint?
The product's initial setup phase was very simple.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Secure Endpoint?
Cisco is aggressive in pricing, making it competitive and sometimes even cheaper than other good products like CrowdStrike, Microsoft Defender, or SentinelOne.
What needs improvement with Cisco Secure Endpoint?
Cisco Secure Endpoint lacks features like DLP which other vendors offer. XDR is new, so integration capabilities with third-party tools need improvement. The forensic capabilities need enhancement,...
How is Cortex XDR compared with Microsoft Defender?
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is a cloud-delivered endpoint security solution. The tool reduces the attack surface, applies behavioral-based endpoint protection and response, and includes risk-ba...
Which offers better endpoint security - Symantec or Microsoft Defender?
We use Symantec because we do not use MS Enterprise products, but in my opinion, Microsoft Defender is a superior solution. Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is a cloud-delivered endpoint security s...
How does Microsoft Defender for Endpoint compare with Crowdstrike Falcon?
The CrowdStrike solution delivers a lot of information about incidents. It has a very light sensor that will never push your machine hardware to "test", you don't have the usual "scan now" feature ...
 

Also Known As

Cisco AMP for Endpoints
Microsoft Defender ATP, Microsoft Defender Advanced Threat Protection, MS Defender for Endpoint, Microsoft Defender Antivirus
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Heritage Bank, Mobile County Schools, NHL University, Thunder Bay Regional, Yokogawa Electric, Sam Houston State University, First Financial Bank
Petrofrac, Metro CSG, Christus Health
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Endpoint vs. Microsoft Defender for Endpoint and other solutions. Updated: August 2025.
867,676 professionals have used our research since 2012.