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Cisco Secure Firewall vs SonicWall TZ comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 6, 2025

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

Fortinet FortiGate
Sponsored
Ranking in Firewalls
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
327
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (1st), WAN Edge (1st)
Cisco Secure Firewall
Ranking in Firewalls
7th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
409
Ranking in other categories
Cisco Security Portfolio (4th)
SonicWall TZ
Ranking in Firewalls
20th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
84
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 21.1%, up from 17.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Secure Firewall is 5.8%, up from 5.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SonicWall TZ is 2.9%, up from 2.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Firewalls
 

Featured Reviews

EhabAli - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient, user-friendly, and affordable
In the past, NSS Labs was utilized to test files and verify the numbers and datasheets. It would be beneficial to have an organization or testing lab that can verify the numbers in our datasheets since changes are frequently made, which can be inconvenient for review. For instance, when comparing different competitors such as Forcepoint, Palo Alto, and Check Point, the throughput or numbers in the datasheet may be lower than the actual numbers. Conversely, Fortinet typically reports very high numbers, but they cannot be replicated in the real world. Therefore, it would be advantageous for them to partner with a neutral testing organization such as NSS Labs to validate these numbers, thus providing more credibility and comfort to everyone regarding the accuracy of the datasheets. For the migration, everyone has a firewall in use and I am selling Fortinet. Typically, I am replacing another firewall. Previously, there was a tool available to convert configurations from one firewall, such as Palo Alto, to Fortinet, but this tool is no longer free. If it could be made free again, it would be very beneficial. This tool shows a lot of promise and is very good. Making it free would help many companies deliver their products in a more efficient and integrated way. It would also be more valuable to include the tool with the firewall package or license instead of having to pay extra for it. Paying extra puts more pressure on small companies to deliver the firewall and complete the configuration, especially if they have hundreds or thousands of policies. It's very painful to move through these policies line by line. The stability has room for improvement. When it comes to Secure SD-WAN, everything is fine. They are going the right way. SD-WAN is very promising. They can provide the SD-WAN solution separately, but they will not take this approach because even the smallest firewall can support the features, so there is no need to have a separate service or appliance. They are following the right steps, and there is nothing to be improved. Feature-wise, I'm really satisfied with the new release, and the features they have added. For now, it's fine.
Maharajan S - PeerSpot reviewer
Enhances security with precise access control but has integration challenges
Overall, I would rate the product six out of ten. Because of the support and cost, I moved away from Cisco, but otherwise, it is a good product. Recommendation depends on the requirement. If lacking a proper team and being dependent on the OEM and partner, Cisco is not suitable. However, if the team is qualified with Cisco-certified people and the requirement is a big network, it can be considered. In today's hybrid work world, having an expanded gateway is more typical than having a single one. Thus, Cisco is unlikely to be recommended for a hybrid requirement unless in-house skills align. Otherwise, depending on partners and Cisco, it can be a risk. I rate the overall solution six out of ten.
Rias Majeed - PeerSpot reviewer
Robust VPN integration stands out despite needing enhanced vendor compatibility
The integrated VPN functionality is working well with the global VPN client, which is a fast client, though it comes at a cost. SonicWall TZ is functional depending on the service level taken by the user. For SMB segments, SonicWall performs well. Despite lacking certain features, it is still considered a good product. The appliance itself is functional and stable, offering integrated solutions.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"There are great templates, so you don't have to customize them if you don't want to. You do have the option to custom create some folders and some reports, however, with what is there, you don't really need to go through extra effort, as they already give you a lot of predefined views of reports and so forth."
"Overall, the pricing of the solution is very good. The product offers good value."
"It is useful for protecting and segregating the internal networks from the internet. Most of our customers also use the FortiGate client to connect to their offices by using the VPN client, and of course, they usually activate the antivirus, deep inspection, and intrusion prevention services. They are also using it for web filtering and implementing various policies dealing with forwardings, NAT, etc."
"The initial setup of Fortinet FortiGate was straightforward."
"I'm looking forward to FortiGate's dashboard features, insights, application oversight, and monitoring, which could help us significantly."
"From the firewall perspective, the rules and policies are very sufficient and easy to use."
"The product is very stable, easy to troubleshoot, and configure, so it has reduced the time it takes for support."
"I am "headache free" that I don't have to categorize all the websites and that security has been pre categorized by the people, and that the services are getting updated. At least one part of my problem is over."
"The clusters in data centers are great."
"An efficient, easy to deploy and dependable firewall solution."
"The most valuable feature of the Firepower solution is FireSIGHT, which can be easily managed and is user-friendly."
"The high-availability features, the VPN and the IPSec, are our top three features."
"The most valuable feature would be the IP blocking. It gets rid of things that you don't need in your environment."
"Cisco tech is always good and helpful. I would rate them as 10 out of 10."
"I work with Cisco and other partners, but the Cisco team is the best team in our country. When I call them, they always help us."
"Provides good integrations and reporting."
"Good VPN connection."
"It's a stable solution."
"The most valuable features are unified threat management which provides security intelligence and the VPN for both site-to-site and remote access."
"The solution is stable."
"The solution is priced fairly and competitively."
"The stability is very nice."
"The VPN is quite useful for us, as well as the ATP."
"User-friendly firewall solution which scales well, is stable, and has high availability."
 

Cons

"WAN load-balancing could be a lot better at detecting when a link is poor or inconsistent, and not just flat out dead."
"Fortinet FortiGate should improve the VPN tokens."
"I would like to see improvements made to the dashboard and UI, as well as to the reporting."
"Web security solutions can be improved."
"Compared to some other products, the DLP is not at par for the moment."
"Fortinet should focus on enhancing the capabilities of FortiGate by consolidating its various products, such as FortiGate Cloud, FortiManager, and FortiAnalyzer."
"Fortinet FortiGate can improve by integrating the web application firewall and the DDoS protection part of the solution. Having a WAF feature, web application firewall, and proxy together would be a good benefit."
"Quality control on their firmware versions needs improvement. When they introduce new firmware, there tend to be bugs."
"The management usability and security of Cisco Firewall are based on Firepower Management Center, which is quite out of date compared to other vendors."
"They could improve by having more skilled, high-level engineers that are available around the clock. I know that's an easy thing to say and a hard thing to do."
"Its implementation was not straightforward. It was mainly because we were running two projects together."
"The stability could be better because we have a lot of issues with the stability of Cisco Firepower."
"In NGFW, Cisco should be aligned with the new technology and inspection intelligence because Cisco is far behind in this pipeline."
"Cisco Secure Firewall’s customer support could be improved."
"Even on a smaller scale, people are finding you need HA pairs, and there's no way that the ASA can do that, at least in the virtual version."
"We had an event recently where we had inbound traffic for SIP and we experienced an attack against our SIP endpoint, such that they were able to successfully make calls out... Both CTR, which is gathering data from multiple solutions that the vendor provides, as well as the FMC events connection, did not show any of those connections because there was not a NAT inbound which said either allow it or deny it."
"The quality of tech support can vary."
"The log analyzer in SonicWall TZ is something that they need to improve upon."
"I think content filtering is the area this product should improve. It's a little tricky to get put in correctly."
"The interface and technical support are probably the two most important things that I would like SonicWall to improve."
"The solution's pricing could be made cheaper."
"Its reporting can be improved. Currently, we cannot directly get the user names. It only shows the IP, which makes it a bit confusing because we need to use the IP to find the user. If we could directly get the name of the user, it would be better."
"There is still room for improvement, and it's not advisable even if the organization has grown."
"The reporting analytics could be improved, it is very unstable."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"If the customer is looking for SD-WAN, it comes free with FortiGate."
"Fortinet is competitive price-wise."
"Its price could be better."
"Fortinet FortiGate gives you most of the features in one license."
"The licensing scheme of Fortinet is better than Cisco. It is more logical."
"It is too expensive for us. My organization is very small, and we have a total of ten users. We have three internal users and seven external users. The FortiGate 100D series is too expensive for renewing the licenses."
"The price is fair for what we get with FortiGate."
"The price is fine."
"Once you know what the product is, it is not that bad. Yes, it is expensive. When you try to get a license, it is like, "Well, I don't know which one of these I need. And, if I don't buy it now, then I will probably be back later. Now, I have to justify the money." Typically, you end up just buying everything that you don't use most of the time. It is one of those solutions where you get what you pay for. If you don't know what you need, just buy everything. We have additional licenses that we don't use."
"The prices of Cisco Secure Firewall are competitive, especially for us as Cisco partners. We purchase the products directly from Cisco as a gold partner, which allows us to obtain better pricing than we would get from normal distributors or the local market."
"The pricing for Cisco products is higher than others, but Cisco is a very good, strong, and stable technology."
"License capacity needs to be extended and the vendor needs to work on the pricing."
"I rate the product's price a seven on a scale of one to ten, where one is expensive, and ten is cheap."
"Cisco is cheaper than Check Point although it is not as cheap as Fortigate. But with the latest improvements in hardware and speed, the pricing is okay."
"The pricing is too high and the licensing is too confusing."
"There are additional implementation and validation costs."
"The firewall with the servers costs about 80 pounds a month. We get the device, and it is replaced every two or three years."
"It is an expensive solution compared to one of its competitors."
"It is a bit expensive. We have to purchase the license and the reporting part separately, which makes it a bit pricey. This is the main reason why we have thought of moving to another firewall. It would be good if they combine both of these."
"The license that we purchased is good for three years."
"Getting licenses in our country, Ghana, is not easy. Though, once we have them, adding them is quick (about a day)."
"Its price is very high, which makes it difficult to convince the clients to buy this solution."
"The price is fair for the solution for the quality you receive."
"I give the price an eight out of ten."
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Comparison Review

it_user206346 - PeerSpot reviewer
Mar 11, 2015
Cisco ASA vs. Palo Alto Networks
Cisco ASA vs. Palo Alto: Management Goodies You often have comparisons of both firewalls concerning security components. Of course, a firewall must block attacks, scan for viruses, build VPNs, etc. However, in this post I am discussing the advantages and disadvantages from both vendors concerning…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
22%
Computer Software Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Educational Organization
41%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
4%
Government
4%
Computer Software Company
19%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Construction Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Which is the better NGFW: Fortinet Fortigate or Cisco Firepower?
When you compare these firewalls you can identify them with different features, advantages, practices and usage a...
What is the biggest difference between Sophos XG and FortiGate?
From my experience regarding both the Sophos and FortiGate firewalls, I personally would rather use FortiGate. I know...
What are the biggest technical differences between Sophos UTM and Fortinet FortiGate?
As a solution, Sophos UTM offers a lot of functionality, it scales well, and the stability and performance are quite ...
Which is better - Fortinet FortiGate or Cisco ASA Firewall?
One of our favorite things about Fortinet Fortigate is that you can deploy on the cloud or on premises. Fortinet Fort...
How does Cisco's ASA firewall compare with the Firepower NGFW?
It is easy to integrate Cisco ASA with other Cisco products and also other NAC solutions. When you understand the Cis...
Which is better - Meraki MX or Cisco ASA Firewall?
Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) software is the operating software for the Cisco ASA suite. It supports netw...
Would you choose Fortinet Fortigate or Sonicwall TZ?
I’ll say it depends on your needs. Fortinet FortiGate and SonicWall TZ are both next-gen firewalls (NGFW) with simila...
What do you like most about SonicWall TZ?
The most valuable feature of SonicWall TZ is the double authentication, where it asks for one password and again asks...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SonicWall TZ?
The price is normal. It is a nominal cost for an SMB TZ used for SMB businesses. However, more licenses are required ...
 

Also Known As

FortiGate 60b, FortiGate 60c, FortiGate 80c, FortiGate 50b, FortiGate 200b, FortiGate 110c, FortiGate, Fortinet Firewall
Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Firewall, Cisco ASA NGFW, Adaptive Security Appliance, Cisco Sourcefire Firewalls, Cisco ASAv, Cisco Firepower NGFW Firewall
Dell SonicWALL TZ
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Dell, HP, Oracle, Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Vodafone, Orange, BT Group, Telstra, Deutsche Telekom, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, CenturyLink, NTT Communications, Tata Communications, SoftBank, China Mobile, Singtel, Telus, Rogers Communications, Bell Canada, Telkom Indonesia, Telkom South Africa, Telmex, Telia Company, Telkom Kenya
There are more than one million Adaptive Security Appliances deployed globally. Top customers include First American Financial Corp., Genzyme, Frankfurt Airport, Hansgrohe SE, Rio Olympics, The French Laundry, Rackspace, and City of Tomorrow.
AeroM_xico Delta TechOps, Unimat
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Firewall vs. SonicWall TZ and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
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