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

Cisco Sourcefire SNORT vs Fortinet FortiWeb 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 Sourcefire SNORT
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) (12th)
Fortinet FortiWeb
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
121
Ranking in other categories
Web Application Firewall (WAF) (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

Cisco Sourcefire SNORT and Fortinet FortiWeb aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Cisco Sourcefire SNORT is designed for Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) and holds a mindshare of 3.0%, up 2.6% compared to last year.
Fortinet FortiWeb, on the other hand, focuses on Web Application Firewall (WAF), holds 4.4% mindshare, down 7.5% since last year.
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco Sourcefire SNORT3.0%
Darktrace10.1%
Fortinet FortiGate8.5%
Other78.4%
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
Web Application Firewall (WAF) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Fortinet FortiWeb4.4%
Imperva Application Security Platform7.6%
Cloudflare5.2%
Other82.8%
Web Application Firewall (WAF)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2772102 - PeerSpot reviewer
Cloud Architect at a consultancy with 1-10 employees
Logging and customizable rules have helped improve threat monitoring and detection
The logging is mainly what I consider one of the best features with Cisco Sourcefire SNORT. Being able to log and store it in a file allows you to push it to a centralized repository. The logging and reporting help improve incident response. You should always be logging threats, any sort of misconfiguration, and anything that could be an issue. It's important to at least log and monitor it. The basic rules provide a good baseline in assessing Cisco Sourcefire SNORT's ability in providing real-time analytics for threat detection, but as a professional, you should look to constantly modify that baseline. They provide extensive customizability so you can define your own rules. The customizability allows it to be adaptable in protecting against diverse network threats to the constant change.
HameedAhmed - PeerSpot reviewer
Joint Director at PAA
Security threats have been reduced through seamless deployment and strong integration with other tools
I have used Fortinet FortiWeb's integration features. We have easily integrated all of the applications with the product. Most of the applications we are using are in-house built. My technical team is looking after the best features. I have not used it extensively for maybe two and a half years. I have been involved in the installation, but I am not actually using the product. I work with it from time to time but not extensively. I would assess Fortinet FortiWeb's adaptive machine learning and artificial intelligence as having new patches installed regarding artificial intelligence, but when we bought it, I think the learning feature was there. Now they have installed artificial intelligence features through patches. We have a complete portfolio of Fortinet in our organization, including FortiMail, Fortinet FortiWeb, and FortiGate, along with multi-factor authentication. All of the products are from Fortinet. Fortinet tools integrate with each other and work in conjunction. I think Fortinet FortiWeb has helped us meet regulatory compliance because we are not a regulatory organization, but our sister organization is regulatory. We have regulatory compliance with the International Civil Aviation Authority, whose audit teams have checked our data center and these security products, and they are satisfied with us. The question about leveraging Fortinet FortiWeb's automated policy management does not pertain to my domain because I am not so technical, but I am in a management role now. My engineer is more technical than me. I would rate this product an eight point five out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The whole solution is very good, and stable."
"We primarily use this solution as an intrusion prevention system for external firewalls and deploy the solution on-premises."
"I like most of Cisco's features, like malware detection and URL filtering."
"I would recommend this solution; it's reliable and scalable, with easy installation and integration."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to automatically learn the traffic in our environment, and change the merit recommendations based on that."
"The most valuable feature is the visibility that we have across the virtual environment."
"It has a huge rate of protection. It's has a low level of positives and a huge rate of threat protection. It's easy to deploy and easy to implement. It has an incredible price rate compared to similar solutions."
"The solution can be integrated with some network electors like Cisco Stealthwatch, Cisco ISE, and Active Directory to provide the client with authentication certificates."
"FortiNet shows me the health of the entire network."
"The most valuable feature is the web application firewall (WAF)."
"The most valuable feature is ease of use."
"It is a good product. We have just blocked everything coming from some geographical locations or certain countries, and it has been working very efficiently when I look at logs, events, and incidents generated from the system. It is generating very good analytic reports about it. This is the most valuable thing about this solution. It has load balancing and almost everything that a web application firewall needs. It is very flexible and easy to learn and configure. It can be easily learned and configured by using the information available on different channels such as YouTube."
"We use Fortinet FortiWeb to protect our exchange terminal for mail security."
"The initial setup was straightforward, it was easy."
"The most valuable feature is that this product represents a whole solution, including a WAF, and even anti-defacements."
"The valuable feature of Fortinet FortiWeb vulnerability scanner"
 

Cons

"I would like to have analytics included in the suite."
"With the next release, I would like to see some PBR, so that you can do the configuration with the features."
"Cisco Sourcefire SNORT can scale, but if you have too much, you could fill up your log files, which I consider when discussing scalability."
"To be frank, the product is not really stable, although they're working on that. Whenever I go to the technical community with an issue, they will usually say that it is not there yet, but the technical team are working on it. The issues are not insolvable. I think they should just keep working on the product to make sure that the product can become very stable. The technical support is great. I appreciate that. We have a lot of communities supporting Firepower now, so you can find help for whatever issue you have."
"The pricing needs to be improved. We have lots of low-budget clients around us. Budget constraints are always a deterrent in our market."
"A lot of Cisco equipment is very good, but in judging the model of this solution that we have, I feel that it is the worst."
"There are some bugs in this solution and troubleshooting them is complicated."
"The customization of the rules can be simplified."
"We had some trouble using some features."
"If some of my customers want to migrate from F5 to Fortinet Firewall, or the Fortinet WAF solution, there are some migration issues since I cannot migrate all the elements quickly using Fortinet Firewall."
"There is room for improvement in pricing, and actually, the price is a bit higher because on the same terms I purchased, the support subscription is so high."
"FortiWeb needs to have support for the newest technology being used in web applications."
"HA Architecture needs improvement. I would improve it by working on AP HA."
"The tool's WAF or web application firewall area has certain aspects that can be improved."
"When you compare it with the F5 solution, FortiWeb is weak in detecting the Layer 7 DDoS attacks."
"We have encountered issues with webhooks and management of FortiWeb Web Application Firewall's on-premise version."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We have a three-year license for this solution."
"I don't know the exact amount, but most of the time when I go to a company with a proposition, they will say, "This thing that you are selling is good, but it's expensive. Why don't you propose something like FortiGate, Check Point, or Palo Alto?" Cisco device are expensive compared to other devices."
"The cost is per port and can be expensive but it does include training and support for three years."
"If one is an extremely expensive product, and ten is cheap, I rate the tool's price as a five."
"Licensing for this solution is paid on a yearly basis."
"​The pricing is reasonable."
"The product is expensive. I rate the pricing a ten out of ten."
"The licensing cost of the product is pretty high compared to other OEMs in the market."
"The costs are standard. We pay around $1,600 yearly."
"Fortinet FortiWeb's pricing is reasonable. Its licensing costs are yearly."
"The pricing is in the middle. I would rate the pricing a five out of ten. It feels like a justified cost for the features."
"I rate the product price a four on a scale of one to ten, where one is a high price, and ten is a low price."
"This product offers two pricing options: a standard package and an advanced package."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) solutions are best for your needs.
908,344 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Outsourcing Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Outsourcing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business60
Midsize Enterprise27
Large Enterprise37
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Sourcefire SNORT?
If one is an extremely expensive product, and ten is cheap, I rate the tool's price as a five. There are some other tools in the market that are more expensive than Cisco. There are no additional c...
What needs improvement with Cisco Sourcefire SNORT?
I have not had much experience with the community-driven rule set while utilizing Cisco Sourcefire SNORT. I don't have experience with recognizing zero-day vulnerabilities, but based on my knowledg...
What is your primary use case for Cisco Sourcefire SNORT?
Endpoint protection is the main use case. The main aspect involves specifying different rules, and when network traffic hits these rules, it will try to block the traffic or at least log the traffi...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiWeb?
The pricing for Fortinet FortiWeb varies with different models having different prices. It depends on the requirement. For VM machines, the price increases based on CPU configurations of 2, 4, or 8...
What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiWeb?
There is room for improvement in Fortinet FortiWeb. The team was only from FortiGate itself. They are making new firmware versions and releasing them before checking, which leads to many bugs in th...
What is your primary use case for Fortinet FortiWeb?
Fortinet FortiWeb is very good as a web application solution. I have been working with Fortinet FortiWeb since 2020.
 

Also Known As

Sourcefire SNORT
FortiWeb Web Application Firewall (WAF)
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

CareCore, City of Biel, Dimension Data, LightEdge, Lone Star College System, National Rugby League, Port Aventura, Smart City Networks, Telecom Italia, The Department of Education in Western Australia
Lush, Barnabas Health, Options, Riverside Healthcare, Hillsbourough County Schools, Columbia Public Schools, Schiller AG
Find out what your peers are saying about Fortinet, Darktrace, Check Point Software Technologies and others in Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS). Updated: July 2026.
908,344 professionals have used our research since 2012.