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Cisco Umbrella vs Google Cloud DNS comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 30, 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 Umbrella
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
122
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (1st), Internet Security (1st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (2nd), Domain Name System (DNS) Security (1st), Cisco Security Portfolio (1st)
Google Cloud DNS
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
7
Ranking in other categories
Managed DNS (7th)
 

Mindshare comparison

Cisco Umbrella and Google Cloud DNS aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Cisco Umbrella is designed for Domain Name System (DNS) Security and holds a mindshare of 21.6%, down 25.4% compared to last year.
Google Cloud DNS, on the other hand, focuses on Managed DNS, holds 4.6% mindshare, down 6.0% since last year.
Domain Name System (DNS) Security Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Cisco Umbrella21.6%
Infoblox Advanced DNS Protection12.4%
Palo Alto Networks DNS Security7.5%
Other58.5%
Domain Name System (DNS) Security
Managed DNS Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Google Cloud DNS4.6%
Cloudflare31.5%
Quad930.0%
Other33.900000000000006%
Managed DNS
 

Featured Reviews

Emilio Montoya - PeerSpot reviewer
CTO at PROA
Ensures internet navigation safety and boosts productivity
The features of Cisco Umbrella I prefer most are DNS protection and traffic redirect. With Cisco Talos's threat intelligence, we reduce the impact of malware traffic in our network, and we currently see the behavior of equipment and choose the correct sites. Cisco Talos has helped us reduce the impact of malware traffic. We can see the behavior and choose the correct sites. We're currently testing secure access with Umbrella in order to secure access to core applications. It's a product that the user doesn't even know is there, even though it is protecting them. It's not hard on the equipment. And, for us, it centralizes everything, which improves productivity. With the Experience Insights feature of Cisco Secure Access, we've seen impacts on the management of user connectivity by allowing us to deliver safe connectivity. We are testing the Secure Access product with Cisco Umbrella to improve our connectivity with our users in order to secure access to the corporate applications. Cisco Umbrella is in the cloud, which is nice.
Shikar Singh - PeerSpot reviewer
Solutions Architect / IT Program Manager at Optum
Constantly improving and adapting to customer needs
The effectiveness of Google Cloud DNS largely depends on where an organization stands in its cloud journey and its overall technology landscape. For those heavily invested in Google Cloud Platform (GCP) and already embracing cloud solutions, Google Cloud DNS can be rated quite high, ranging from seven to nine out of ten.Deployment times for Google Cloud DNS can vary depending on the complexity of the infrastructure and configuration requirements. For straightforward setups and cloud-ready cases, deployment can typically be completed within a few minutes to an hour. However, in more complex infrastructure scenarios involving extensive configuration, deployment may take longer, possibly spanning days or weeks.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It has the ability to quickly block new threats."
"Cisco Umbrella offers DNS layer security, a secure web gateway, and cloud access security broker functionality."
"It provides centralized, device-agnostic management of the Internet experience."
"The customer experience is very good, and the product improves security posture."
"The most valuable features for us include tenant lock, content filtering, and DLP solutions, looking for PII and information being exfiltrated."
"It is user-friendly. It is easy to manage the solution."
"Application performance has greatly improved and there are less operational issues. Productivity has been going up because we have less operational issues. Also, we have happy customers."
"We are very new users of the solution and are still in the exploration stages, but we are happy with the product thus far."
"The tool is well integrated. We don’t need the interface of another provider. The product helps me manage my domain and write in Google Cloud."
"The initial setup process is easy."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"The most significant features are the internal and external endpoints using Google Cloud DNS, which are very beneficial for dependent apps."
"Google Cloud DNS continues to evolve based on customer feedback and technological advancements."
"It is a scalable solution."
"The scalability is good."
 

Cons

"If a hardware platform were provided for Umbrella, that would definitely improve the market for it... Especially when we are addressing governmental customers, they hesitate to connect to the cloud. That is where we need a hardware platform so that the solution can be used on-premises as well."
"Looking at the full umbrella suite in the light of SASE, Secure Access Service Edge, they are clearly lacking in the inline CASB."
"They should provide more integrations and bring things together so that there is a more standard feel to their platform. We also use Cisco ISE, and it has a very different feel from Cisco Umbrella."
"Cisco Umbrella is difficult to manage and needs to include a dashboard. It needs to improve pricing as well."
"I would like to see more integrations with more products. Some of the integrations need to be simpler as well. For example, the integration with Cisco Secure Firewall could be simpler. It would be good to make reporting simpler. For those who don't use SecureX, it would be good to make Umbrella really simple to use upfront. It's not a difficult product, but it can be daunting for someone who isn't exposed to it because there are so many options."
"We need to work on integration as it is very complex."
"It needs better integration with external threat feeds to improve scoring."
"I'd like to see improvement in its overall integration with all the other platforms. There's some integration between Umbrella and Meraki, but an overall Cisco problem is that there are so many different tools, and finding easy, seamless ways of connecting everything together is always a challenge."
"The UI is tricky to understand for people who have not worked with DNS records. People with little to no experience with DNS records can find it hard to understand. For example, you need to know the hallmarks to input records since they need to be matched in a specific format."
"The solution's price could be better."
"Migrating away from Google Cloud DNS can be difficult."
"More features around rules-based configurations would be beneficial."
"It needs to provide better integration."
"The cost of using Google Cloud DNS can be relatively high compared to other options, especially considering the cloud environment."
"The UX of the product is an area with certain shortcomings where improvements are required."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Licensing with Cisco can be a little complex, but I think it's comparable with that of other similar products. It's always hard to put a price on security, but the price is fair for the value it provides."
"The price should be slightly lower than the current price because if you look at the whole solution, it is simply a threat intelligence solution to block blacklisted things. The price should be lower looking at the features provided by the solution. The price isn't too high either, but it could be lower."
"Its value exceeds its pricing."
"It has a reasonable price. It is certainly not as expensive as it used to be. It is in line with other offerings on the market. There are a number of different flavors of Umbrella. They could bring Umbrella SIG down a bit because its price is a little bit high for what it does, but I also understand why its price is high."
"In terms of licensing, we're not able to be extremely clear with the customer because it's based on their reporting. It's not based on the actual traffic. If they say they have 50 users but they have 80, we'll just buy for 50 users. That's something where we'd like to have more flexibility."
"The solution’s pricing is reasonable."
"In the region I'm from, that of EMAR, Europe, the Middle East, Eastern Asia and Africa, our organizations do not have many liquid cash assets, so the price could be better."
"Cisco has a model called ELA. With ELA, if you buy the solution you will have the complete security portfolio and you can pay it yearly or after three years, it depends on the contract."
"I am not sure about the pricing. However, I can give you a rough estimate which is like ten cents per month per zone."
"The cost of using Google Cloud DNS can be relatively high compared to other options, especially considering the cloud environment. I would rate it 6 out of 10. Cheaper alternatives might be desirable, but the decision depends on various factors such as vendor lock-in, organizational adaptability, and alignment with other technologies in use."
"The product is expensive."
"It is expensive but cost-effective."
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Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Domain Name System (DNS) Security solutions are best for your needs.
881,282 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
Comms Service Provider
17%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Educational Organization
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business49
Midsize Enterprise30
Large Enterprise51
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise4
 

Questions from the Community

Which is the better security solution - Cisco Umbrella or Zscaler?
Cisco Umbrella and Zscaler Internet Access are two broad-spectrum Internet security solutions that I have tried. Zscaler Internet Access is a good option for carrying out multiple security functi...
Which is the better security solution - Cisco Umbrella or Microsoft Cloud App Security?
Cisco Umbrella is an integral component of the Cisco SASE architecture. It integrates security in a single, cloud-native solution, unifying multiple features like DNS-layer security, threat intelli...
What do you like most about Cisco Umbrella?
Cisco Umbrella is easy to monitor, manage, and deploy.
What do you like most about Google Cloud DNS?
Google Cloud DNS continues to evolve based on customer feedback and technological advancements.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google Cloud DNS?
Pricing and support are really good. There are no complaints about the pricing.
What needs improvement with Google Cloud DNS?
I am not heavily involved with Cloud DNS, but from an end-user perspective, the customization part could be improved. More features around rules-based configurations would be beneficial.
 

Also Known As

OpenDNS
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Chart Industries, City of Aspen, Eastern Mountain Sports, FLEXcon, George Washington University, Jackson Municipal Airport Authority, Ohio Public Library Information Network, PTC, Richland Community College, Smart Motors, Tulane University, VeriClaim
MeilleursAgents
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco, Infoblox, Palo Alto Networks and others in Domain Name System (DNS) Security. Updated: January 2026.
881,282 professionals have used our research since 2012.