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Cortex Cloud by Palo Alto Networks vs Sophos Cloud Optix comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 19, 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

Cortex Cloud by Palo Alto N...
Ranking in Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
108
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (1st), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (1st), Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (1st)
Sophos Cloud Optix
Ranking in Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
30th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) category, the mindshare of Cortex Cloud by Palo Alto Networks is 16.2%, down from 18.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Sophos Cloud Optix is 0.4%, down from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)
 

Featured Reviews

Mohammad Qaw - PeerSpot reviewer
It gives you one console to see all of your assets, review their configurations, and build your processes
Most customers use Prisma Cloud for visibility and compliance. Prisma has so many features, but many organizations do not use them. They primarily use the visibility part to connect all their cloud accounts and hosts for visibility to see if they are missing any security controls or if they have any misconfigurations. You can connect it to cloud environments such as Azure, AWS, Oracle Cloud, Alibaba, etc., or to an on-prem data center. Prisma Cloud gives you so many options to automate processes related to your daily operations. When it comes to cybersecurity, you can automate things with their existing APIs. They also have out-of-the-box integrations with many solutions. I have not seen any limitations. Everything is customizable. You can do whatever you want, defining the reporting and custom use cases. They recently updated the UI, so it's much better than before.
Jean Desir - PeerSpot reviewer
DLP is a valuable feature that we use a lot for info audits.
The dashboard and the process for applying policies could be more intuitive. Cloud Optix isn't that difficult once you get the hang of it, but the IT folks managing this want it to be more user-friendly. Deploying the agents could be more seamless, too. Ideally, Cloud Optix would automate adding agents into your environment by integrating with Active Directory or some policy.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution's dashboard looks very user-friendly."
"Prisma Cloud's real-time detection and monitoring of our entire system is the most useful."
"Prisma Cloud's monitoring features such as the compute compliance dashboard and the vulnerability dashboard, where we can get a clear visualization of their docker, have also been valuable. We can get layer-by-layer information that helps us see exactly where it's noncompliant. They update the dashboards quite frequently."
"The initial setup is seamless."
"It supports the multi-cloud environment beautifully."
"Configuration monitoring and alerting is the most valuable feature; it happens at the cloud's speed, allowing our development team to respond quickly. If a configuration goes against our security best practices, we're alerted promptly and can act to resolve the issue. As cloud security staff, we're not staring at the cloud all the time, and we want to let the developers do their jobs so that our company is protected and work is proceeding within our security controls."
"I like Palo Alto's threat protection and Wi-Fi coverage. It has advanced features like DNS security and sandboxing. The automation capabilities are excellent."
"I found the network queue sets useful. I also liked the Workload Protection Module, the vulnerability findings, and how the rule sets handle the vulnerabilities based on severity."
"I find Cloud Optix to be a valuable solution since it provides a single, unified dashboard to monitor cloud assets, such as AWS and Azure."
"I find Cloud Optix to be a valuable solution since it provides a single, unified dashboard to monitor cloud assets, such as AWS and Azure."
"The most valuable feature for me would be the solution's endpoint protection."
"The most valuable feature of Sophos Cloud Optix is the simple way to manage my devices on the network. Additionally, it is easy to navigate and has a user-friendly interface."
"DLP is a valuable feature that we use a lot for info audits."
 

Cons

"They need to make the settings more flexible to fit our internal policies about data. We didn't want developers to see some data, but we wanted them to have access to the console because it was going to help them... It was a pain to have to set up the access to some languages and some data."
"The licensing is a bit confusing."
"The integration of the Compute function into the cloud monitoring function—because those are two different tools that are being combined together—could use some more work. It still feels a little bit disjointed."
"The access controls for our bank roles were not granular enough. We needed specific people to do particular actions, and we often had to give some people way too much access for them to be able to do what they needed in Prisma. They couldn't do their jobs if they didn't have that level of access, so other people had to do that part for them. It would help to have more granular role-based access controls."
"The UI is the worst."
"A better correlation between the multiple products Prisma Cloud contains would be crucial. It would reduce the time spent looking at reports and enable you to get all the actionable insights across products. I think that Palo Alto is working on it, but they need to work faster because it doesn't make sense to have all these products in a single pane of glass without any correlation between them."
"It does not provide runtime security or protection for Windows Server. It is currently lacking in terms of Windows environment."
"It would be ideal if they could somehow reduce the deployment time."
"There are times when the devices are at maximum capacity, and it takes a while before the device is updated. For example, if the device has a virus, and it's not aligned to connect to the network, even after you've scanned the device, and cleaned out the virus, once the management clears the system to allow it back on the network it takes some time. It can be frustrating when you have your line manager or in management affected trying to access the network."
"Sophos should enhance its AI-driven detection features and anomaly detection."
"The dashboard and the process for applying policies could be more intuitive. Cloud Optix isn't that difficult once you get the hang of it, but the IT folks managing this want it to be more user-friendly."
"Sophos should enhance its AI-driven detection features and anomaly detection."
"The setup was a little bit complex."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price for Prisma Cloud is reasonable."
"I find the pricing to be expensive."
"The pricing structure is easy to understand. Depending on the use case the pricing of the solution can be different. There are not any additional costs to the standard living fees."
"Prisma Cloud is more expensive than Check Point CloudGuard."
"Prisma Cloud is quite scalable. In our current licensing model, we're able to heavily extend our cloud workload and onboard a lot of customers. It really helps, and it is on par with other solutions."
"The pricing is competitive. From what I have seen in the past, it is on par with the others."
"I wouldn't mind if it were cheaper. We are spending a fair amount of money on Prisma Cloud."
"The pricing and licensing are expensive compared to the other offerings that we considered."
"Regarding the pricing for Sophos Cloud Optix, I would say that it was a very good price."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
18%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
16%
Government
9%
University
7%
Insurance Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your primary use case for Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks ?
Prisma Cloud helps support DevSecOps methodologies, making those responsibilities easier to manage.
What Cloud-Native Application Protection Platform do you recommend?
We like Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks, since it offers us incredible visibility into our entire cloud system. We are able to easily see where our container vulnerabilities lie and and where cl...
What do you think of Aqua Security vs Prisma Cloud?
Aqua Security is easy to use and very manageable. Its main focus is on Kubernetes and Docker. Security is a very valuable feature and their speed of integration is very good. The initial setup was ...
What do you like most about Sophos Cloud Optix?
The most valuable feature for me would be the solution's endpoint protection.
What needs improvement with Sophos Cloud Optix?
I guess that customer training is an area that needs improvement. What I've noticed is that we are not best trained for the software we might purchase, where you might discover later, "you could do...
What is your primary use case for Sophos Cloud Optix?
Sophos Cloud Optix is the endpoint scanner for the workstations at my company, and they control the firewall and the servers. So it provides endpoint protection with Sophos Firewall Manager.
 

Also Known As

Prisma Cloud, Prisma Public Cloud, RedLock Cloud 360, RedLock, Twistlock, Aporeto
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Amgen, Genpact, Western Asset, Zipongo, Proofpoint, NerdWallet, Axfood, 21st Century Fox, Veeva Systems, Reinsurance Group of America
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Cortex Cloud by Palo Alto Networks vs. Sophos Cloud Optix and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
838,713 professionals have used our research since 2012.