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Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) vs Microsoft Defender XDR comparison

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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:
 

Categories and Ranking

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Net...
Sponsored
Ranking in Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
117
Ranking in other categories
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) (4th), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (4th), Ransomware Protection (2nd), AI-Powered Cybersecurity Platforms (1st)
Datto Endpoint Detection an...
Ranking in Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)
47th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Microsoft Defender XDR
Ranking in Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)
9th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
108
Ranking in other categories
Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (5th), Microsoft Security Suite (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) category, the mindshare of Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is 3.6%, down from 3.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) is 1.1%, down from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender XDR is 2.1%, down from 2.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks3.6%
Microsoft Defender XDR2.1%
Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)1.1%
Other93.2%
Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)
 

Featured Reviews

ABHISHEK_SINGH - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Process Expert at A.P. Moller - Maersk
Gained full visibility and streamlined threat detection through behavior-based insights and AI integration
Initially, we got to have a lot of false positives when we onboarded, but nowadays it's quite smooth. We have fine-tuned our security policies and allowed different levels of policies to get rid of those false positives. Currently, we are getting a fairly good amount of incidents that are not false positives or benign, but actionable items. The process is streamlined. In the initial days, the operations used to get involved in a lot of benign and other activities, but now the process is streamlined. We are leveraging the auto-detection and remediation plans. The operations teams are now more involved in other business roles as well, not just looking into the logs and fetching out what's happening there. They have fixed a lot of things. Initially, they didn't have IAC code drift detection, cloud posture management, or security posture management, but they have those now. They purchased different vendors and did a merger with that. They have now Prisma Cloud that gets integrated and now they are working with Cortex Cloud. Everything that was negative has now been addressed, and the product altogether looks to be in a very better and mature shape now. Currently, it's more or less detecting the workloads with AI-based best practices. Since most organizations are consuming AI agents and other things, we are looking forward to seeing what other feature enhancements Palo Alto can support in that.
reviewer2406663 - PeerSpot reviewer
Director at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
Effective risk response, easy deployment, and enhanced security
They use Datto EDR as part of the solutions that we supply Datto EDR has helped reduce overall security incident costs by fifteen percent. The ease of deployment has been good, and the responsiveness of the application to risks has been quite effective. The inclusion of web filtering would be…
reviewer2812758 - PeerSpot reviewer
Infosec at a government with 10,001+ employees
Integrated defenses have unified threat hunting, phishing simulations, and identity investigations
I appreciate Microsoft Defender XDR's MDE, Microsoft Defender tool, which has Attack Simulator. Instead of doing a phishing campaign and getting a separate tool, Microsoft Defender XDR does it all. These features of Microsoft Defender XDR have helped us conduct a phishing campaign quarterly, which has been beneficial. I also appreciate the fact that it has Defender for Office integrated, Defender for Identity, and everything integrated together. I would describe the process of using Microsoft Defender XDR to prioritize incidents in my security operations as quite decent. I appreciate the automatic alerting system where any incidents or alerts we receive come directly to our email. From there, we can open the email, go directly to Microsoft Defender XDR, and start our investigations and remediations. I perceive the integration of security and identity access management in Microsoft Defender XDR as affecting my identity protection strategies very well because it is well integrated with Purview, integrated well with Entra ID, and integrated well with Exchange. I especially appreciate MDO, the Office product. If anything happens and I want to conduct an investigation, it takes me directly to Exchange, where I can also investigate any emails or phishing incidents. Instead of going to different portals, everything can be done from Microsoft Defender XDR. If necessary for further investigation, Microsoft Defender XDR then directs me to that environment. I would assess the integration of AI in guiding security actions within Microsoft Defender XDR as quite positive. Recently, Security Copilot went big, and it is beneficial that I can use that, especially to write KQL. I can do threat hunting features and intelligence all within using Microsoft's Security Copilot. It also has a nice AI feature for threat hunting. I know that all the Defender logs go to Sentinel, and I can pull it up from Microsoft Defender XDR or from Sentinel. The fact that I can actually do all that within Microsoft Defender XDR is a nice feature. In the top module, I can do threat lookups, and I can actually type KQLs in Microsoft Defender XDR and look up incidents. Predictive shielding has had a nice impact on my proactive security measures. It is beneficial that it has, similar to Entra ID, a secure score. For me to improve the product, the secure score helps me out. If I rate it from highest to lowest, I can see what things I can improve. Secure score helps me see what areas I can improve in Microsoft Defender XDR to increase my score and bring it to 80 or more. Knowing Microsoft Defender XDR from using it since 2019, before COVID days, I know that they have improved significantly. It is much more user-friendly and has a very nice vulnerability feature that I find handy and useful. The fact that this feature integrates into Intune is also very decent.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Cortex XDR is stable, offering high quality and reliable performance."
"The normal protection was really effective, and we detected situations that if we didn't have Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks, it's highly likely that we would have been affected, but it protected the infrastructure."
"The initial setup is easy."
"The behavior-based detection feature is valuable."
"The solution's most valuable feature is the user interface."
"The most valuable feature of Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is its machine-learning capabilities. Additionally, there is full integration with other solutions."
"The most valuable feature is that you can select remote access of any machine for sandboxing."
"The main benefit of using Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks while employing Palo Alto Firewall at the internet edge is that it improves security on our endpoint devices, integrating seamlessly with Palo Alto Firewalls to deliver comprehensive network, analyst, and security details all in a single dashboard, which allows us to manage everything from our network devices."
"The ease of deployment has been good."
"The most valuable feature of Datto EDR is the visibility of the endpoints."
"Datto Endpoint Detection and Response is a perfect product for endpoint security."
"The insight that the solution provides is the most valuable aspect. The security scanning they do is excellent."
"We also use Microsoft Sentinel, Defender for Cloud, Defender for Identity, and Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps. They are all integrated and it was very easy to integrate them. In my experience with the integrations, it was just a click of a button and things were integrated. It's just a button."
"Microsoft Defender is stable."
"Instead of using three or four tools for security, we can use one."
"In our company,we have faced multiple attacks over the last few months, but none of them have been successful, and I think Microsoft Defender XDR has played a major role in it."
"In Microsoft 365 vendor products, monitoring and connectivity across all Microsoft and third-party connectors enable viewing of all activity within those environments."
"Microsoft Defender XDR has significantly improved our operational security."
"Microsoft 365 Defender is simple to upgrade."
"Microsoft Defender XDR is very comprehensive, covering a lot of the services, tools, and applications that we use, so it's very efficient, and it works out of the box."
 

Cons

"There are some third-party solutions that are difficult to integrate with, which is something that can be improved."
"I would like to see improvement in the tool's user interface, particularly in the area of managing alerts and providing more reporting capabilities."
"Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks could improve by adding a sandbox feature to better compete with their competitors which have it."
"Impact on system performance is horrible, adding a lot of delays for users."
"If he is using a smaller company, he can depend on some other tools because Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is a bit expensive."
"Technology evolves every day, so it would be nice if it gets more secure. It can also have more integration with other platforms."
"Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is a very good product, but financially, it is very expensive, so the company should look into that area."
"This is a very costly product."
"The solution should allow the automation of playbooks."
"The inclusion of web filtering would be good."
"The solution could improve by having more deployment methods."
"The deployment of the solution right now is terrible. We find it to be very bad. It could be improved enormously."
"The onboarding and offboarding need improvement. I work with other vendors as well, and they have an option to add a device or remove a device from the portal, whereas with Microsoft 365 Defender, we need to do that manually. However, once you do that, everything can be controlled through the portal, but getting the device onboarded and offboarded is currently manual. If we have an option to simply remove a device from the portal or get a device added from the portal, it would be more convenient. The rest of the features are similar. This is the only area where I found it different from others. I would also like to be able to simply filter with a few of the queries that are already there."
"My client would like the solution to be more customizable without using code. You can only build on the default console, but we're not allowed to change it."
"The management features could be improved, particularly in terms of better integration with Intune, Microsoft's cloud-based management solution."
"From a performance standpoint, improvements could be made."
"The price could be better. It'll also help if they can continuously update and upgrade the solution. Every day there's a new virus uploaded into the network, and we have to keep updating it to identify all these things."
"The patching capability should be there. Patching is something that you cannot do even though you see the vulnerabilities present in your environment. For patching, you have to depend on another solution."
"Microsoft Defender XDR is not a full-fledged EDR or XDR."
"In the future, it would be beneficial for Microsoft to consider making the product more user-friendly or simplified for those who are interested in using it. Currently, it requires a high level of technical expertise, making it challenging for beginners or less experienced individuals."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"In terms of the cost Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is very expensive because we are a Mexican company and when you translate dollars to pesos the cost is very high. The solution is very expensive for Mexican companies. I understand that they have international prices, but I do not think it offsets the price enough for many companies in countries, such as Mexico. The amount it is reduced is not a massive percentage."
"The pricing is a little high. It is per user per year."
"Every customer has to pay for a license because it doesn't work with what you get from a managed services provider."
"The price of the solution could be reduced. I have customers that have voiced that the solution is good for the value but if I want to sell more of the solution the price reduction would help."
"Cortex XDR's pricing is ok."
"The cost of Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is $55 to $90 USD per endpoint per month."
"It is cost-effective compared to similar solutions. It fits for the small businesses through to the big businesses."
"We pay about $50,000 USD per year for a bundle that includes Cortex XDR."
"There is an annual license to use this solution. The price of the solution can be expensive depending on the company."
"Datto Endpoint Detection and Response is not an expensive solution."
"We've managed to navigate it effectively through our enterprise agreement, and Microsoft's academic discounts have proven to be quite generous."
"The most valuable licensing option is expensive, so pricing could be improved. Licensing options for this solution also need to be consolidated, because they frequently change."
"The licensing fee for Microsoft 365 Defender is fair."
"I believe the pricing is fair and acceptable. I consider it to be reasonable and satisfactory."
"Microsoft Defender XDR is already included in our Office 365 licensing. It is better because we're saving money by using it."
"The product is fairly priced for what we get from it."
"Microsoft Defender XDR is included in our license."
"Microsoft Defender XDR's licensing is complicated."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
12%
Construction Company
11%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Healthcare Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Outsourcing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business47
Midsize Enterprise21
Large Enterprise54
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business46
Midsize Enterprise28
Large Enterprise41
 

Questions from the Community

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto vs. Sentinel One
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto vs. SentinelOne SentinelOne offers very detailed specifics with regard to risks or attacks. ...
Comparing CrowdStrike Falcon to Cortex XDR (Palo Alto)
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto vs. CrowdStrike Falcon Both Cortex XDR and Crowd Strike Falcon offer cloud-based solutions th...
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,...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Infocyte HUNT?
The price is quite low. On a scale of one to ten, I would rate it a four, meaning it is quite cheap.
What needs improvement with Infocyte HUNT?
The inclusion of web filtering would be good.
What is your primary use case for Infocyte HUNT?
They use Datto EDR as part of the solutions that we supply.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft 365 Defender?
My experience with the pricing, setup costs, and licensing of Microsoft Defender XDR is that we are on an E5 license,...
What needs improvement with Microsoft 365 Defender?
From my perspective, Microsoft Defender XDR can be improved with better visibility in certain areas where I can trigg...
What is your primary use case for Microsoft 365 Defender?
My main use cases for Microsoft Defender XDR are telemetry, advanced hunting, and the ability to perform host isolati...
 

Also Known As

Cyvera, Cortex XDR, Palo Alto Networks Traps
Infocyte HUNT
Microsoft 365 Defender, Microsoft Threat Protection, MS 365 Defender
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

CBI Health Group, University Honda, VakifBank
Check Point Software, PwC, Grant Thornton, AT&T, DHL, U.S. Department of Defense
Accenture, Deloitte, ExxonMobil, General Electric, IBM, Johnson & Johnson and many others.
Find out what your peers are saying about Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) vs. Microsoft Defender XDR and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
911,602 professionals have used our research since 2012.