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

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

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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...

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) category, the mindshare of Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is 3.4%, down from 4.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) is 1.5%, down from 2.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender XDR is 2.6%, down from 3.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks	3.4%
Microsoft Defender XDR	2.6%
Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)	1.5%
Other	92.5%

Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)

Featured Reviews

ABHISHEK_SINGH

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.

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reviewer2406663

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…

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Kunle Oluwadiya

House security operator at Cypress Creek Renewables

Advanced threat hunting saves significant time in tracking and responding to incidents

Microsoft Defender XDR could be improved with a lower price. My main suggestion would essentially be what Copilot is providing, which is a single pane of glass, so I don't have to go to different windows. That's just a workflow consideration for me. It would be great to have all the information centralized into one particular data app. If I need to open up extra ones, I can, however, I would appreciate a future where everything I need is right there on one single pane of glass. Beyond that, there's really nothing else I see that I would want Microsoft to improve.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"After deploying Traps, we saw the performance of the network improve by 65 to 70 percent."

"Traps is quite a stable product. Once it was properly deployed and configured, you have nothing to be worried about."

"We use it for malicious connections from malicious websites, to identify payloads that might be inside the traffic, to identify malicious processes or bugs that are running on the network, and any activities that tend to lead to data infiltration."

"The multi-layered approach to the product gives you confidence that it will stop exploits, ransomware, worms, or viruses from compromising endpoints, essentially providing peace of mind."

"Cortex is a very good total solution on the endpoints."

"Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks's ability to block sophisticated threats in real time is quite good and is on par with SentinelOne's."

"The product is mostly automated, and we do not have to make decisions, because all the decisions are made by the product itself and we are not required to create any custom policies since the policies that are created are well defined in the product itself."

"Cortex XDR features advanced threat detection capabilities."

More Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks pros

"The most valuable feature of Datto EDR is the visibility of the endpoints."

"The insight that the solution provides is the most valuable aspect. The security scanning they do is excellent."

"The insight that the solution provides is the most valuable aspect."

"The ease of deployment has been good."

"Datto Endpoint Detection and Response is a perfect product for endpoint security."

"My clients like Defender's file integrity monitoring. They're monitoring Windows and Linux system files."

"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."

"One of the most valuable features of Microsoft Defender XDR is its ability to provide preemptive reports regarding excessive privileged access."

"I like that it's fully integrated with Windows, Microsoft 365 Exchange Online, and Outlook. It is better than other antivirus solutions because it's fully integrated with all Microsoft products. It's easy to integrate them and onboard all Windows devices from SCCM."

"We can use Defender to block and monitor for security purposes without needing multiple other products to do different tasks."

"The solution is well integrated with applications. It is easy to maintain and administer."

"Microsoft 365 Defender is a good solution and easy to use."

"I like that it's stable. It's been stable for a long time, and Microsoft Defender has done a good job there."

More Microsoft Defender XDR pros

Cons

"A little bit more automation would be nice."

"Every 30 or 40 days, there's a new version and we need to go and make sure our customer's laptops are upgraded."

"The complexity and confusion regarding product variants, such as XDR, Forexiant, and Forexon, must be addressed."

"The product's pricing could be better."

"The main issue I could point out is the offline agents and the way that it is missing."

"One thing that was missing was the integration part. Currently, they don't have out-of-box integration with IBM QRadar, or if they have the integration, the integration doesn't work well."

"For Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks, if I had to point out improvements, I would say the UI is still somewhat difficult for beginners."

"The solution should force customers to integrate with network traffic to see the full benefits of XDR."

More Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks cons

"The deployment of the solution right now is terrible. We find it to be very bad. It could be improved enormously."

"The inclusion of web filtering would be good."

"The deployment of the solution right now is terrible. We find it to be very bad."

"The solution should allow the automation of playbooks."

"The solution could improve by having more deployment methods."

"Microsoft 365 Defender does not have a unique package with emerging endpoint security technologies, such as EDR and XDR."

"For some scenarios, it provides good visibility into threats, and for some scenarios, it doesn't. For example, sometimes the URLs within the emails have destinations, and you do get a screenshot and all further details, but it's not always the case. It would be good if they did a better job of enabling that for all the emails that they identified as malicious. When you get an email threat, you can go into the email and see more details, but the URL destination feature doesn't always show you a screenshot of the URL in that email. It also doesn't always give you the characteristics relating to that URL. It would be quite good if the information is complete where it says that we identified this URL, and this is what it looks like. There should be some threat intel about it. It should give you more details."

"The support from Microsoft could improve. There are times I have to wait for a response from a qualified specialist."

"There is no comprehensive visibility, making it less user-friendly."

"Microsoft Defender XDR is not a full-fledged EDR or XDR."

"Sometimes, configurations take much longer than expected."

"The improvements to Microsoft Defender XDR would probably go on the Linux side. There's still some more work to be done there."

"365 Defender has multiple subsets, including Defender for Cloud Apps. When integrating Defender for Cloud Apps with apps on third-party cloud platforms like AWS or GCP, there are limitations on our ability to control user activities. If Microsoft added more control over third-party products, that would be a game-changer and help us quite a lot."

More Microsoft Defender XDR cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution has one subscription for endpoint protection and one subscription for detection and response. The two licenses combined give you the BRO version."

"We didn't have to pay any additional fee for the cloud instance. It just came with the renewal, which was nice."

"I don't recall what the cost was, but it wasn't really that expensive."

"The pricing seems fair, and I do like the licensing model. You use wherever they are, and it is elastic."

"Traps pays for itself within the first 16 months of a three-year subscription. This is attributed to OPEX savings, as security teams spent less time trying to identify and isolate malware for analysis as a result of a reduction in malware incidents, false positives, and breach avoidance."

"I did PoCs on products called Cylance and CrowdStrike. Although, I consider these products and they were also good, when it come to cost and budgetary factors, Traps has been proven to be better than the other two products. It is quite cost-effective and delivers all the entire solution which we require."

"Our license will require renewal in August, after which the maintenance will continue as usual."

"Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is an expensive solution."

More Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks pricing and cost advice

"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."

"It can be complex to navigate since customers have varying licensing agreements across Microsoft. If they go straightforward with E5 for all users, it's simple, but combinations based on budget constraints can complicate things."

"Defender XDR is included in the E5 license, but it's a bit too expensive."

"Understanding the subscription model has been a bit challenging, as every feature or requirement comes with an additional cost."

"The licensing fee for Microsoft 365 Defender is fair."

"While the standalone price of Defender XDR might seem high, its value becomes clear when considering the ease of implementation and smooth integration with our existing Microsoft infrastructure, especially when bundled with other Microsoft products."

"The solutions price is fair for what they offer."

"Microsoft Defender XDR is already included in our Office 365 licensing. It is better because we're saving money by using it."

"365 Defender is billed per account. I don't know the exact price, but my supervisor told me that Microsoft Defender is cheaper than the alternatives. It's bundled, so you get all the features in one place."

More Microsoft Defender XDR pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) solutions are best for your needs.

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885,286 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Construction Company

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

Comms Service Provider

12%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Retailer

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	44
Midsize Enterprise	20
Large Enterprise	47

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	46
Midsize Enterprise	26
Large Enterprise	39

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 do you like most about Microsoft 365 Defender?

Microsoft Defender XDR provides strong identity protection with comprehensive insights into risky user behavior and p...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft 365 Defender?

My experience with pricing, setup, costs, and licensing of Microsoft Defender XDR is tied to our E5 subscription, whi...

What needs improvement with Microsoft 365 Defender?

I am not aware of a mobile app that would be available for my team. With a single analyst, if she is ever away, it wo...

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint vs Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks

Comparisons

Compared 9% of the time

SentinelOne Singularity Complete vs Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 6% of the time

CrowdStrike Falcon vs Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 4% of the time

Cortex XSIAM vs Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 4% of the time

TrendAI Vision One vs Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks

Compared 2% of the time

More Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks Competitors

SentinelOne Singularity Complete vs Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)

Compared 17% of the time

CrowdStrike Falcon vs Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)

Compared 12% of the time

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint vs Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)

Compared 9% of the time

Intercept X Endpoint vs Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)

Compared 6% of the time

Bitdefender GravityZone EDR vs Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)

Compared 6% of the time

More Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) Competitors

CrowdStrike Falcon vs Microsoft Defender XDR

Compared 11% of the time

Wazuh vs Microsoft Defender XDR

Compared 7% of the time

Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs Microsoft Defender XDR

Compared 5% of the time

SentinelOne Singularity Complete vs Microsoft Defender XDR

Compared 4% of the time

Check Point Harmony Endpoint vs Microsoft Defender XDR

Compared 2% of the time

More Microsoft Defender XDR Competitors

Product Reports

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks

Download Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks product report

Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)

Download Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) product report

Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) report

Microsoft Defender XDR

Download Microsoft Defender XDR product report

Also Known As

Cyvera, Cortex XDR, Palo Alto Networks Traps

Infocyte HUNT

Microsoft 365 Defender, Microsoft Threat Protection, MS 365 Defender

Overview

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks provides advanced threat detection with AI-driven endpoint protection and seamless integration, ensuring multi-layered security and automatic threat response.

Cortex XDR is designed to safeguard endpoints against malware and suspicious activities. It offers advanced threat detection and response capabilities using behavioral analysis, AI, and machine learning. It seamlessly integrates with security infrastructures, providing endpoint security, firewall integration, and enhanced visibility in both cloud-based and on-premises environments.

What are the key features of Cortex XDR?

Advanced Threat Detection: Uses AI and machine learning for proactive threat identification.
Multi-layered Security: Combines various security measures for comprehensive protection.
Endpoint Protection: Safeguards against malware and exploits.
Behavioral Analysis: Monitors suspicious activity for early detection.
Automatic Threat Response: Automates responses to neutralize threats.

What benefits should users expect?

Ease of Use: Simplifies security management with intuitive design.
Resource Efficiency: Minimizes impact on system resources.
Integration Capabilities: Works well with existing security setups.
Reduced Analyst Workload: Automates processes to decrease manual intervention.

Organizations in diverse sectors deploy Cortex XDR to protect against malware, leveraging its advanced threat detection capabilities. Its integration with existing security infrastructures appeals to those seeking comprehensive protection in both cloud and on-premises environments, providing enhanced visibility and threat intelligence.

Palo Alto Networks

With Datto Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) you can detect and respond to advanced threats. Datto EDR is an easy to use cloud based EDR solution that's designed for Managed Service Providers (MSPs).

datto

Microsoft Defender XDR is a comprehensive security solution designed to protect against threats in the Microsoft 365 environment.

It offers robust security measures, comprehensive threat detection capabilities, and an efficient incident response system. With seamless integration with other Microsoft products and a user-friendly interface, it simplifies security management tasks.

Users have found it effective in detecting and preventing various types of attacks, such as phishing attempts, malware infections, and data breaches.

Watch the Microsoft demo video here: Microsoft Defender XDR demo video.

Microsoft

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.

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