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ESET EDR/XDR vs Microsoft Defender XDR 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

ESET EDR/XDR
Ranking in Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)
62nd
Ranking in Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
38th
Average Rating
0.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
Authentication Systems (39th)
Microsoft Defender XDR
Ranking in Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)
5th
Ranking in Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
4th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
97
Ranking in other categories
Microsoft Security Suite (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Extended Detection and Response (XDR) category, the mindshare of ESET EDR/XDR is 1.0%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender XDR is 7.0%, up from 6.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
 

Featured Reviews

MV
An easy-to-use solution that could improve it’s website-scouring capabilities
The solution is easy to use The solution could improve how it scours each website. We have used the solution for more than a year. The stability is very good, so I rate the solution’s stability an eight out of ten. I rate the scalability a seven out of ten. Our clients are mostly medium-sized…
Gabor Nyerd - PeerSpot reviewer
Includes four services and four products, which can help organizations a lot
We found that sometimes integrations work, but testing them can take some time. Sometimes, configurations take much longer than expected. We have a configuration in place that needs to be synchronized with another server. However, the servers are four hours apart, so this can cause delays. In general, I believe that the time it takes to configure and test a service should be shorter. Sometimes, it can take a couple of hours to test a single configuration setting. Other times, it is only ten or fifteen minutes, which is normal. However, sometimes, even immediate actions can be triggered by configuration changes, and some settings can take up to eight hours to complete. I believe that this time can be improved. Microsoft is making a lot of improvements to its services in a short period of time. This is a good thing, as it means that the services are constantly being updated and improved. However, it can be challenging for customers to keep up with the changes. For example, a customer may read about an update, understand it, and share it with their colleagues and boss. However, it may take days or weeks to test the update and get the necessary approvals. This can be especially challenging for large customers with many users or machines. In some cases, Microsoft may change a service before the customer has had a chance to implement the previous update. This can be frustrating for customers, as it means that they have to constantly learn new things and adjust their workflows. On the one hand, it is important for Microsoft to keep updating and improving its services. This helps to ensure that the services are meeting the customers' needs and that they are staying ahead of the competition. Microsoft should also be mindful of the challenges that these changes can create for customers. One way to address this challenge is to provide customers with more time to implement changes. Microsoft could also provide more information about upcoming changes so that customers can plan ahead. Ultimately, Microsoft needs to strike a balance between keeping its services up-to-date and providing customers with a smooth transition to new features.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is easy to use."
"The product integrates security into one tool instead of having third-party security tools."
"The common and advanced security policies for threat hunting and blocking attacks are valuable."
"Advanced hunting is good. I like that. We can drill down to lots of details."
"We are connected to Microsoft and have every laptop enrolled. This acts as an endpoint. The tool helps me check security and compliance. I can also check what a device is doing."
"The feature I find most valuable is Defender for Endpoint."
"The visibility into threats is also very impressive because Microsoft helps you predict things and provides analytics to help you really improve your security. And all of this technology works across the domain, so it is pretty helpful in terms of threat analytics."
"Vulnerability assessment and just-in-time access are some valuable features of Defender for server plans."
"The Endpoint Manager is incredible; it has a very straightforward interface and is exceedingly easy to use. Pulling out and deploying different tags or resources is a simple task across various departments with different levels of security. The notifications are also simple and satisfying; it's great to see the bubble informing us which devices are compliant and which are waiting to update."
 

Cons

"The solution could improve how it scours each website."
"The abundance of sub-dashboards and sub-areas within the main dashboard can be confusing, even if it all technically makes sense."
"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 mobile app support for Android and iOS is difficult and needs improvement."
"The management and automation of the cloud apps have room for improvement."
"At times, there may be delays in the execution of certain actions and their effects."
"The licensing process needs improvement and clarification, as it is currently difficult to understand which features are licensed to which users."
"I do think that maybe having a feature within my organization where there are three different domains within which we have to operate would be helpful, as there is currently no unified view within the domains."
"I personally have not seen much evidence of how Defender can enhance the story of zero trust for enterprises."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I rate the solution’s pricing a six or seven out of ten.."
"Defender XDR is included in the E5 license, but it's a bit too expensive."
"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."
"They have moved from a licensing model to pay-per-use... The question is: What happens if, for any reason, there's not enough budget to accept this model? That could be a great problem."
"The product is fairly priced for what we get from it."
"The pricing of Microsoft 365 Defender is definitely on the costly side, but with the features and services that Microsoft provides, such as the seamless integration of all the Defender tools, while the price is on the higher side, there is no alternative."
"Microsoft Defender XDR is already included in our Office 365 licensing. It is better because we're saving money by using it."
"The bundling of software makes it easier to manage our setup, but Microsoft purposefully obfuscates this through marketing ploys to hide costs."
"Microsoft Defender falls within a mid-tier price range compared to other security solutions."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
22%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Healthcare Company
6%
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ESET EDR/XDR?
I rate the solution’s pricing a six or seven out of ten. Our customers have a yearly license with no additional costs.
What needs improvement with ESET EDR/XDR?
The solution could improve how it scours each website.
What do you like most about Microsoft 365 Defender?
Microsoft Defender XDR provides strong identity protection with comprehensive insights into risky user behavior and potential indicators of compromise.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft 365 Defender?
Licensing is somewhat confusing, particularly when presenting our pitch decks to stakeholders and leveraging key features in premium SKUs, but we managed with some assistance from Microsoft.
What needs improvement with Microsoft 365 Defender?
It would be beneficial to reduce the number of clicks required to navigate between blades, as the current navigation and breadcrumb system can be a bit confusing. Some inconsistencies exist between...
 

Also Known As

ESET Secure Authentication
Microsoft 365 Defender, Microsoft Threat Protection, MS 365 Defender
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Mitsubishi Motors, Canon
Accenture, Deloitte, ExxonMobil, General Electric, IBM, Johnson & Johnson and many others.
Find out what your peers are saying about CrowdStrike, SentinelOne, Wazuh and others in Extended Detection and Response (XDR). Updated: March 2025.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.