No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall vs Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention 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:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
5.2
Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall reduces costs and improves efficiency with centralized management, automation, and reduced workforce needs.
Sentiment score
5.7
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention offers financial benefits and high user satisfaction despite its cost, boosting revenues, especially in Italy.
Cybersecurity ROI could be $1 or $100 million, depending on the risk of data behind it.
Sales Manager at Mega tech S.A
It is easy and offers different solutions for each solution type with small, mid, and large scale options available.
Senior Network Engineer at Anthology
I did see a return on investment with Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall, as mentioned by the efficiency improvements and the metrics related to how much I cut investigation time, the number of incidents, and the ease of making changes or pushing new configurations.
Cybersecurity Engineer at a tech consulting company with 51-200 employees
It offers insights into security threats, despite the inability to quantify its impact in numbers.
Principle Cloud Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
5.8
Most customers find Forcepoint Firewall support helpful and reliable, despite occasional delays and logistical challenges.
Sentiment score
5.9
Palo Alto Networks' support is praised for expertise but faces inconsistent response times and communication challenges with third-party facilitation.
Unlike Fortinet where you can escalate an issue and quickly get responses from the development team, Forcepoint's process seems slow and challenging.
Sales Manager at Mega tech S.A
TAC engineers are very experienced and troubleshoot issues within the expected timeframe with no problems.
Senior Network Engineer at Anthology
We have a point of contact from the account manager to the presales representative, and they connect with the technical support team, providing support in Indian time, so we do not have to worry about US or European time zones.
MANAGER SOLUTION CONSULTING at a manufacturing company with 201-500 employees
I rate technical support from Palo Alto as eight out of ten.
Principle Cloud Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
I have proof of this rating - when I escalate a case, I receive a reply from TAC support after two days.
Presales Engineer at SAUDI PARAMOUNT COMPUTER SYSTEMS
Overall, I find the technical support from Palo Alto Networks quite good, although getting a hold of the TAC can be challenging and sometimes requires long phone calls.
Global Network Tech Lead at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.2
Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall offers scalable integration, supporting diverse environments with ease in both on-premises and cloud deployments.
Sentiment score
7.7
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention is scalable, adaptable, and efficient, though cost may constrain its broad deployment.
I can have one management node similar to Palo Alto Panorama, with multiple nodes covering different sites, data centers, or zones.
Cybersecurity Engineer at a tech consulting company with 51-200 employees
Even if you have some firewalls in the cluster, it is not necessary to have them on the same version.
IT Consultant at M-COM s.r.o
In a country such as India with a large population, we often need to scale up or down depending on projects and requirements, and it is very much easy to do both ways.
MANAGER SOLUTION CONSULTING at a manufacturing company with 201-500 employees
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention is scalable and works well wherever enforcement points exist.
Principle Cloud Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.7
Forcepoint Firewall is reliable with minor issues; high-availability setups reduce downtime, though complex deployments may face challenges.
Sentiment score
7.7
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention is praised for its superior stability and performance, though requires careful version selection.
It has many freezes for no reason.
Cyber Security Specialist at a comms service provider with 501-1,000 employees
Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall should make some improvements because there is some instability with their software.
System Engineer at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Proper sizing of the firewall models ensures that the system does not experience crippling performance issues.
Principle Cloud Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
 

Room For Improvement

Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall needs a user-friendly interface, better integration, improved support, and competitive pricing.
Palo Alto Networks needs improvements in email filtering, setup ease, user experience, support services, and enhanced security features.
Fast response and efficient handling of issues, similar to how Fortinet responds, would be great.
Sales Manager at Mega tech S.A
AI improvements could be beneficial, as having AI capabilities has become an important checkmark feature.
CEO at a comms service provider with 11-50 employees
I recommend that additional features be included in a single license to avoid the need for extra licensing costs.
Head of IT Department at Mana
Palo Alto needs to focus on how to bring that technology to end users and how easy it is to use, especially in a hybrid environment where users work from various locations.
Global Network Tech Lead at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
The behavioral detection capabilities could be expanded to address all threats at the perimeter, reducing the reliance on endpoint detection and response systems.
Principle Cloud Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
 

Setup Cost

Forcepoint's pricing is competitive, especially in Asia, with variable licensing terms and additional costs for extra features.
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention is costly but valued for strong threat detection, with pricing challenging for smaller businesses.
The costs can be high since additional features require separate licenses.
Head of IT Department at Mana
In terms of price, I would say Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall is not expensive.
MANAGER SOLUTION CONSULTING at a manufacturing company with 201-500 employees
In terms of pricing, I would place Forcepoint in the middle when compared to other firewalls like Fortinet and Palo Alto.
Sales Manager at Mega tech S.A
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention requires an add-on license and is considered expensive compared to competitors like Cisco AMP and FortiGate firewalls.
Principle Cloud Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
 

Valuable Features

Forcepoint NGFW offers robust security, easy integration, advanced protection, and versatile deployment with centralized management for seamless connectivity.
Palo Alto Networks excels in threat prevention with features like sandboxing, machine learning, and user-friendly design, enhancing efficiency.
Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall has impacted my organization positively by making it very easy to work and offering a more competitive price compared to other vendors.
Cyber Security Specialist at a comms service provider with 501-1,000 employees
Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall has positively impacted my organization by providing always-on perimeter security.
Responsabile System and Security at a energy/utilities company with 501-1,000 employees
Strong network segmentation is my favorite feature that Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall offers.
Cybersecurity Engineer at a tech consulting company with 51-200 employees
As traditional signature-based mechanisms become less effective due to the evolving nature of attacks, this solution's focus on behavioral analysis is crucial.
Principle Cloud Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
We are satisfied with the analytic capabilities of Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention, especially the reporting features available in the Palo Alto portal in terms of their application visibility interface, which is very good for us to get visibility on all critical applications and the associated users, as well as the risks associated with every category of traffic.
Global Network Tech Lead at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
 

Categories and Ranking

Forcepoint Next Generation ...
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
52
Ranking in other categories
Firewalls (25th), Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (10th), WAN Edge (11th)
Palo Alto Networks Advanced...
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Network Security Systems solutions, they serve different purposes. Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall is designed for Firewalls and holds a mindshare of 1.0%, up 0.4% compared to last year.
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention, on the other hand, focuses on Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS), holds 4.5% mindshare, down 5.6% since last year.
Firewalls Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall1.0%
Fortinet FortiGate14.5%
OPNsense8.2%
Other76.3%
Firewalls
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention4.5%
Darktrace10.2%
Fortinet FortiGate9.2%
Other76.1%
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
 

Featured Reviews

Ajit Pratap Kundan - PeerSpot reviewer
MANAGER SOLUTION CONSULTING at a manufacturing company with 201-500 employees
Unified security management has improved traffic control and simplified remote workforce access
Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall does help in vulnerability identification and response by providing a single unified console through which I am able to monitor and manage infrastructure. The URL filtering capability of Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall helps in blocking malicious sites. We have to take care of both known threats and unknown threats. The firewall takes care of known threats, and we protect ourselves from unknown threats such as malicious code and malware that we cannot create firewall rules for. With these routing capabilities and policies, only whitelisted things get processed or passed. The biggest advantages of Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall, especially as a partner, service provider, and integrator, are that it is very easy to integrate these APIs with our solution, and most of the features I am getting in the clientless mode. Even with the client mode, it is easy to integrate with our client, allowing the customer to get a single client to address all the features of the firewall as well as the GTNA perspective. The flexibility of deployment, especially for the government and defense sectors, is that they want an on-premises solution, while the rest of the PSUs or enterprise segment are comfortable with the cloud offering, which is the SaaS offering and the way to go in the future.
Partha Dash - PeerSpot reviewer
Global Network Tech Lead at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Advanced protection enables us to confidently secure against evolving threats
Palo Alto Networks can improve Advanced Threat Prevention by catering to the growing adoption of AI and agentic tooling. The Threat Protection modules should have the necessary intelligence to protect against those types of threats, as AI will be there to do a human job; this is an evolving area. From an Advanced Threat Protection perspective, the technology associated with Palo Alto Networks, such as their sandboxing environment, is quite good. However, Palo Alto needs to focus on how to bring that technology to end users and how easy it is to use, especially in a hybrid environment where users work from various locations. While Palo Alto excels in certain setups, they need to improve the user experience in distributed working conditions.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Firewalls solutions are best for your needs.
904,748 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Construction Company
9%
Performing Arts
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business29
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise14
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise15
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall?
In terms of price, I would say Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall is not expensive. It is very much comparable to other vendors, and pricing is not a problem, especially for the Asian market, with...
What needs improvement with Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall?
The negative side of Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall is that the ZTNA part is missing. For that, we have to integrate a third-party component with Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall to complet...
What is your primary use case for Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall?
The major use cases for Forcepoint Next Generation Firewall are in government turnkey projects where we require a lot of traffic coming from the public domain. That is why we are putting these fire...
Which is the best DDoS protection solution for a big ISP for monitoring and mitigating?
Arbor would be the best bid, apart from Arbor, Palo Alto and Fortinet have good solutions. As this is an ISP, I would prefer Arbor.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Palo Alto Networks Threat Prevention?
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention requires an add-on license and is considered expensive compared to competitors like Cisco AMP and FortiGate ( /products/fortinet-fortigate-reviews ) fi...
What needs improvement with Palo Alto Networks Threat Prevention?
Palo Alto Networks can improve Advanced Threat Prevention by catering to the growing adoption of AI and agentic tooling. The Threat Protection modules should have the necessary intelligence to prot...
 

Also Known As

Forcepoint NGFW, Stonesoft Next Generation Firewall, McAfee Network Security Platform, Intel Security Network Security Platform
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR)
University of Arkansas, JBG SMITH, SkiStar AB, TRI-AD, Temple University, Telkom Indonesia
Find out what your peers are saying about Fortinet, Netgate, Cisco and others in Firewalls. Updated: July 2026.
904,748 professionals have used our research since 2012.