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Juniper Session Smart Router vs Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 1, 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

Fortinet FortiGate
Sponsored
Ranking in Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
328
Ranking in other categories
Firewalls (2nd), WAN Edge (1st)
Juniper Session Smart Router
Ranking in Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
13th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
Routers (7th)
Versa Unified Secure Access...
Ranking in Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
WAN Edge (10th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (14th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 21.1%, up from 21.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Juniper Session Smart Router is 2.9%, down from 3.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform is 4.7%, down from 5.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
 

Featured Reviews

EhabAli - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient, user-friendly, and affordable
In the past, NSS Labs was utilized to test files and verify the numbers and datasheets. It would be beneficial to have an organization or testing lab that can verify the numbers in our datasheets since changes are frequently made, which can be inconvenient for review. For instance, when comparing different competitors such as Forcepoint, Palo Alto, and Check Point, the throughput or numbers in the datasheet may be lower than the actual numbers. Conversely, Fortinet typically reports very high numbers, but they cannot be replicated in the real world. Therefore, it would be advantageous for them to partner with a neutral testing organization such as NSS Labs to validate these numbers, thus providing more credibility and comfort to everyone regarding the accuracy of the datasheets. For the migration, everyone has a firewall in use and I am selling Fortinet. Typically, I am replacing another firewall. Previously, there was a tool available to convert configurations from one firewall, such as Palo Alto, to Fortinet, but this tool is no longer free. If it could be made free again, it would be very beneficial. This tool shows a lot of promise and is very good. Making it free would help many companies deliver their products in a more efficient and integrated way. It would also be more valuable to include the tool with the firewall package or license instead of having to pay extra for it. Paying extra puts more pressure on small companies to deliver the firewall and complete the configuration, especially if they have hundreds or thousands of policies. It's very painful to move through these policies line by line. The stability has room for improvement. When it comes to Secure SD-WAN, everything is fine. They are going the right way. SD-WAN is very promising. They can provide the SD-WAN solution separately, but they will not take this approach because even the smallest firewall can support the features, so there is no need to have a separate service or appliance. They are following the right steps, and there is nothing to be improved. Feature-wise, I'm really satisfied with the new release, and the features they have added. For now, it's fine.
Sascha Bülow - PeerSpot reviewer
Tunnel-free and secure vector routing technology is its major USP, and as a partner, we get good support from them
The UI of the SSR conductor is the main part where improvements can be done. Today, for every configuration step, you have to do a series of clicks. What we are missing there are wizards. For example, I have two applications, and I want one application to be prioritized against the other. In such a case, a wizard for assigning policies to a service without configuring each step by hand would be very helpful. There should be an overhaul of the GUI of the conductor. The functionality they have got in the Mist portal should be baked into the conductor itself. It would be really great, but as we all know, that won't happen. Besides that, there are so many things we are discussing with the engineers and the product management of 128T or Juniper. I'm pretty sure that every feature that will come in the next half-year or three-quarters of a year would be influenced directly by us.
PriyankDubey - PeerSpot reviewer
A flexible, stable and scalable solution
I don't have issues with the hardware, as the requisite capacity is visible in the data sheets. All the details in the data sheets are accounted for. But, I find myself confused when it comes to combining this with the software. I have not come across documentation on the Versa website which would provide information about the parameters for selecting the appropriate license. For this we are assisted by the solution's design engineer and the Versa team. I do what I can as a project manager and make the best suggestions I am capable of concerning the competition. Future releases should contain AI for the voice feature. SSL VPN is lacking in the solution. I wish to see this in the near future.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"FortiGate Secure SD-WAN includes best-of-breed next-generation firewall (NGFW) security, SD-WAN, advanced routing, and WAN optimization capabilities, delivering a security-driven networking WAN edge transformation in a unified offering."
"It is a one box solution, which covers most of the edge device’s requirements."
"The most valuable features of Fortinet FortiGate are the ease of use and the UI. It has always provided me with what I needed. I have no need for additional costs that other solutions have, such as Sophos."
"Overall, the pricing of the solution is very good. The product offers good value."
"It's very easy to set up, it's very easy to make policies and, for an organization, that means you don't need IT expert in firewalls. You just need to have somebody who knows a little bit of IT, and that's it. With other products, you need someone with a "Masters" degree in firewalls."
"It's very fast and easy to configure."
"It is quite easy to handle."
"Fortinet FortiGate is scalable for our users. Right now, we have almost 70 users. We do not have any plan to increase our usage of FortiGate. For maintaining the firewall solution, one staff member is enough."
"The solution is especially Session's smart, application-aware, AI-based."
"They provided us with a customized product according to our requirements."
"The most valuable feature of Juniper Session Smart Router is its unique SDR channel."
"Customer service is very prompt."
"As compared to the other major vendors in the SD-WAN market, such as VeloCloud, Cisco, and others, the tunnel-free and secure vector routing technology is its major USP, which gives plenty of room to discuss with the customer why IPSec from 1998 is a bit outdated."
"Our organization finds the application routing features extremely useful."
"Versa is a good centralized solution, where you're setting up your infrastructure in a data center type thing."
"Our customers are very satisfied with this solution. They have not mentioned any areas for improvement."
"The product is very stable with no complaints."
"The solution is stable and suitable."
"The necessary enhancement pertains to the controller segment, specifically addressing the issue of frequent flapping when a link is left. In the case of Versa Unified, if a link experiences frequent flapping within an entire branch, it triggers instability. Hence, it is imperative that the overall routing system is not contingent solely upon the active dial branches."
"The product has a dynamic VPN feature for SD-WAN."
"The flexibility is a great feature."
 

Cons

"Fortinet could improve the windows opener or the virtual IP solutions for opening windows. The virtual IP settings need improvement as firewalls are trending in new development directions."
"We would like to have the ability to disable some of the security functionalities."
"A lack of integration between our data centers."
"The platform's interface could improve."
"They have to just improve its performance when we enable all UTM features. When you enable all the features, the performance of FortiGate, as well as of Sophos and SonicWall, goes down."
"In the next release, maybe the documentation on how to use this solution could be improved."
"The central management for the FortiGate Fortinet Firewall needs improvement. They have the manager to do the essential management for both SD-WAN and for the security policy. They should also improve the SD-WAN function."
"Technical support is good but the response time could be faster."
"Regarding improvement, we still need to see what it can do."
"Juniper Session Smart Router could be better in terms of software performance."
"The UI of the SSR conductor is the main part where improvements can be done. Today, for every configuration step, you have to do a series of clicks. What we are missing there are wizards. For example, I have two applications, and I want one application to be prioritized against the other. In such a case, a wizard for assigning policies to a service without configuring each step by hand would be very helpful. There should be an overhaul of the GUI of the conductor. The functionality they have got in the Mist portal should be baked into the conductor itself. It would be really great, but as we all know, that won't happen."
"Juniper Session Smart Router can improve the integration for Wi-Fi devices and add additional Sassy deployments."
"The solution's current customer support is not that good. So, they need to improve that. Also, the solution's UI is quite complex, so they need to simplify it."
"The stability of FlexVNF's controller and devices could be improved."
"The interface could be simpler."
"Certainly, there are areas that require enhancement, and the current focus is on improvements. Presently, I believe that the emphasis should be on enhancing user interface (UI) features, particularly over end devices. The issue arises when attempting to log in to Versa from other devices, as the UI is not device-specific. Consequently, guiding someone to log in to Versa antivirus becomes challenging. Despite the absence of issues on the website, the lack of a login scope impedes graphical representation of user data or databases. Since work databases support only a limited range of features, I recommend augmenting features for end devices to address these limitations."
"The UTM features can be improved. It should offer better functionality."
"I heard about them for the first time just before I started working on Versa. They do have blogs for information, but they could publicize more about the documentation and architecture. It doesn't seem to have that much exposure, and they should work on their customer base more."
"Another thing that should be improved in Versa are their firewall features."
"The web interface can be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of Fortinet FortiGate is better than Cisco, Check Point, and Palo Alto. In terms of pricing, it's probably a better-priced firewall solution overall."
"Its price could be better."
"When you look at these end security systems and firewalls, these firewalls even five years ago were $50,000 or perhaps $25,000 to implement in some types of customer sites. Now we're talking about tools that are $1,000. In this case, it might have been $500 or something like that."
"The license is too expensive to renew. The license renewal process is also complex."
"Fortinet has one or two license types, and the VPN numbers are only limited by the hardware chassis make."
"The cost of Fortinet FortiGate is competitive and not expensive compared to other enterprise- grade solutions. On average, the license cost per year is around seventy percent of the firewall's purchase price."
"Fortinet is competitive price-wise."
"The price of FortiGate is comparable to that of most other firewall solutions and is more affordable than Cisco."
"It is a simple bandwidth-based license and the orchestration comes bundled with the solution by default."
"We are currently renegotiating the offer for the licenses and the license bundle model. The license for an ISP has to be different from the license for an end customer. This is something we are currently renegotiating with Juniper, but, of course, the pricing for the licensing is always an issue when you want to get more customers."
"It is neither cheap nor expensive. I rate the pricing a five out of ten on a scale where one is cheap and ten is expensive."
"The price is expensive but it makes sense for the market."
"We provide subscriptions for our customers on a yearly, not monthly, basis."
"It is not very expensive because of the white box support. Its hardware is much cheaper than other products. With the support for x86 and white box, it is one of the most cost-effective platforms that are currently available."
"While I cannot provide too much commentary on the price, I feel it to be fair for the moment."
"I find Versa a little more expensive than VMware in terms of remote access and secure web gateway elements."
"Price wise, it's more expensive than is the competition. I would give pricing a rating of three out of five."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
21%
Computer Software Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Computer Software Company
19%
Manufacturing Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Which is the better NGFW: Fortinet Fortigate or Cisco Firepower?
When you compare these firewalls you can identify them with different features, advantages, practices and usage a...
What is the biggest difference between Sophos XG and FortiGate?
From my experience regarding both the Sophos and FortiGate firewalls, I personally would rather use FortiGate. I know...
What are the biggest technical differences between Sophos UTM and Fortinet FortiGate?
As a solution, Sophos UTM offers a lot of functionality, it scales well, and the stability and performance are quite ...
What do you like most about Juniper Session Smart Router?
The most valuable feature of Juniper Session Smart Router is its unique SDR channel.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Juniper Session Smart Router?
Juniper Session Smart Router is not significantly cheaper than, for example, Cisco.
What needs improvement with Juniper Session Smart Router?
I did not find any problem with Juniper. Regarding improvement, we still need to see what it can do.
What do you like most about Versa FlexVNF?
Versa is a good centralized solution, where you're setting up your infrastructure in a data center type thing.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Versa FlexVNF?
Both Versa and VMware are cheap in terms of the router. I find Versa a little more expensive than VMware in terms of ...
What needs improvement with Versa FlexVNF?
We've had the odd occasional stability issue with software upgrades, etcetera. They don't support certain other third...
 

Also Known As

FortiGate 60b, FortiGate 60c, FortiGate 80c, FortiGate 50b, FortiGate 200b, FortiGate 110c, FortiGate, Fortinet Firewall
128T Networking Platform, 128 Technology SD-WAN, Juniper SSR Series
Versa FlexVNF, FlexVNF, Versa Titan
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Dell, HP, Oracle, Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Vodafone, Orange, BT Group, Telstra, Deutsche Telekom, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, CenturyLink, NTT Communications, Tata Communications, SoftBank, China Mobile, Singtel, Telus, Rogers Communications, Bell Canada, Telkom Indonesia, Telkom South Africa, Telmex, Telia Company, Telkom Kenya
Revation Systems
CenturyLink, RCN Business, Colt Technology Services
Find out what your peers are saying about Juniper Session Smart Router vs. Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
848,989 professionals have used our research since 2012.