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Malwarebytes Teams vs Microsoft Defender for Business comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 15, 2026

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 Protection Platform (EPP)
4th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
121
Ranking in other categories
Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (5th), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (3rd), Ransomware Protection (2nd), AI-Powered Cybersecurity Platforms (1st)
Malwarebytes Teams
Ranking in Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
23rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
37
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Microsoft Defender for Busi...
Ranking in Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
19th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
Microsoft Security Suite (19th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) category, the mindshare of Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is 3.8%, up from 3.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Malwarebytes Teams is 1.5%, down from 2.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Business is 1.3%, down from 2.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks3.8%
Microsoft Defender for Business1.3%
Malwarebytes Teams1.5%
Other93.4%
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
 

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.
reviewer2594097 - PeerSpot reviewer
Chief Executive Officer at a wholesaler/distributor with 11-50 employees
Exceptional malware protection with regular updates and behavior-based detection
There are no built-in backups or integrated backup options, which could be an opportunity. The free version is effective, however, the paid version is pricey compared to it. Other customers have mentioned issues with false positives. It lacks enterprise-level management and more enterprise functionality. CrowdStrike and SentinelOne are much more enterprise-grade solutions. Malwarebytes has limited integration with cybersecurity tools and lacks enterprise integrations because it is not an enterprise product.
YusufBuhari - PeerSpot reviewer
Head Of IT Security at Dangote Industries Limited
Unified defenses have strengthened threat hunting and automated incident disruption
I see room for improvement in Microsoft Defender for Business, particularly regarding the consolidation of all security solutions in one place and the integration of AI and data security into the same platform. I want to see more organized asset inventory, including identities, cloud resources, and various network devices. While there has been innovation from Microsoft, I am concerned about the lack of risk quantification across all major security solutions, including Microsoft's. Risk quantification is essential for CISOs to assess, communicate, and translate security risks into financial impacts, which is a challenge for many security leaders today. I would like to see a clear path for prioritization of risks within Microsoft Defender for Business, especially around vulnerability management. Even though there are features to prioritize remediation of risks based on exploitability, it could be more organized. A clearer structure for prioritizing remediation of risks would help manage them more effectively, as it is impractical to address all risks simultaneously.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The product has an intuitive dashboard."
"We've had a significant increase in blocking with a decrease in false positives, because it's looking at how the files work, not just a list of files that it's been told to look for."
"In one single alert, we are getting the network telemetry, endpoint telemetry, email security telemetry, and proxy telemetry all in one single ticket, making it very easy."
"It has a higher cost than other solutions, like CrowdStrike or Microsoft’s EDR tools, but it reduces the cost of our operations because it’s a new generation antivirus tool."
"The anti-exploit is impenetrable. We chose Traps because it is the only product that we were not able to get anything past."
"Traps pays for itself within the first 16 months of a three-year subscription."
"They have a new GUI which is just fantastic."
"The interface is easy to use and it is more up to date than our previous solution."
"I would recommend Malwarebytes because it's quite secure and able to prevent ransomware."
"It is a stable solution."
"Considering the overall management of the system and seeing what is being protected, it is doing a great job."
"Being able to cloud manage it from just a cloud login is valuable. We can get to it from anywhere, which is really helpful. The fact that we can remediate from the cloud console is one of our favorite features."
"Ten times a day, improved signatures will be downloaded, so it is very up-to-date in terms of malware experience."
"The technical support services are good."
"I commonly recommend Malwarebytes to people due to the fact that I find it quite reliable."
"The most valuable feature is its ability to customize for different groups."
"The interface is quite user-friendly."
"Everything is stable. There have been no technical errors or stability issues."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its central console."
"I recommend Microsoft Defender for Business to startup organizations looking for a plug-and-play solution."
"The solution includes attack-savvy service and risk protection, part of data center management, and offers an effective single-dashboard view with Microsoft 365."
"The security features in Microsoft Defender for Business that have been most effective for our company include the way it's built-in and intertwined into all the operating systems, giving us a good opportunity to holistically block things for the organization using that tenant."
"Defender's main strength is its integration with Microsoft Sentinel, offering valuable insights."
"I rate Microsoft Defender for Business a 10 out of 10."
 

Cons

"This is a very costly product."
"There's an overall lack of features."
"I am facing issues with customer support for Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks, so I am not satisfied with customer support."
"Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is not only pricey; it is extremely expensive."
"The solution lags to the real-time scenarios here and there."
"The deployment is pretty hard."
"Data privacy is a matter of concern. You have to be careful with data privacy, it can be sensitive and Cortex can have most of your access."
"The GUI could be improved. It's a little bit cumbersome. It could be more user-friendly."
"They could come up with better reporting capabilities."
"A solution must be installed in the main gateway to give an overview of the incoming and outgoing traffic. The technical support team's response time should be faster."
"They can include advanced scanning and improve reporting. I scan malware on the pen drive. Some more reports need to be added for that. It should also provide better protection because we have a new version of the malware."
"Every once in a while, the product gets clobbered. It's not just one thing. So, it could be a Microsoft update or a Kaspersky update."
"Every once in a while, it gets clobbered by updates from other places. I don't think this should happen."
"Requires increased efficiency in terms of detecting false positives."
"The interface could be improved. Currently, you need to really dig around to find the elements you need."
"Malwarebytes is too simplistic. From a SOC IR perspective, it doesn't give you very much data around it. It doesn't tie things or provide SHA-1 and SHA-256 detection information, which makes it hard to do an additional investigation."
"Defender's reporting is rather scattered, and its URL filtering mechanism doesn't really work."
"I am not satisfied with Microsoft's technical support. There are challenges with the knowledge and experience of the support staff, frequent redirection between departments, and slow response times."
"I have an open case for close to two months with no responses or updates, except for an email response, and I've made four or five phone calls regarding the Microsoft Interconnect for AD and cloud tenant."
"The user interface has a lot of features which can make it complex and hard to adapt to for some users."
"The security could always be improved."
"We faced some issues while running some applications on Mac."
"Defender's threat protection should be fine-tuned to reduce false positives. It could be more targeted, reflecting a continuous evolution in detecting. Also, it could be easier to integrate into other environments."
"I see room for improvement in Microsoft Defender for Business, particularly regarding the consolidation of all security solutions in one place and the integration of AI and data security into the same platform."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is a little high. It is per user per year."
"Licensing for Palo Alto Networks Cortex XDR can be costly, especially when it comes to a hundred users. A license is required for each user, and the subscription must be renewed on a yearly basis."
"I am using the Community edition."
"Its pricing is kind of in line with its competitors and everybody else out there."
"The price of the product is not very economical."
"Cortex XDR's pricing is ok."
"Compared to CrowdStrike, Cortex XDR is an expensive solution."
"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."
"The licensing is per seat, with clients being a little less expensive than servers. If we need more licenses, we can accomplish that within a day. As Malwarebytes adds new features to their product, such as DNS filtering and a patching module, they want to charge us more even though we're a premium user, which isn't ideal."
"Its cost is around $60 a machine. The cost of the total solution for 250 people is about $8,500 a year. If we add EDR to it, it will bring that cost up to about $15,000. The cost for Carbon Black is about $25,000, which is $10,000 more, but you get all AI functions with it."
"The price of Malwarebytes is in the middle range compared to other vendors."
"Malwarebytes is a cost-effective product."
"It is really expensive. We've got between 30 and 40 licenses every year, and for the number of licenses that we have, we're finding that Malwarebytes on average costs between $900 and $1,000 more per year than comparable options. We're paying about $3,300 per year for these licenses. There are no additional costs beyond the standard licensing fee."
"The cost may be something in the ballpark of $20-25 a year per computer."
"Its licensing is annual. There are no additional costs beyond the standard licensing fee."
"We expect to pay $1,000 USD a month, depending on the number of users."
"It has to get more competitive because we are starting to see some of the competitors providing better pricing, and some of it, of course, is to gain market share. The Defender product pricing is probably a little higher than the competitors."
"Defender for Business is included by default with an Office 365 premium subscription."
"Since we're a nonprofit, we get pretty good discounts on the tool."
"The tool is cheap, while some other solutions are more expensive. I remember the tool cost about five euros for a workstation or for a user on a monthly basis."
"The tool's cost has been a little high, but I do not think it was terrible."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
13%
Outsourcing Company
12%
Construction Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Construction Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
13%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business49
Midsize Enterprise21
Large Enterprise56
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business22
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise6
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business15
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise4
 

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 Malwarebytes?
I really hate the automatic rebilling without officially confirming it with me. It's an annoyance and they should at ...
What needs improvement with Malwarebytes?
It takes up too much space when it's trying to run in the background.
What is your primary use case for Malwarebytes?
My primary use case is that it's protecting me against malware.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Defender for Business?
Our thoughts on the pricing for Microsoft Defender for Business are that we wish it could be better. If the pricing w...
What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for Business?
I see room for improvement in Microsoft Defender for Business, particularly regarding the consolidation of all securi...
 

Also Known As

Cyvera, Cortex XDR, Palo Alto Networks Traps
No data available
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

CBI Health Group, University Honda, VakifBank
Knutson Construction
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Malwarebytes Teams vs. Microsoft Defender for Business and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
917,884 professionals have used our research since 2012.