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McAfee Web Gateway Cloud Service vs Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks comparison

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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

iboss
Sponsored
Ranking in Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
Internet Security (3rd), Web Content Filtering (1st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (7th), ZTNA as a Service (7th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (8th)
McAfee Web Gateway Cloud Se...
Ranking in Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
32nd
Average Rating
0.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Prisma Access by Palo Alto ...
Ranking in Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
65
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (1st), Enterprise Infrastructure VPN (5th), ZTNA as a Service (1st), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Secure Web Gateways (SWG) category, the mindshare of iboss is 2.4%, up from 1.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of McAfee Web Gateway Cloud Service is 0.7%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks is 9.2%, down from 11.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks9.2%
iboss2.4%
McAfee Web Gateway Cloud Service0.7%
Other87.7%
Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2701851 - PeerSpot reviewer
Managing Director
Enhances web security with a single pane of glass and flexible deployment
I don't see any need for improvement; one of the really good things about iboss as a company is that they listen to customer feedback. I have suggested enhancements, and they are responsive, making changes for the better, and they do a lot of testing. To improve iboss, although we haven't used it, we considered the VPN solution that comes with the highest tier licensing, which includes DLP and various other add-ons. We prefer using another product which automatically logs you back onto your network when turning on your PC. With iboss, the connection is manual, which doesn't meet our needs. Additionally, sizing can be tricky because, although the initial recommendations may seem adequate, actual usage may require more gateways than anticipated.
MF
Security Engineer at Mavisco Resources Sdn Bhd
A scalable and user-friendly tool that provides an easy-to-configure user interface
The solution is used for granular filtering. For example, an organization can use the solution to allow users to access Facebook but stop them from playing games The user interface is easy to configure. We don't have to configure a database manually. It’s already present in the product. We just…
Roberto Pastorino - PeerSpot reviewer
Network and Cybersecurity Consultant at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
Have supported client adoption of security solutions but need more control over infrastructure
It's a working solution. It's not the easiest, but no DLP solution is easy. With Netskope, the whole infrastructure is proprietary. Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks is using a service in AWS, and it's not totally a proprietary infrastructure. Sometimes a third-party outage could impact the whole operability. I'm not certain if the vendor is moving towards sovereignty of infrastructure at this moment, but from what I saw in the past, there was this reliance on third parties for the infrastructure: AWS, GCP, Oracle, and others. This is one point of attention for me. I would prefer more proprietary infrastructure.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"iboss is among the few products providing inline filtering where no application is needed on the device. It operates on the network side and is not device-based. This feature was one of the main reasons why we stayed with them for so long."
"We chose iboss for both zero trust and proxy (SWG) because their SWG was superior."
"The console is cloud-based, which is something I really appreciate."
"I would rate the technical support of iboss a solid 10 without a shadow of a doubt."
"Our primary use case for this product is DLP,"
"Because of iboss, I did not have to assign web filtering tasks to my techs on a daily basis."
"Valuable features: Within the filter: Controls (Web categories, applications, and Allow/Block list) and Network (local Subnets). Within the reporter: Logs (Event Log) and Reports."
"iboss is pretty scalable. They provide good support. The case managers you work with to coordinate what you need are pretty good."
"The user interface is easy to configure."
"The Autonomous Digital Experience Management (ADEM) offered by Palo Alto is a good reporting tool. It gives insights into how things are going within the network. It takes all the data from the users' endpoints and does an analysis, and it suggests changes as well."
"Prisma Access provides comprehensive security. It provides URL filtering, application control, SSL, DLP, etc. It provides complete security for the cloud environment."
"It protects all app traffic so that users can gain access to all apps. Unlike other solutions that only work from ports 80 and 443, which are predominantly for web traffic, Prisma Access covers all protocols and works on all traffic patterns... The most sophisticated attacks can arise from sources that are not behind 80/443."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to join your network and provide access through the VPN."
"It's very stable. Sometimes after installing the boxes, we leave them for one or two years. We would just touch the box in the case of the customer needing new requirements or changes to the setup."
"The solution improved the consistency of our security controls and the BCP. There has been a 20 percent reduction in TCO. Prisma Access also enabled us to deliver better applications by centralizing security management."
"It is geographically dispersed, and it sits on top of Google and AWS platforms. Therefore, you don't face the standard issues, such as latency or bandwidth issues, that you usually face in the case of on-prem data centers."
"The remediation process is easy compared to other platforms."
 

Cons

"Sometimes, obviously, there are bugs."
"The solution could be stronger on the integration side and offer more cloud applications like G Suite or Oracle."
"SSL decryption: We had issues with learners using apps instead of using web browsers. This type of encryption is tough for any appliance in a BYOD environment."
"One thing I would like to see differently with their Zero Trust platform is that some of the AI aspects related to high-risk activities have more false positives."
"For zero trust implementation, we encountered complexity issues, especially with a large infrastructure company ExxonMobil."
"I am currently doing a PoC of the zero trust aspect of it. Compared to other similar solutions, it is hard to get around each feature. It takes a while to get used to it."
"Sometimes the agent stops working in iboss, and we have to reinstall the agent."
"The reporting feature needs improvement. It doesn't give you the expected results. It is quite difficult to get the specific reports needed, and it is not as intuitive as the rest of the platform."
"The product should provide more integrations."
"We would like to see improvements in the licensing; currently, Palo Alto provides 500 to 1000 licenses for users, and we want to see 1500 to 2000 licenses for one version."
"It wasn't so satisfying to work with it. There is room for improvement in the policy management. It is difficult to cover the entire scenery through Palo Alto products."
"The cloud setup is straightforward, and the onboarding process is much better, but the on-premises initial setup is slightly complex."
"The product's current price is an area of shortcoming where improvements are required."
"When it comes to the VPN, it uses the global protect VPN functionality to connect remotely, but it has a feature limitation for assigning multiple IP sub-links to different user groups. It would be much better if we are able to assign the current IP blocks for the sub-links based on the user groups."
"Its security is good. Everything is good, but the way the dashboard responds can be improved. It takes time to implement a policy. If you change only two or three lines and push the policy to make the change work, it takes 20 to 30 minutes even for a small change. That is something very irritating from the implementation perspective."
"We are using the SaaS offering. We use our applications for microservices. We use Twistlock to scan containers, and it displays these results in Prisma, which is a good feature because we can see vulnerabilities with respect to these containers. We can see everything in a very detailed manner. However, when you have different environments for a single application, such as DEV, QA, PROD, and TEST, all these environments run multiple containers, which can lead to a very high number of containers. In such a scenario, it shows you the alerts for all those containers that have vulnerabilities. If you show the results of all the containers that share the same image, it is not going to add any value. Therefore, they should narrow down the alerts based on a container. It should show information for a single container. Otherwise, the person who is looking at the results gets the impression that he has to fix all these issues. This is something that they can improve."
"When it comes to integration mechanisms, Prisma SaaS does not support reverse proxy type of integrations."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We have not priced the solution recently, but they were competitive with other vendors in the past."
"We had the cost of purchasing a new appliance along with the implementation and licensing costs. However, the following year, the cost of just licensing was similar to what was paid the previous year for a new appliance along with the implementation and licensing costs."
"It is not expensive, and it is also not cheap. iboss is priced right in the sweet spot for the number of features it offers."
"The overall pricing for iboss is very competitive and transparent."
"It is expensive compared to one of its competitors."
"It is probably in line with other solutions, but I do not deal with the financial side."
Information not available
"Actually the solution is very expensive. I don't know the particulars since the purchasing team dealt with it."
"It's pricey, it's not cheap. But you get what you pay for."
"It is a little expensive. Because it is one of the best in the market, it is a little bit more expensive than other vendors."
"This is not an expensive product and everything is included with one license."
"There's no reason not to buy the enterprise version that gives you unlimited PoPs, but you must understand the limitations you impose on yourself if you do that. If you go crazy, that allowlist will be too big for Kubernetes clusters."
"We have to pay additional costs for maintenance and support services."
"It is not cheap. It is expensive. The good thing is that you are able to pay for what you need, but overall, it is not cheap. The pricing is not based on packages. You pay based on the features. If you want DLP, you only pay for DLP. They are very flexible. It is not cheap, but the licensing is flexible. There are no additional costs in addition to the standard licensing fees."
"The licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis and for what we get, the price is good."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Financial Services Firm
26%
Insurance Company
10%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise5
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business23
Midsize Enterprise21
Large Enterprise27
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with iboss?
For zero trust implementation, we encountered complexity issues, especially with a large infrastructure company Exxon...
What is your primary use case for iboss?
Previously when I used iboss, we did the POC for iboss for ExxonMobil. Four or five people wanted to move from our ol...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for iboss?
Regarding pricing, setup costs, and licensing, iboss is not cheap, and that's my only concern. There are cheaper alte...
Ask a question
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What is the better solution - Prisma Access or Zscaler Private Access?
We looked into Prisma Access before choosing Zscaler Private Access (ZPA). Palo Alto’s Prisma Access is a secure ac...
What do you like most about Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks?
The most valuable features of the solution are in the areas of the secure remote access it provides while also being ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks?
From my experience, Palo Alto is more expensive compared to solutions like Netskope and Triscale.
 

Also Known As

iBoss Cloud Platform
No data available
Palo Alto Networks Prisma Access, Prisma Access, GlobalProtect, Palo Alto GlobalProtect Mobile Security Manager, Prisma SaaS by Palo Alto Networks, Prisma Access
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

More than 4,000 global enterprises trust the iboss Cloud Platform to support their modern workforces, including a large number of Fortune 50 companies.
Information Not Available
Concord Hospital, State of Colorado, Essilor International, RheinLand Versicherungsgruppe, University of Westminster, Universidade Nove de Julho, SPAR Austria, CAME Group, ZipRealty, Greenhill & Co., IKT Agder, Aviva Stadium, Animal Logic, Management & Training Corporation, Brigham Young University Hawaii, School District of Chilliwack
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco, Fortinet, Zscaler and others in Secure Web Gateways (SWG). Updated: December 2025.
879,853 professionals have used our research since 2012.