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Microsoft Defender for Endpoint vs ZoneAlarm comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 2, 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

Microsoft Defender for Endp...
Ranking in Anti-Malware Tools
1st
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
210
Ranking in other categories
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) (2nd), Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (3rd), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (3rd), Microsoft Security Suite (3rd)
ZoneAlarm
Ranking in Anti-Malware Tools
18th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Anti-Malware Tools category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is 8.1%, down from 17.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of ZoneAlarm is 2.2%, down from 2.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Anti-Malware Tools Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint8.1%
ZoneAlarm2.2%
Other89.7%
Anti-Malware Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Robert Arbuckle - PeerSpot reviewer
Security Analyst III at a healthcare company with 10,001+ employees
Automatically isolates threats and integrates with logging to reduce response time
Overall, I would evaluate the Microsoft support level that I receive at probably about a seven, but that depends on the day. It has been spotty. We have had issues where the urgency level of the Microsoft support is not as high as ours, especially during a data breach or potential data breach situation. We have had issues with some of the offshore support being lackluster. One specific thing that comes to mind is we were on a support call with our CISO on the call, and the Microsoft agent, who did not actually work for Microsoft, is one of the vendors that Microsoft uses for support, said, "Just to set expectations, my lunch break is in an hour and I am going to go away then." For us, it was already ten o'clock at night and we had been working on this for a couple of hours, trying to get a security engineer on with us. For him to tell us that he was going to go away and have lunch, it was, "Okay, but go find somebody else if you need to." It was just the lackluster approach, and it seemed like he did not really care. We seem to get a lot of this when we get non-Microsoft support. I can identify areas for improvement with Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, as it is kind of a convoluted mess to try to take care of false positives. Especially when they have been identified as false positives but they keep going off over and over again. It is great for my pocketbook because it generates a lot of on-call action, but I would really prefer more sleep at two o'clock in the morning than dealing with false positives. I would say that the unified portal for managing Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is suitable for both teams as they are all in there. It would be great if they would stop moving things around and renaming things, which makes sense. The new XDR portal is pretty nice. Being able to have it central again inside of the regular Security Center without having to open up two windows is helpful. Overall, I think it is pretty good. There is always going to be something that could be improved, such as alerting and the ability to modify alerts would be a little bit helpful to have. Being able to add more data into the alerts and turn off alerts that are not as useful would be beneficial. It is hard to say what the quantitative impact the security exposure management feature has had on our company's security, because a lot of it is kind of subjective. I think we are sitting at around a fifty percent score still, and a lot of it is just kind of unusual circumstances that we cannot really implement without breaking the organization.
Bala_Krishna - PeerSpot reviewer
Director at esupport Solutions Pvt ltd
Security suite has protected individual devices from threats, while installation and network features require improvements
BIG-IP is actually the LTM, Link Load Balancer, which comes with ASM, meaning Application Security Module. It consists of multiple modules, such as ASM, SWG, and a domain DNS manager. ZoneAlarm allows defining trusted and public networks, which helps maintain security in public Wi-Fi environments. It offers comprehensive protection, securing PCs against threats. Users do not experience any system slowdowns while scanning. Harmony Browser protects all your browsing activity and is bundled with Harmony Endpoint and Harmony Connect. It provides a small but effective security layer and sometimes comes packaged with the larger Harmony suite.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I am using it for very simple purposes. It is perfect and quite effective. I have been using it for a while, and I have never had any virus infection, data leak, or other security breaches. It works fine for standalone purposes. If you log on to OneDrive, it has ransomware protection."
"It's pretty easy to scale."
"It comes included with the Windows license."
"I like that it's easy to deploy because it already comes with Windows 10. Overall, it has all the features that we need. Easy to deploy, comes with updates, and comes with Windows updates. You don't have to really manage or update the signature."
"The patch management is very easy, as it can be done automatically or added to a schedule."
"One of the valuable features of the solution is the small updates that keep my machine relatively clean from any infections."
"Microsoft Defender for Endpoint comes pre-installed in Microsoft Windows."
"The main features of this solution are that it handles everything by itself and is well integrated."
"This antivirus is regularly updated, and the updates can be scheduled."
"ZoneAlarm protects all computers from viruses, spyware, and hackers."
"It is quick and easy to configure."
"The product's most valuable feature is the detection engine due to its ability to identify threats."
"The solution maintains reasonable scalability."
"It gives us security for the users' mobiles and ends up protecting us in a significant way."
"The phone access scan stands out as the most valuable feature for me."
"It is easy to use through interfaces and easy to configure each of the customizations we created based on the characteristics that we wanted."
 

Cons

"There's scanning going on that occasionally topples the memory, causing everything to freeze. This should be fixed."
"Microsoft Defender for Endpoint could improve by making the reporting better."
"The second major area for improvement involves enhanced capabilities for different operating systems or platforms. That is, even though we have coverage for different operating systems or platforms such as Linux, we don't get all of the controls and enhanced capabilities that are available with Windows devices."
"It is inexpensive but could be cheaper like anything else."
"Right now, there's a portal for Azure, portals for Microsoft Office, and portals for endpoints. It would be good to have only one portal and integrate everything."
"I would like to see improvements made to how it secures activities on web pages."
"A challenge is that it is not a multi-tenant solution. Microsoft's tenant is a licensed tenant. I'm an MSSP. So, I have multiple customers. In Microsoft's world, that means that I can't just buy an E5 license and give that out to all my customers. That won't work because all of the customer data resides within a single tenant in Microsoft's world. Other products—such as SentinelOne, Palo Alto Cortex, CrowdStrike, et cetera—are multi-tenant. So, I can have it at the top of the pyramid for my analyst to look into it and see all the customers, but each customer's data is separate. If the customer wants to look at what we see, they would only see their data, whereas in the Microsoft world, if I've got multiple customers connected to the same Microsoft tenant, they would see everybody else's data, which is a privacy problem in Europe. It is not possible to share the data, and it is a breach of privacy."
"At times, the other antivirus products are now doing AI, in terms of understanding the behavior of the system and determining when there's an anomaly. This is something that Defender can improve on."
"Some of our users say that the interface is a little bit outdated for 2020, and want it to be more modern and cozy."
"The solution's efficiency in threat containment and overall protection needs improvement."
"Currently, the client is only available for the Windows Operating System but it would be good if it were released for Mac OS as well."
"I would like it to be integrated with the Check Point centralization solution like Infinity Portal. It would be great to be able to manage it through the same website."
"Perhaps the primary area for potential enhancement is to make it faster, ensuring a more seamless experience while maintaining robust security features."
"They need to update and improve the features available for Mac."
"We'd like better performance of the network equipment. There are high-speed environments where an immediate response is required."
"They should release a single update with all the necessary characteristics to avoid being in a cycle of consecutive updates."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We have the E5 security license, and the solution comes with that."
"It is an expensive solution. It would be nice if it could be included with the Microsoft Office package."
"We have a bundle where the price includes all Microsoft products."
"Licensing options vary. Some customers buy it as an enterprise agreement and pay yearly. Others buy it as a CSP, so they pay per month. It completely depends on the customer's needs."
"The solution is free and comes with Windows."
"You need a license to use this solution."
"We mostly use Microsoft products. We use Office 365, and we use Azure. We're also a Microsoft partner. So, the licensing was much cheaper for us, and at the same time, a lot of the features that we were looking for were included in Defender."
"We are using the free version."
"We have to pay a yearly licensing fee for ZoneAlarm, which is cheap."
"This is a freeware product and I recommend using it."
"We use the free version of the software, but it can be upgraded to the paid Extreme Security edition."
"The pricing is reasonable, with a yearly renewal license costing seventy dollars."
"I rate the product pricing a seven out of ten."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Government
8%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Hospitality Company
11%
Educational Organization
8%
Outsourcing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business80
Midsize Enterprise40
Large Enterprise92
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business14
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise4
 

Questions from the Community

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, applies behavioral-based endpoint protection and response, and includes risk-ba...
Which offers better endpoint security - Symantec or Microsoft Defender?
We use Symantec because we do not use MS Enterprise products, but in my opinion, Microsoft Defender is a superior solution. Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is a cloud-delivered endpoint security s...
How does Microsoft Defender for Endpoint compare with Crowdstrike Falcon?
The CrowdStrike solution delivers a lot of information about incidents. It has a very light sensor that will never push your machine hardware to "test", you don't have the usual "scan now" feature ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ZoneAlarm?
ZoneAlarm has an acceptable price. Not much detail can be provided as I am not the one to judge the price.
What needs improvement with ZoneAlarm?
Check Point support needs improvement. Currently rated at 9 out of 10, more support is required. There are some concerns on support that need addressing. The integration of new products with their ...
What is your primary use case for ZoneAlarm?
I work with vendors such as F5 and deal with F5 as a reseller. I work with F5 BIG-IP regarding F5 Shape Security. BIG-IP Advanced WAF is what I work with regarding BIG-IP DNS or BIG-IP AFM. Advance...
 

Also Known As

Microsoft Defender ATP, Microsoft Defender Advanced Threat Protection, MS Defender for Endpoint, Microsoft Defender Antivirus
No data available
 

Interactive Demo

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Petrofrac, Metro CSG, Christus Health
Terma, Optix, Samsung Research Amercia, SF Police Credit Union, Independence Care System, Mattias Thomsen, Carmel Partners, Desert Research Institute, CRIF, FXCM Inc, US State Agency
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Endpoint vs. ZoneAlarm and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,515 professionals have used our research since 2012.