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Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 1, 2024

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 Offi...
Ranking in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
60
Ranking in other categories
Email Archiving (1st), Email Security (1st), Microsoft Security Suite (10th), Secure Email Gateway (SEG) (1st)
SonicWall Capture Advanced ...
Ranking in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
23rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is 8.3%, down from 16.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection is 1.8%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Defender for Office 3658.3%
SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection1.8%
Other89.9%
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
 

Featured Reviews

Emeka Ndulu - PeerSpot reviewer
Cloud Solutions Architect at a tech services company with 201-500 employees
Improves threat visibility and response while reducing manual tasks and training users against phishing
I appreciate the attack simulation feature whereby I get to train users and educate them on how to identify phishing emails and spam emails, as well as the anti-spam protection. It gives me visibility into my threat environment and threat landscape to ensure that I am one step ahead of any likelihood of threats within my environment. I get to detect it and respond, so the threat intelligence is very effective. Microsoft security solutions save my time. It saves money because once I protect my environment, I don't lose money. It has decreased my detection time and my time to respond.
Mohamed Fouad - PeerSpot reviewer
Cybersecurity Team Leader at Emak Integrated Solutions
Advanced sandboxing has protected our environment and stops unknown threats in real time
The most capable feature of SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection is the accurate verdict of the file, and I have used many other types of sandboxing, but using SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection is truly helpful for our organization. In my experience, the best features SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection offers include accuracy for the submitted files, and one of the most valued features is its usability, as it is so usable and helpful to integrate with other solutions, making it a fantastic product overall. It is easy to set up and connect SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection with other solutions, as it can be integrated with many products, supporting real-time memory inspection, rapid signature deployment, broad file type support, and block until verdict capability, along with flexible configuration, while providing comprehensive reporting. SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection supports sandbox evasion techniques, which is important since sophisticated malware increases the evasion capability to detect and deceive sandboxing environments. SonicWall employs deception techniques simulating user interaction or fake high volume targets to determine when custom malware can still potentially bypass detection through environment-aware code. SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection positively impacts our organization by helping us stop advanced persistent threats, as we have defined our targeted adversaries and increased security for our organization.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The feature of Microsoft Defender for Office 365 that I like the most is probably the email features specifically, because those are the ones that a typical end user will accidentally click on a link not knowing what it is, and it'll catch it, and then it'll feed it over to Defender and stop the attack from happening before it actually can."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 saves me time; it does save a lot of time, especially with the automation."
"The deployment capability is a great feature."
"Defender enables us to secure all 365-related activity from a single place. It gives us visibility into everything happening in Outlook, protecting us against phishing and other email-based threats. Defender helps us detect any suspicious behaviors."
"Defender for Office 365 has helped eliminate having to look at multiple dashboards and that is the aspect I like most about it. It is simpler, effective, and convenient. The users like the process efficiency."
"Threat Explorer is an invaluable tool for me, and it plays a crucial role in helping me discern the origins of various email campaigns, pinpointing where they emanate from, and identifying the individuals within our organization who are affected."
"The product is not resource-intensive."
"One of the best features of the tool is its capability to aggregate insights from different workloads, basically from the Office 365 and endpoints part."
"It also has an easy configuration. The feedback that we get from our customers is that it's a good product."
"We get alert messages whenever there is a new threat. We are notified at the firewall level that things are blocked, which keeps us in our comfort zone."
"The stability of the solution is good. We haven't had any breaches or crashes. It's been very stable for us."
"The reporting that you get from it is the most valuable feature. You can see it via the appliance itself, and also via the MySonicWall account for the registered device. You are able to select the file if it's malicious, and you can select it in the reporting and see what triggered it, and things like that. I found that to be quite useful."
"Provides good protection and security."
"The ATP (Advanced Threat Protection) on scanning is the most valuable feature."
"They have a large database of commonly known things that they can catch automatically, then they have anything which is questionable go to the sandbox and be examined there before going into our network."
"I like this setup for a firewall. You can set things up very easily and you can automate items as well. It's a very robust firewall solution for enterprise as well as small businesses."
 

Cons

"The cost of Security Copilot is up there right now, and I think it needs to come down for more people to adopt."
"Microsoft sometimes has downtime, and we'll get several incidents coming in back to back. We have a huge backlog of notifications, many of which may be false positives. However, there might be serious alerts, so we can't risk dismissing all of them at once."
"The inbuilt analysis of false positives can be faster. It's not slow, but it can be faster."
"It would be better if it were more scalable. It depends on the architecture, but we would like to make it more scalable for both data centers."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 should improve the troubleshooting tools. It's unclear whether the device is blocked at the firewall level or at the device itself. The granularity needed for troubleshooting is currently lacking. From my perspective, Microsoft should address this issue to benefit many users who likely share the same sentiment."
"The visibility into threats is not up to the mark, as I do not have control. I rate my experience with Microsoft Defender for Office 365 as six out of ten due to troubleshooting and pricing concerns."
"I assess the stability and reliability of the solution as seven out of ten."
"I'd like some additional features any product can give me to protect our environment in a better way."
"Could provide online training to allow customers to learn more about the product."
"It does fare well against enterprise products."
"I would like to have better documentation before starting with deployment because the deployment is a bit complex."
"I would say the solution needs a much simpler user interface, but the functionality of the firewall is quite extensive. You need the user interface to be that way. However, if there was a way to make the user interface a little easier, that would be great."
"SonicWall had a recent layoff. This is a concern for us, because now we are missing the local presence from both the engineering and sales side."
"Having an on-premise solution as well would be an option for some people, but they'll want to use a cloud solution for their sandboxing. Certain sites would want to keep all the checks done on an on-premise appliance. All the checking, rather than sending that up into a cloud engine."
"SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection needs to reconsider the pricing, especially in the cloud environment."
"SonicWall should promote their roadmap and improve their marketing to customers."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution could be better by simplifying the business model of their licensing. It was hard to figure out how to get the licensing done for the environment, initially."
"I know that the product is incredibly expensive."
"Compared to other brands, Microsoft Defender for Office 365's pricing is competitive."
"For large enterprise organizations, they can definitely afford it, but for small and medium organizations, they might struggle to cover the expenses."
"From the pricing point of view, like any other product in the market, there is scope for negotiation."
"The pricing is normal. Considering its popularity, it's not overpriced."
"The license is expensive because the cost is based on the number of users."
"It's a user-base subscription."
"The best deal from SonicWall is to buy the HA pair. When you buy the initial one, you receive the second one at a significant discount. If there is an event and something happens to one firewall, then you have the second firewall to roll into. For the price, it's pretty to tough to beat and not a lot of other firewall vendors offer it. You battle for a discount on both. Where with SonicWall, if you buy one, the second one is at half price. It's pretty straightforward."
"It's thirty dollars per user and we have 30 users."
"When you compare it with other solutions, they are cheaper and more economical."
"We get our value for our money."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
6%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business23
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise31
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise3
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
The inbuilt analysis of false positives can be faster. It's not slow, but it can be faster.
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
My use case for Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is for email protection, safe links, protection of links, documents, protecting my documents, and protecting attachments. I also use it to conduct ...
What needs improvement with SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection?
SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection needs to reconsider the pricing, especially in the cloud environment. The product is good overall, but the GUI needs to be more stable. I chose nine out...
What is your primary use case for SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection?
My main use case for SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection is that it helps us with sandboxing for analyzing and inspecting unknown files and URLs. A quick specific example of how I've used ...
What advice do you have for others considering SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection?
I advise others looking into using SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection to consider that it is truly helpful and very important to have great sandboxing with advanced threat protection to s...
 

Also Known As

MS Defender for Office 365
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is trusted by companies such as Ithaca College.
Wonder Cement, Foster Clark Products
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs. SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,665 professionals have used our research since 2012.