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Microsoft Defender XDR vs Secureworks Taegis XDR comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 8, 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

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Net...
Sponsored
Ranking in Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
6th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
109
Ranking in other categories
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) (4th), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (7th), Ransomware Protection (2nd), AI-Powered Cybersecurity Platforms (2nd)
Microsoft Defender XDR
Ranking in Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
4th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
108
Ranking in other categories
Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (8th), Microsoft Security Suite (4th)
Secureworks Taegis XDR
Ranking in Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
20th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
Network Detection and Response (NDR) (14th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the Extended Detection and Response (XDR) category, the mindshare of Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is 4.9%, down from 5.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender XDR is 4.7%, down from 6.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Secureworks Taegis XDR is 1.4%, up from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Extended Detection and Response (XDR) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Defender XDR4.7%
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks4.9%
Secureworks Taegis XDR1.4%
Other89.0%
Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
 

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.
KO
House security operator at Cypress Creek Renewables
Advanced threat hunting saves significant time in tracking and responding to incidents
Microsoft Defender XDR could be improved with a lower price. My main suggestion would essentially be what Copilot is providing, which is a single pane of glass, so I don't have to go to different windows. That's just a workflow consideration for me. It would be great to have all the information centralized into one particular data app. If I need to open up extra ones, I can, however, I would appreciate a future where everything I need is right there on one single pane of glass. Beyond that, there's really nothing else I see that I would want Microsoft to improve.
Mohammad Talha Talkin Alam - PeerSpot reviewer
Assistant Manager IT at PDS Multinational
Improved network protection has secured our servers and monitors web and application traffic
Till now, I have not seen any weak point that needs to be improved in Secureworks Taegis XDR. I think that since the technology is becoming upgraded, it will be good for Sophos to include more features in future updates of this solution. Secureworks Taegis XDR is a good product, but it should include AI technology.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The positive impacts I see from Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks include a complete 360-degree view of our security posture altogether, being a uniform platform where we are ingesting logs from multiple resources."
"The scalability of Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is very good."
"The multi-layered approach to the product gives you confidence that it will stop exploits, ransomware, worms, or viruses from compromising endpoints, essentially providing peace of mind."
"They did what they said. This solution could apply to any scenario."
"The interface is easy to use and it is more up to date than our previous solution."
"It's a nice product that's stable and scalable."
"The level of security I get for my endpoints and servers is extremely valuable."
"The positive impacts I see from Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks include a complete 360-degree view of our security posture altogether, being a uniform platform where we are ingesting logs from multiple resources."
"The comprehensiveness of Microsoft's threat detection is good."
"The 'Incidents and Alerts' tab is a valuable feature where we can find triggered alerts."
"I like 365 Defender's advanced threat hunting. The dashboard is user-friendly with templates for site policies, etc. The most important use case is evaluating the risk links and applications."
"A crucial aspect for our team is the inclusion of identity and access management tools from the vendor."
"The common and advanced security policies for threat hunting and blocking attacks are valuable."
"The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that Microsoft Defender XDR is easy to integrate with other Microsoft platforms or products."
"The feature I like the most in Microsoft Defender XDR is XDR because it has taken us a while, but we are a global company with people in a few countries, and now we can have centralized alerts that we send out to Teams messages and clean up infected computers or help people in a very short amount of time."
"The native capabilities are quite good as it slips in seamlessly as part of our integration and gives a lot of flexibility in terms of configuration and customization as per the business requirements."
"Definitely, Secureworks Taegis XDR is cost effective for the long run since the product is at a lower cost rather than other brands."
"It's a complete solution package."
"The initial setup was straightforward."
 

Cons

"There is a severe gap in functionality between Windows, Linux, and Mac versions."
"When it comes to core analysis and security analysis, Cortex needs to provide more information."
"I have run into some detection issues with Cortex XDR. It needs to be better at detection of internal attacks."
"In general, the price could be more competitive."
"The deployment is pretty hard."
"Impact on system performance is horrible, adding a lot of delays for users."
"Basically, they don't provide customer support tools just to investigate the logs."
"We had a problem with getting our older endpoints up to date, but their newest updates have been really good."
"The data recovery and backup could be improved."
"Microsoft Defender XDR is not a full-fledged EDR or XDR."
"When integrating Defender for Cloud Apps with apps on third-party cloud platforms like AWS or GCP, there are limitations on our ability to control user activities."
"The documentation on their website is somewhat outdated and doesn't show properly. I wanted to try a query in Microsoft Defender 365. When I opened the related documentation from the security blog on the Microsoft website, the figures were not showing. It was difficult to understand the article without having the figures. The figures were there in the article, but they were not getting loaded, which made the article obsolete."
"When discussing the secure score, which includes overviews and recommended actions, some of these recommended actions are not applicable to us, particularly those related to Microsoft Internet Explorer, which we do not use in any of our environments."
"The licensing is a nightmare and has room for improvement."
"The design of the user interface could use some work. Sometimes it's hard to find the exact information you need."
"I would like more of the features in Defender for 365 to be included in the smaller licenses. Even if I buy a small license and don't need everything, security shouldn't be a question. Security is one of the main aspects of all projects from our side, so it would be nice to have more features in the smaller licenses."
"We found limitations in the XDR's detections, lacking the ability to create customized detection and log parsing rules."
"The pricing could be improved."
"Secureworks Taegis XDR is a good product, but it should include AI technology."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing seems fair, and I do like the licensing model. You use wherever they are, and it is elastic."
"It has a yearly renewal."
"Cortex XDR is a costly solution."
"I feel it is fairly priced."
"The solution has one subscription for endpoint protection and one subscription for detection and response. The two licenses combined give you the BRO version."
"It has reasonable pricing for the use cases it provides to the company."
"It is cost-effective compared to similar solutions. It fits for the small businesses through to the big businesses."
"It is present, but when compared to other competitive products, I would say it is not less expensive; however, when all of the other added values are considered, the price is reasonable."
"Defender plan 1 is tenant-wise, and Defender plan 2 is per-user, which makes it more expensive. To have certain features, you would need to purchase the E5 license. For all of the capabilities that the tool provides, the price, though it can be high, is fair."
"It is fairly priced because we get complete integrated services with the E5 license."
"All I can say again is the E5 gives you all the capabilities that it offers. It also gives Office 365 and one terabyte of storage. All in all, the E5 license model makes sense. There are some people who say it's quite costly, but rather than paying different vendors, it makes sense to go all in with Microsoft if you've got that licensing. From that perspective, it's cost-effective, but I can't comment much on that."
"Microsoft Defender XDR's licensing is complicated."
"I find the pricing to be quite competitive, especially considering its inclusion in our E5 subscription, which provides a comprehensive set of functionalities."
"For Defender, they have Endpoint Plan 1 and Endpoint Plan 2, but I don't know on what basis they have classified Endpoint Plan 1 and Plan 2, but it has given me enough pain to pick and design Endpoint Plan 1 or Endpoint Plan 2 for my organization. In fact, we are still struggling with it. Too many SKUs are confusing. There should not be too many SKUs, and they shouldn't charge for every new feature."
"Its licensing and pricing are handled by someone else. My role is limited to incidents or issues with the portal, but you get what you pay for. It is worth the cost."
"Microsoft Defender XDR is already included in our Office 365 licensing. It is better because we're saving money by using it."
"The pricing is six out of ten."
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886,174 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Educational Organization
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business44
Midsize Enterprise20
Large Enterprise48
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business46
Midsize Enterprise26
Large Enterprise40
No data available
 

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 do you like most about Microsoft 365 Defender?
Microsoft Defender XDR provides strong identity protection with comprehensive insights into risky user behavior and p...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft 365 Defender?
My experience with the pricing, setup costs, and licensing of Microsoft Defender XDR is that we are on an E5 license,...
What needs improvement with Microsoft 365 Defender?
From my perspective, Microsoft Defender XDR can be improved with better visibility in certain areas where I can trigg...
What needs improvement with Secureworks Taegis XDR?
Till now, I have not seen any weak point that needs to be improved in Secureworks Taegis XDR. I think that since the ...
What is your primary use case for Secureworks Taegis XDR?
I use Secureworks Taegis XDR within my organization primarily to secure our network infrastructure so that none can a...
What advice do you have for others considering Secureworks Taegis XDR?
I have not used the threat hunting feature of Secureworks Taegis XDR. I have not used customizable workflows in Secur...
 

Also Known As

Cyvera, Cortex XDR, Palo Alto Networks Traps
Microsoft 365 Defender, Microsoft Threat Protection, MS 365 Defender
Secureworks Taegis NDR
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

CBI Health Group, University Honda, VakifBank
Accenture, Deloitte, ExxonMobil, General Electric, IBM, Johnson & Johnson and many others.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender XDR vs. Secureworks Taegis XDR and other solutions. Updated: February 2026.
886,174 professionals have used our research since 2012.