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Proofpoint Email Protection vs Symantec Messaging Gateway comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 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

Proofpoint Email Protection
Ranking in Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
105
Ranking in other categories
Email Security (1st), Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (3rd), Digital Risk Protection (3rd), Office 365 Protection (1st)
Symantec Messaging Gateway
Ranking in Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
12th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Secure Email Gateway (SEG) category, the mindshare of Proofpoint Email Protection is 19.0%, down from 21.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Messaging Gateway is 2.7%, up from 2.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Secure Email Gateway (SEG) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Proofpoint Email Protection19.0%
Symantec Messaging Gateway2.7%
Other78.3%
Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
 

Featured Reviews

Siva_Prasad - PeerSpot reviewer
Principal Consultant at Infosys
Email defenses have reduced phishing incidents and protect sensitive data across our enterprise
As things are evolving and threats develop in unpredictable ways, Proofpoint must adopt AI solutions and agentic solutions more aggressively and provide them to customers as part of service offerings. Inbuilt AI solutions would add more value and make Proofpoint a more premium choice for customers. With the help of AI solutions, agentic AI, and generative AI capabilities, the product would be more efficient than it currently is. Filtering false positives is highly challenging because it is impossible for humans to identify which emails are genuine and which are spam. Proofpoint should focus more on this area with back-end agents or other tools. Proofpoint should decide which emails are genuine and which are spam so it is not a challenge for end users. When receiving an email, end users should not have to determine whether to respond or not. Proofpoint should not release such spam emails and should strictly block such spam and spoof emails based on connection IPs. Currently, false positives occur in the product, and while this occurs in every product, it is an area where Proofpoint can focus on improving and reducing false positives. One email is enough for an end user to be deceived and lose money, so addressing this area is critical.
Girish Vijay - PeerSpot reviewer
Deputy Manager IT at Carl Bechem Lubricants India Pvt. Ltd.
A stable and reasonably priced solution that performs well and has a very good malware database
Since Symantec merged with Broadcom, they might have lost some good technical engineers. Maybe that’s the reason why the product is performing poorly. When we have a good marketing and sales team, even though our product cannot perform, we will sell it at a high price because of the buzzwords. However, at the end of the day, the product should perform. Most of the products might not perform. Symantec is a very good product, but the services are basic. I rate the technical features of the product a nine out of ten. However, I would rate the services provided by the solution a six out of ten. Overall, I rate the tool an eight out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I recommend all of my customers to migrate and start using Proofpoint as it is secure, minimizes risk, and eliminates phishing attacks."
"Proofpoint Email Protection offers an additional layer of protection compared to other brands like Microsoft, Mimecast, and Barracuda. While these major companies excel at detecting malicious attachments, the solution goes further by analyzing the context of emails, allowing for more nuanced decision-making."
"From the reports that we hear back from clients regarding Proofpoint Email Protection, they are noticing less spam and fewer phishing attempts in their email."
"The best features of Proofpoint Email Protection are the advanced level of anti-spam and antivirus technology, the TAP feature that helps me scan URLs and provides URL defense, outbound filtering and prevention capabilities, and particularly the TRAP feature where I can pull out all phishing emails from all users' mailboxes in a single click."
"The spam filter for email is good."
"Proofpoint Email Protection's detection for true positives are great, false negatives or type two errors are very low, type one errors are acceptable and this capability is the one that allows the least amount of spam to enter."
"It's the top choice because no company can operate without security. Ensuring email protection is a major priority for any organization when building its infrastructure."
"Although it is a bit costly compared to Mimecast, Defender, and Cofense Vision, it is efficient and strong in security, so I do not mind the cost because I will not reduce my security risk."
"The setup is pretty simple."
"I've been using Messaging Gateway for ten years."
"The solution is "set and forget". You pay for it and everything is done for you."
"I like that it's simple and easy to configure, deploy, and manage. The reporting function has all the features we're looking for, and we are fine with that."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway is stable and scalable. Installation is easy, and the deployment and maintenance can be done by one administrative person."
"It is a solid and stable product."
"Messaging Gateway is stable."
"The feature that I like the best is the fingerprinting concept."
 

Cons

"I think Proofpoint Email Protection could be improved if the user interface portals could be consolidated into a single portal, as there are currently four, five, or six separate ones."
"Proofpoint Email Protection can be improved in that it is quite a large product, so learning how to be fully conversant in it can take some time within the team; this is probably the biggest challenge at the moment for us, getting everyone fully conversant to support the product."
"I believe if the GUI were more user-friendly for people using it for the first time, or if there were more training available for end users to share with them, that would be good."
"I would want better spear phishing protection in the essentials package."
"I think Proofpoint Email Protection could be slightly more intuitive."
"The incident reporting on offer needs to be improved. It's lacking right now. It should be on the platform somewhere."
"The scalability can be improved, and the solution can be optimized."
"The false positives are an issue. There are many false positives that come in, which you report to Proofpoint."
"Messaging Gateway's advanced malware detection could be improved."
"It will provide Excel reports and PDF reports, but it would be great if they supported the concept of Crystal Reports."
"Where it is not available, as is the case with unstructured data, this product fails miserably."
"Since it was purchased by Broadcomm, we've found there's been a general slide in terms of the local services we have access to and we are considering replacing them."
"The product must improve the user dashboards."
"The solution takes up a lot of memory."
"Recently, I've had some problems regarding their support. The tech was acquired by Broadcom, and since then, the support part is very bad."
"The false positive submissions must be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Proofpoint is fairly expensive."
"The licensing model for Proofpoint Email Protection is simple. It's based on the number of users. Price-wise, Proofpoint Email Protection is a five out of ten because it's a pretty expensive solution."
"Customers pay around $90,000 yearly for a 1,000-user organization, with the subscription license being the main expense, apart from implementation fees."
"The solution is expensive."
"We sell annual licenses for this solution."
"Clients pay for an annual subscription of Proofpoint Email Protection. Every client always finds it expensive."
"The solution uses a licensing model that is reasonable compared to other products."
"I rate the product price a seven on a scale of one to ten, where one is low price and ten is high price."
"They're a little costly compared to Microsoft."
"The cost of Symantec Messaging Gateway is too expensive in general. However, the appliance also includes the price of the license in the same bundle."
"For 150 users, we pay INR 1,60,000."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway’s pricing is very cheap."
"It's a bit expensive compared to its competitor Barracuda Email Security Gateway but cheaper than Sophos Email."
"A subscription for technical support costs extra."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Financial Services Firm
18%
Construction Company
9%
Computer Software Company
7%
Marketing Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business28
Midsize Enterprise24
Large Enterprise59
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise8
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Proofpoint Email Protection?
I would say that the pricing for Proofpoint Email Protection is a little costly compared to other email tools, but it is worth it.
What needs improvement with Proofpoint Email Protection?
I believe Proofpoint Email Protection can be improved; currently, it does not allow organizations to create their own IP listings, so whatever comes into Proofpoint is what helps to remove spam and...
What is your primary use case for Proofpoint Email Protection?
My main use case for Proofpoint Email Protection is working as an anti-spam and phishing analyst, where I need to protect the organization and public users from spam and phishing. In my daily work,...
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Also Known As

Proofpoint Enterprise Protection, Proofpoint Digital Protection
Symantec.cloud, Symantec Email Security.cloud
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Blocket, University of Waterloo, Lincoln Memorial University, WellSpan Health, U-Haul, Carestream Health, Westinghouse
Doric, Joblink Plus, Our Lady of Mercy College, Parramatta, PPB Advisory, Slater & Gordon Lawyers, Sydney Adventist Hospital Ltd.
Find out what your peers are saying about Proofpoint Email Protection vs. Symantec Messaging Gateway and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
899,204 professionals have used our research since 2012.