I am a tech support engineer or an endpoint security engineer who works with Cortex XDR's team itself, looking after all the support cases related to our technical stuff, specifically malware cases.
Sr. Endpoint Security Engineer at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Easy-to-use and easy-to-install
Pros and Cons
- "The tool is easy to use."
- "When it comes to malware files, it should be a little quick because, at times, it would give a wrong result in the sense of what it might be on malware, even if it still might be a normal one."
What is our primary use case?
What is most valuable?
The most valuable feature of the solution is Broker VM, which is the best functionality, as I haven't found such a feature in any other product I have worked on till now.
What needs improvement?
Some feature requests are coming up from the customers. I feel like there should be a quick improvement. There is a little gap in implementing the tool's features as the team needs to do an investigation, which would take more time than expected, leaving the customers frustrated. The product team's investigation to decide on the features to be introduced in the solution should be a little quick. When it comes to malware files, it should be a little quick because, at times, it would give a wrong result in the sense of what it might be on malware, even if it still might be a normal one. At that point in time, we need to change the tool's version, and it generally needs to be changed from our end with Java and Jira. Maybe it should be a little improved in that case.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks for two years. I am an endpoint security engineer for Cortex XDR's team. I worked with a client company as a foreign technical support engineer.
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What do I think about the stability of the solution?
So far, I haven't found any stability issues in the tool. Right now, I am on post-maternity leave, so I left the company six or seven months ago. To date, I haven't found any stability issues with the tool. Stability-wise, I rate the solution an eight and a half out of ten.
The tool is not used in my organization because I work within the tool's XDR team related to Palo Alto. I don't have an exact count of the users because we have different customers on a larger scale.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
It is a scalable solution. Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.
How are customer service and support?
I am not required to contact the solution's technical support since I handle the customers' tickets.
How was the initial setup?
My company was involved in mass deployment. I am not involved in the deployment stuff because we work as a break-and-fix team. We generally don't go ahead with a mass deployment. For individual deployment, it is a quick and easy-to-install tool. Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is not like every other antivirus product, and I think it is an easy-to-install tool. There is a team for the tool to help you out, but certain pre-requirements need to be filled. If all the pre-requirements are met, there will be no issue with the installation.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
I am not sure about the tool's pricing because we are not from the accounts team. The tool's pricing is managed by the accounts department.
What other advice do I have?
I recommend the tool as it is an emerging or upcoming product with a set of features. My recommendation of the tool surely depends upon the scale of the business.
The tool is easy to use. We even have an accounts team where they can help you from scratch. We have a tech support team who would definitely suggest it to you over the session, so nothing as such is required as they will definitely help the users with the tool.
I rate the tool an eight and a half or nine out of ten.
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Senior Consultant Cybersecurity at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees
An antivirus that provides EDR and XDR, but it is expensive
Pros and Cons
- "The solution's most valuable feature is the user interface."
- "The solution lags to the real-time scenarios here and there."
What is our primary use case?
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is an antivirus tool that provides EDR and XDR.
What is most valuable?
The solution's most valuable feature is the user interface. I've used other solutions like Cylance and CrowdStrike, but Cortex XDR stands out from all the products. It has also moved to XSIAM. Cortex XDR introduced it long ago, while other tools are implementing it now.
What needs improvement?
The solution lags to the real-time scenarios here and there.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks for five years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The solution would have bugs, but we get support 24/7 to deal with them.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is a scalable solution.
How was the initial setup?
The solution’s initial setup is easy.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is an expensive solution.
What other advice do I have?
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is a cloud-based solution. I would recommend the solution to other users if they can afford it. Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is worth the money. It is easy for a beginner to learn to use the solution for the first time.
Overall, I rate the solution a seven out of ten.
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
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Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks
March 2026
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Cash Management Officer at a retailer with 1,001-5,000 employees
Lightweight, helpful technical support, and user-friendly
Pros and Cons
- "The solution's most valuable feature is its ability to rapidly detect certain hardware files."
- "Currently, we are monitoring all USB drives and ports but we would like to improve our device control capabilities."
What is our primary use case?
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is the antivirus solution we use for Androids.
What is most valuable?
The solution's most valuable feature is its ability to rapidly detect certain hardware files.
All other features of Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks are fine.
What needs improvement?
We have implemented a product that blocks USB usage and also provides device control for our company.
Currently, we are monitoring all USB drives and ports but we would like to improve our device control capabilities.
Although we are using this feature, we allow specific systems and USB devices. For example, we enable certain users to use external hard drives but we may disable them if necessary. However, due to the nature of our organization, we do not have a dedicated department for this task.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working with Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks for approximately seven years.
We are working with the most recent version.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability of Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is a nine out of ten.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I would rate the scalability of Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks a ten out of ten.
In our organization, we have 2,700 licenses. Our users are mostly IT specialists.
Our organization is using the Cortex system across all platforms, including servers running Linux, Mac, and Windows operating systems.
Maintenance is done by the vendor.
How are customer service and support?
Technical support is good.
We have also used them for Palo Alto Firewalls.
We do not have any issues with support, I would rate them a nine out of ten.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
Previously, approximately one year ago, we used Kaspersky.
We are currently using both Kaspersky and Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks.
How was the initial setup?
The installation process is straightforward, and the software itself is lightweight.
What about the implementation team?
The installation process takes less than a minute.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Our license will require renewal in August, after which the maintenance will continue as usual.
I am not aware of the fees, it is handled by our financial department.
What other advice do I have?
I would recommend this solution to others who are interested in using it.
I would rate Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Network Security Engineer at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Ability to mitigate ransomware issues and includes advanced threat analytics and behavioral analytics
Pros and Cons
- "If any application performs suspicious activities, such as changing registries or modifying other applications, Cortex XDR detects and blocks the entire application."
- "Product might have some bugs."
What is our primary use case?
Cortex XDR mainly focuses on endpoint protection. Unlike other antivirus products, it is way more advanced. It allows you to manage your endpoints and includes advanced threat analytics and behavioral analytics. For example, it offers a behavioral analysis, the main purpose of which is to identify suspicious activity.
If any application performs suspicious activities, such as changing registries or modifying other applications, Cortex XDR detects and blocks the entire application. This ensures that unauthorized actions are prevented.
Another feature of Cortex XDR is its ability to mitigate ransomware issues. It creates duplicate files on the endpoint, and if any ransomware attempts to access these files, it detects and identifies the ransomware attack. Cortex XDR offers many such advanced features in its cloud platform.
How has it helped my organization?
What needs improvement?
Product might have some bugs. But these will be fixed in the next version. They'll try to work on that and fix those issues. They won't let it go easily.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been implementing and supporting this product for one year.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The end users are around thousands.
How are customer service and support?
I am from the support team. I fix things. If customers have any issues with the product, they call me. That's the role of my job. I am from the partner side.
How was the initial setup?
The deployment and setup process is handled by a different team. So I have never deployed Cortex, but I know the steps. It is not easy, but at the same time, it is not very complicated.
It's cloud-based. You don't have to set up a server; it's all on the cloud. You have to set up your tenant on their dedicated server once you subscribe to the product.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Price-wise, Cortex XDR is quite expensive compared to regular endpoints. It is a bit more expensive than other products, but it's worth the money.
What other advice do I have?
Cortex is a good product. But like every other product, it has some flaws. Not every product is ideal. Every product has its flaws. So when compared with other products, Cortex is one of the good products. I would suggest you take the product because it is really one of the good products, but it has some flaws.
So, I would rate it an eight out of ten.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer. customer/partner
Information Security Manager at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
Numerous available AI modules and very effective communication methods
Pros and Cons
- "The solution is a new generation XDR that has a lot of artificial intelligence modules."
- "The server sometimes stops continuously to check things so it would be helpful to receive access updates or technical reasons."
What is our primary use case?
Our company uses the solution to detect behaviors and provide difficulty remediation for malware. The solution acts like a terminal that allows for the renewal of malware directly from the terminal in any meeting room.
We also have an IOP configuration that allows us to compare our own indicators and compromise rules. This is very efficient because anytime there is an IAP release on the web page, we can update or create a repository of different notification alerts.
What is most valuable?
The solution is a new generation XDR that has a lot of artificial intelligence modules.
The solution's communication methods are very effective.
Configuring or eradicating terminals is easy.
What needs improvement?
The server sometimes stops continuously to check things so it would be helpful to receive access updates or technical reasons.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using the solution for 18 months.
How are customer service and support?
Technical support was very responsive. You can present a critical configuration issue and they provide a solution as quickly as possible.
The Linux agent was a little bit sketchy on our side but we got good support.
How was the initial setup?
The setup is very straightforward.
What about the implementation team?
We implemented the solution in-house and worked with one telecom rep for network permissions.
Two of our cybersecurity engineers deployed to 4,000 endpoints in two months. We had a little bit of an issue with Linux but resolved it so all endpoints were fully operational within three months.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing is a little bit on the expensive side so is rated a seven out of ten.
What other advice do I have?
The solution is solid and measures up against other products. I rate the solution an eight out of ten.
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Sr. Cybersecurity Solutions Architect at a computer software company with 201-500 employees
It provides a whole new level of visibility and integrates with most other vendors
Pros and Cons
- "Cortex covers everything I need. It's a perfect solution. Cortex provides a different level of visibility because it's an extended EDR, allowing you to grab logs from the network and firewalls. Palo Alto invented the concept of the extended EDR or XDR."
- "The price could be a little lower."
What is most valuable?
Cortex covers everything I need. It's a perfect solution. Cortex provides a different level of visibility because it's an extended EDR, allowing you to grab logs from the network and firewalls. Palo Alto invented the concept of the extended EDR or XDR.
What needs improvement?
The price could be a little lower.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Cortex for four years.
How are customer service and support?
Palo Alto provides on-the-ground and remote support. They have a local team on the ground and teams in India or other countries. Their support is excellent, and they know what they're doing.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
Some of my customers have McAfee, Symantec, or Kaspersky. Palo Alto can integrate with other vendors, so it's not locked to one single vendor. Other vendors like Trend Micro, Bitdefender, CrowdStrike, etc. have limitations on log collection from other places. On Palo Alto's datasheet, it tells you that it can talk to Check Point, Fortinet, etc. It's pretty awesome. I believe this is a huge advantage that allows us to implement Cortex anywhere.
How was the initial setup?
I rate Cortex XDR 10 out of 10 for ease of setup. It can be deployed on-prem or on the cloud. It's an easy process that doesn't take long.
What other advice do I have?
I rate Cortex XDR 10 out of 10.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer. Partner/Implementer
Divisional Operations Director at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
Allows us to create queries for investigation, provides good visibility, and has been able to see every single threat
Pros and Cons
- "The live terminal is probably the best thing ever. It gives you the access to get straight onto any machine."
- "It tends to do 99.9% of things. The only thing I'd like is single sign-on authentication into their cloud platform so that my users can be properly authenticated against it."
What is our primary use case?
Officially, I'm an MSP, but I also host it for our own internal software. I've got XDR installed on 26,000 devices. It is used for threat prevention, policy enforcement, firewall rules, and DLP. We use it for pretty much everything. Our firewalls also integrate with XDR.
We use XDR Pro. It is in the cloud, and we have got version 7 at the moment, which is probably the latest update of it.
How has it helped my organization?
The key thing is the visibility of what's going on in our networks and on our end devices. It gives us visibility.
It provides the ability to query. I can query for any file or any IOC on any of the devices installed, and it will search for a data link.
What is most valuable?
The live terminal is probably the best thing ever. It gives you the access to get straight onto any machine.
In general, it has been able to see every single threat that has ever come up and it helps us stop it.
I've used it for a great many years now, and it worked really well. From the Palo Alto side, whatever they buy, they integrate that really well into their integration suite, and that makes a massive difference.
What needs improvement?
The onboarding process could be better.
It tends to do 99.9% of things. The only thing I'd like is single sign-on authentication into their cloud platform so that my users can be properly authenticated against it.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Its stability is very good.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Its scalability is very good. It is on my servers as well as my end users. I've got five and a half thousand end-users plugged in, and they're all on, and then I have 26,000 servers on it as well.
How are customer service and support?
I would rate them a 9 out of 10. The only reason why they lose a point is that if I escalate, it gets done really quickly. I've got all the various contacts I could ever need inside Palo Alto, but some of my other colleagues don't have that same level of contact. So, if I'm doing it, it is rapid, but if they're doing it, it is slower.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I've worked with Carbon Black, which Cortex XDR beats hands down. The reason it beats it hands down is because of the ability to query. I couldn't do that with Carbon Black. For me, that was a genuine issue with Carbon Black. That was one of the main reasons why we've literally moved 22,000 devices off Carbon Black into Cortex XDR.
We also use Sophos, McAfee, and BitDefender. As a group, we buy multiple companies a year. So, we come across most of them.
If it is my own device, I would love to have Cortex, but I can't buy one license. I have to buy a minimum of 250 licenses. So, I normally go for something like BitDefender because it has the least amount of bloatware.
How was the initial setup?
It is straightforward. It is pretty much out of the box. It works how you want it to work. So, you can't really ask for more.
It is also easy to maintain.
What about the implementation team?
It was implemented in-house.
What was our ROI?
In the company I'm in, we make software. On that basis, we've gone for what we need to make sure our software and all of our customer data are secure. That drives us more than the ROI. It may sound a little weird, but it is the way we run because, for us, the ROI is almost pointless if we lose all our data.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
I have the full Pro Prevent license. So, I've got post analytics, forensics, and the whole lot of it.
What other advice do I have?
My advice to others who would like to start working with Cortex is to not dip your toe in the water. Go big or go home. If you integrate everything in, you'll get fantastic results. You shouldn't do some bits here and there. You need to use their ecosystem as a whole. If you're in their entire ecosystem, the results are amazing.
I would rate it a 10 out of 10.
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Security Specialist at a media company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Good pricing and an easy initial setup but needs better internal attack detection
Pros and Cons
- "The initial setup isn't too bad."
- "If they had pulse rate detection, it would be better."
What is our primary use case?
We primarily use the solution for security.
What is most valuable?
We're trying to explore Cortex's possibly to detect digital forensics and the source of the issues.
The initial setup isn't too bad.
What needs improvement?
I have run into some detection issues with Cortex XDR.
If they had pulse rate detection, it would be better.
The whole state IPS should be better.
It needs to be better at detection of internal attacks.
For how long have I used the solution?
We started using the solution since about 2019 or 2020. It's been around two or three years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability is pretty good except for one or two cases. Based on the performance, it's been okay. It's got pretty high performance. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
We have around 4,500 users on the solution currently. It usually handles around 1,400 people. We have these devices across many departments.
The solution has the capability to scale. A company can expand it as necessary.
How are customer service and support?
I've contacted technical support one or two times and found that their support is very fast to respond. They are helpful in each case. We are very satisfied with their level of service.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We used to use Symantec. We have since stopped.
Symantec can easily be put on a USB device, and then they can check it all to scan within the computer. However, we tried to submit a case for a feature enhancement, and, after two or three years, they still do not have this feature enabled and available.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup isn't overly difficult on the cloud. We do not wish to have endpoint clients plow into our internal environment. The deployment shouldn't take up too much manpower.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing is pretty good. It's reasonable. I'd rate it four out of five. Of course, it could always be a bit lower.
What other advice do I have?
I'm a customer and end-user.
I'd rate the solution seven out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
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