Fortinet FortiGate-VM Reviews

We're using FortiGate-VM on-prem for our firewalls. The Fortinet component in the cloud is FortiGuard. We get our virus definitions regularly updated from the cloud, but the FortiGate firewalls are all on-prem. While the virtual firewalls are created inside the physical firewall, there is an option for a virtual machine firewall where we'll give you the VHD file, and you can install it to a server.

Virtual machines aren't widely used in Brunei because the Brunei government isn't ready for these things yet. They're more confident in hardware, but everything is slowly starting to head in this direction. Others are watching what will happen when people use the apps before they try them.

Some customers prefer VM, especially those customers already leveraging the virtual machine environment. Typically, they don't want to spend on the hardware because they already have all these VMs, so they choose the VM option. But in most deployments, they still prefer the hardware for their firewall because it's already hard-coded.

To improve FortiGate-VM, Fortinet needs to harden it more. For example, if you are using Hyper-V, then you need guidelines for hardening FortiGate-VM that are specific to the Hyper-V environment. If it's VMware, there should be at least a guideline on how to harden the firewall.

We've been working with FortiGate-VM since 2010.

Fortinet-VM is more scalable than the hardware version. If you're using an appliance, there are limitations in terms of hardware specs. So if you want a more scalable firewall, you can get a VM and install it on a high-end server. From there, you have more leverage on how many virtual firewalls you want to create based on that VM. In other words, it's already fixed hardware in the appliance — it's already hard-coded in the appliance. So if you are using a VM and installing it on a high-specs server, then your machine has much higher performance in packaging all these policies and all these hardware security features. 

We proved the frontline support for our client organizations or customers. So far we are satisfied with Fortinet support. We have currently have Fortinet-certified engineers in our company, so we don't have to contact support unless it's a complex issue. We have an NSE7-certified engineer, so we are quite confident with our deployment now.

FortiGate-VM setup is pretty straightforward. It depends on the implementation size, but it takes a week for an organization of around 100 users. Normally Fortinet helps their customers with deployment and post-deployment adjustments, so you don't have any problems. If anything goes wrong, Fortinet is there to support you. 

Like most similar products in the market, Fortinet's enterprise customers need to pay for annual support. They call it FortiCare, and it's direct support from Fortinet. FortiCare is renewed annually and covers support for new releases, purchases, and updates. 

I rate Fortinet FortiGate-VM eight out of 10. However, based on experience, we usually don't recommend using VM firewalls. We still prefer using a hardware-based firewall when that's appropriate. It depends on your needs and the size of your user base. With FortiGate-VM, you can control the size of your firewall if you're using VMs. But on the other hand, if you are using Microsoft Hyper-V, you need to address all these vulnerabilities of Microsoft. And if you're using VMware, then you need to deal with VMware's vulnerabilities. The hardware version of FortiGate has already been hardened based on FortiGate standards. That's the main difference between the FortiGate appliance and FortiGate-VM.

I am using this solution for testing the protection, but not in a production environment.

The Security Fabric feature is beneficial allowing us to have centralized visibility of all our devices and traffic on our network in one place. This is not typically offered on traditional firewalls.

The most valuable features are locking applications from in and out of my test network and testing malware on different devices. I use malware detection, antivirus, and basic firewall policies to check for different types of security breaches. The UI is really nice and easy to use.

I have had a data issue with physical devices that could improve.

I have been using this solution for a few months.

The solution is stable in terms of performance, but I have faced some issues with memory. The solution does not use the creation memory approach, that other vendors do, or what you would normally find in these kinds of devices. I think it is because the memory gets over-utilized a lot is why I am having the issue with the memory.

In my previous employment, I used to work with approximately six people, and we were responsible to monitor and manage FortiGate itself. I most recently switched my employment and in this particular role, there are approximately five other testers using this solution.

I am satisfied with all of the support for this solution. They have great documentation that is well written of everything that you need to know, such as UI functionality. There are different guides for many things that are really helpful. The technical support is really good.

Before installation, you are able to download the solution online based on the platform you are planning to use it on. For example, if you are going to use it on ESXi, Hyper-V, or AWS, you will have a separate specific installer file for each. The installer is based on the platform you are trying to install it on.

If you have some experience with using virtual technologies or virtualizing software, it is not that complicated to do the installation. For beginners, it might get a little complex or complicated because you have to replicate the properties of a physical device in a virtual container.

For firewall devices, Fortinet is very good. They can improve on other solutions, I have used some solutions in the past that did not have a good UI. There are other things that Fortinet as a whole can focus on.

I rate Fortinet FortiGate-VM a nine out of ten.

I use FortiGate-VM for testing.

The user interface, stability, and scalability are the most valuable features. It's also simple to deploy. 

I have been using this solution for one year. 

Stability and scalability are okay. 

I haven't used technical support.

I like FortiGate-VM for constructing VPNs. It's easy to deploy. I would recommend it. It's quite easy.

I would rate FortiGate-VM a seven out of ten. Not a ten because I think that Cisco is better.

The primary use of this solution is to provide information about SD-WAN and how Fortigate helps to reduce costs.

The most valuable features are the SD-WAN and the web filtering applications control.

Areas for improvement would be application control and web filtering.

I've been using this solution for three years.

I haven't seen any problems with stability.

The scalability of this solution is limited.

The technical support is very good.

The initial setup was very straightforward, and deployment did not take a long time.

This is a very easy appliance, and they make it easy to learn. I would rate it as eight out of ten.

We primarily use the solution as a public cloud for Microsoft Azure. 

My experience with the solution has been very positive and Fortinet provides a great layer of security when it comes to SD-WAN and other security capabilities. There are many models available to suit a host of environments. 

The solution is extremely easy and friendly. The configuration, graphical interface and command line are easy to use.

The price is problematic. 

An interesting feature of the vendor license involves SD-WAN orchestrator and this should be addressed in the part which deals with feature licensing. 

I have been working with FortiGate products for the past five years and with Fortinet FortiGate-VM for the past year. 

The technical support varies with the product in question. The support for FortiGate appliances is relatively good compared with the more complicated support afforded other products. 

I like the comparative use of the SD-WAN feature of the solution. 

The solution could be better priced. 

My sole experience with the solution is in the Azure environments. 

As a Fortinet partner, I make use of many of its products. 

As I feel Fortinet FortiGate-VM to be a good solution, I rate it as a ten out of ten. 

The majority of the government sector prefers using the solution as an external firewall and most of the customers prefer that it be one layer. It's good for use as a preemptive firewall.

I find the simplicity to be most valuable. The solution is very simple to manage and to use effectively. It has a very fast response time. There is no need to make improvements to it whatsoever. 

The graphical user interface should be enhanced. While the antivirus profile can be implemented very easily with the graphic user interface, there are many important features that cannot be undertaken without the CLI command like signature, such as extending a  database. One cannot do a graphical user interface for this and CLI command must be employed instead. 

All hidden features related to CLI should appear as a graphical user interface.

I have been an integrator for Fortinet FortiGate-VM for a couple of years. 

The solution is really stable and the connection with FortiGate is very good, as is the solution. 

The solution is scalable. 

Fortigate has its own systems and provides the services that are related to the priority of the ticket. They provide the tickets for groups, say... one through four and have their own metrics for how they manage these tickets. As such, I consider Palo Alto to be faster and more professional. 

Template or marketplace on Azure can be employed. The credentials one will select while doing the deployment can be used in respect of VM with Fortigate. 

Similar to Palo Alto, we have our own license and we're working on this. The customer must buy his own license. 

Just like with Palo Alto, all products are deployed on the cloud.

We have a large number of customers who are making use of the solution, south of 30. Those in Qatar opt for the solution because of its comparative cost effectiveness. It is not only cheaper but also good.

I rate Fortinet FortiGate-VM as an eight out of ten. 

The client wants to use the solution for a mix of things, however, I can't recall exactly what they are at this time.

The user interface is the most valuable aspect of the solution.

It's important that, over time, the solution just keeps up with additional features. There's nothing specific that comes to mind, however, it's important for Fortinet to stay as much on the edge as possible, as far as keeping up with what's out there.

The solution is fairly complex.

I've probably been using the solution for three or four years at this point, although I'm not exactly sure.

We don't really need to worry about stability. Most of the time, what we were running into is just trying of get the client familiar enough with the solution, so that way they can deal with it going forward on their own. There's a little bit of training going on at the outset.

That's primarily why we steer clients in the direction of Fortinet. With this solution, clients have the potential to grow in the near future. It's just one of those items that we wanted to make sure they had. It's something that is robust enough to be able to handle growing. It's somewhat robust without breaking the bank, initially. 

Our organization doesn't use the solution ourselves, so we don't have a large number of users on the solution. Out of 160 people, maybe a third use it here. It's different, of course, with clients, who use it more extensively.

We've never had any technical issues on the solution and have never had to reach out to technical support. However, I've heard that they are quite helpful. I just can't personally speak to the quality or responsiveness of their services.

For those trying to troubleshoot on their own, the solution doesn't really need or have tutorials, however, you can find so much information online, it's not necessary. It would be nice it newly released features had a bit more information. It doesn't happen often, so it's not too big of an issue.

We previously worked with a lot of open source products.

The solution's initial set up was pretty complex. There were a lot of on-site VPN connections to set up, so we went through a lot of additional setup for the clients.

The deployment was pretty quicksand was probably completed in just a couple of days.

We didn't need a consultant or integrator. We handled the implementation ourselves.

Since we don't primarily work with the solution, I'm not sure what the licensing costs are.

We aren't really a customer or reseller, however, we do occasionally recommend the solution to clients from time to time.

The entity I was recently researching for was looking basically to replace some existing solutions. That was the reason why they were asking me to help them do some research. I, on a normal basis, don't do that much with it anymore. However, because I have access, I've been helping them.

I'm not using the latest version. I may be using the one before that, although I don't know the exact version number.

I would warn other organizations that there are some places where some people run into some roadblocks, and they're not sure what to do. My experience in the past has always been that, at least, the support is actually really good. Therefore, if they're running into a situation that they're not sure about, it's probably better to call and seek professional help, as opposed to trying to force it, because it can get confusing really quick.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

The majority of my use cases are firewalls and SD-WAN.

Most customers are moving to SD-WAN, so with FortiGate-VM, when solutions are traditional WAN, limitations have been addressed by the SD-WAN.

I've found the UTM features and the SD-WAN to be most valuable.

The operating system isn't stable, so it goes to memory counters every night.

I've been using this solution for around ten years.

This solution isn't very stable with the new operating systems compared to the old ones.

FortiGate is scalable.

I've previously used Sophos, Palo Alto, and Check Point. We switched to FortiGate because it's straightforward and easy to manage and also has co-costing for customers.

The initial setup was straightforward, and I'd rate my experience as four out of five. Depending on the environment, deployment takes between two to three months.

I would rate the ROI as four out of five.

Licensing is usually on an annual, two-year, or three-year basis. I would rate the product's pricing as four out of five.

I'd give this solution a rating of nine out of ten.