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Avanan vs Cisco Secure Email comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 2, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
8.4
Avanan improved email security, reduced phishing, increased user trust, enhanced mobile protection, and boosted ROI and revenue growth.
Sentiment score
6.4
Cisco Secure Email enhances ROI with robust security, reducing disruptions and downtime from cyber threats, despite perceived high costs.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
8.1
Avanan's customer service is highly responsive, professional, and proactive, with excellent communication and extensive support staff knowledge.
Sentiment score
7.3
Cisco Secure Email support is praised for its responsiveness and expertise, though experiences can vary based on assigned engineers.
Cisco's tech support can be hit or miss, depending on the engineer you get.
Cloud Partner & Solutions Architect at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
The support is pretty decent, with a rating of eight out of ten.
Chief Information Security Officer at Abcl
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
8.2
Avanan integrates with Office 365 and Google, praised for scalability, admin capabilities, and efficient email protection across diverse organizations.
Sentiment score
7.2
Cisco Secure Email provides scalable solutions for seamless user migration and system growth, with reliable cloud service options.
The on-premises hardware is not very scalable, but switching to the SaaS offering is expected to improve scalability.
Chief Information Security Officer at Abcl
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.5
Avanan is highly praised for its stability, efficiency, security, minimal maintenance, seamless Microsoft 365 integration, and reliable AI-based scanning.
Sentiment score
8.0
Cisco Secure Email is praised for reliability, consistent performance, easy maintenance, and high user satisfaction with stable uptime.
Based on my experience, the stability of Cisco Secure Email is very strong.
Systems Engineer at a non-tech company with 51-200 employees
 

Room For Improvement

Users feel Avanan needs improvements in Active Directory dependency, email quarantining, AI logic, training, UI, performance, pricing, mobile app, and integrations.
Cisco Secure Email's high cost, complexity, poor interface, and limited integration impact usability, requiring AI and service enhancements.
The solution should better analyze the actual content rather than only focusing on the email header or origin.
Chief Information Security Officer at Abcl
It would be beneficial to have the functionality of the Email Threat Defense integrated into the Email Security Gateway so customers don't have to buy two products for full email protection.
Systems Engineer at a non-tech company with 51-200 employees
 

Setup Cost

Avanan provides flexible pricing for Office 365, with straightforward setup and costs between $4 to $8 per user.
Cisco Secure Email is priced higher, but users find its extensive features and security benefits justify the cost.
Its cost is bundled with other Cisco products.
Chief Information Security Officer at Abcl
The licensing is a mess and needs sorting out.
Cloud Partner & Solutions Architect at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
The pricing structure is good as it is user-based or email client-based, which is positive for clients.
Systems Engineer at a non-tech company with 51-200 employees
 

Valuable Features

Avanan provides advanced malware and phishing detection, 24/7 cloud protection, easy integration with Microsoft 365, and ensures secure communications.
Cisco Secure Email provides comprehensive threat management with advanced filtering, intuitive management, and seamless integration, enhancing email security effectively.
It also possesses multiple modules for spam detection, malware detection, and threat intelligence, which are valuable in categorizing emails and determining actions.
Chief Information Security Officer at Abcl
It is highly effective in catching phishing and spam emails.
Systems Engineer at a non-tech company with 51-200 employees
It covers everything through email, like antivirus, IDS, and IPS.
Cloud Partner & Solutions Architect at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
 

Categories and Ranking

Avanan
Ranking in Email Security
16th
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
Data Loss Prevention (DLP) (28th)
Cisco Secure Email
Ranking in Email Security
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
62
Ranking in other categories
Cisco Security Portfolio (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Email Security category, the mindshare of Avanan is 2.9%, down from 3.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Secure Email is 5.2%, down from 7.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Email Security Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Cisco Secure Email5.2%
Avanan2.9%
Other91.9%
Email Security
 

Featured Reviews

Robert Melendez - PeerSpot reviewer
Vice President Information Technology at Makeready
Enhances email security and has a very simple and easy-to-use UI
Spam protection is the most valuable feature. We have implemented the tool to enhance our email security. It helps prevent phishing attacks. The anomaly detection capabilities are baked into the security platform. The product integrates wonderfully with Microsoft 365. It's built right on a cloud platform and works almost natively. The solution has a very simple and easy-to-use UI. The tool appears extremely powerful and has a good solid feature set. It catches things that are bad for my environment. The user interface is good the way it is. If the solution continues down that path, I see no problems with the way it is going. It feels like a mature product.
BD
Chief Information Security Officer at Abcl
Threat intelligence with fast attack detection enables comprehensive email protection
In some cases, detection is missed, leading to false positives where genuine emails are flagged as spam. This could result in users not opening genuine emails. We have highlighted this to Cisco because sometimes phishing or marketing campaigns, which are genuine, are incorrectly flagged as spam. The solution should better analyze the actual content rather than only focusing on the email header or origin.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Construction Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
18%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise6
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business22
Midsize Enterprise18
Large Enterprise25
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Avanan?
Spam protection is the most valuable feature.
What needs improvement with Avanan?
Avanan doesn't cover certain tool segments. Barracuda provides backup and retention of emails and Microsoft 365’s backup and retention services. I've brought this up with the vendor. They told me t...
What do you like most about Cisco Secure Email?
Cisco Secure Email is a budget-friendly solution.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Secure Email?
The pricing structure is good as it is user-based or email client-based, which is positive for clients.
What needs improvement with Cisco Secure Email?
The user interface of the Email Security Gateway ( /products/security-gateway-reviews ) should be improved. It would be beneficial to have the functionality of the Email Threat Defense integrated i...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Cisco Email Security, IronPort, Cisco Email Security, ESA, Email Security Appliances
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Bethel School District, ServiceSource, Capital Caring
SUNY Old Westbury, CoxHealth, City of Fullerton, Indra
Find out what your peers are saying about Avanan vs. Cisco Secure Email and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,927 professionals have used our research since 2012.