We performed a comparison between Fortinet Fortigate and Fortinet Fortigate VM based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: Fortinet Fortigate is the winner in this comparison. According to reviews, it has better support than Fortinet Fortigate VM.
"This version is stable. I don't have any issues with this solution, in our environment, it works well."
"The response is very quick and they can visually resolve our problems in a short period."
"The signature database and zero-day detection are Fortinet FortiGate's most valuable features."
"The most valuable feature is the ease of use."
"The reporting you receive out of this appliance is excellent. You will not need an external management system."
"It's a user-friendly firewall. Most of the tasks are very simple. It's simple to configure and troubleshoot this firewall."
"The solution is very, very easy to use."
"Initial setup is easy to configure."
"The most valuable features are network security, VLAN, network protection, and encryption are very valuable to us."
"The solution's initial setup process was very easy."
"The most valuable feature is the WAN optimization."
"The interface is decent."
"The most valuable features we have found to be the VPN, ease of use, and overall simplicity."
"The most valuable features are the web proxy for protection and web gateway for deployment."
"I've found the UTM features and the SD-WAN to be most valuable."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is that it is easy to operate."
"Fortigate's hardware capacities could be improved."
"Web security solutions can be improved."
"The feature which gives us a lot of pain is ASIC architecture."
"There are some cloud-based features that could be much more flexible than they currently are."
"I feel that the reporting needs to be improved."
"I would like Fortinet to add more automation to FortiGate."
"In some cases, its initial setup could be hard for customers."
"The inability to scale the FortiAnalyzer to match our growth necessitates the purchase of new hardware."
"FortiGate's application load balancing has to be improved. They need to improve a lot on the load balancing and RAF side. They are far behind Citrix in that regard."
"Compatibility and integration with other products or vendors such as Cisco SD-WAN products need improvement."
"VM should be more optimized."
"In the next release, we would like to see full integration with VMware NSX virtualized networks."
"The solution is fairly complex."
"I don't have any specific improvements to suggest, but perhaps the pricing could be enhanced. Regarding updates, more frequent updates would be appreciated. FortiGate-VM is currently focused on providing very good firmware updates, automation, and top-notch features. It stands as a great product for now. Based on our needs and the vulnerabilities we've encountered due to various downloads, I suggest integrating with Kaspersky Gateway. This integration would involve scanning and inspecting both official emails and spam emails. Our customer has successfully worked with Kaspersky Gateway, and overall, the integration has been effective."
"The performance could be better. Some features need to have quality control when the switch is working. The dedicated bandwidth for some users is not reliable."
"We encountered scalability issues in IPSec Module. The tunnels freeze sometimes."
Fortinet FortiGate is ranked 2nd in Firewalls with 306 reviews while Fortinet FortiGate-VM is ranked 9th in Firewalls with 113 reviews. Fortinet FortiGate is rated 8.4, while Fortinet FortiGate-VM is rated 8.4. The top reviewer of Fortinet FortiGate writes "It's a reliable solution that's easy to install and cheaper than competitors ". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Fortinet FortiGate-VM writes "An easy-to-manage and configure tool that provides ample documentation to help with the setup phase". Fortinet FortiGate is most compared with Sophos XG, Cisco Secure Firewall, Netgate pfSense, Meraki MX and SonicWall NSa, whereas Fortinet FortiGate-VM is most compared with Azure Firewall, Palo Alto Networks VM-Series, Fortinet FortiOS, OPNsense and Cisco Secure Firewall. See our Fortinet FortiGate vs. Fortinet FortiGate-VM report.
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We monitor all Firewalls reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.
Purpose-built appliances offer tested performance measures and provide proven results for the specified traffic and service configuration.
VM can only provide vCPUs, RAM, and hard disk resources. However, in some cloud environments, you only have the VM option, no appliances accepted.
We have several Fortigate VM firewalls operating for 3 years now in the cloud and appliances in our centers that handle the traffic just fine. We have not had to increase the resources above the recommendations and they work just fine.
FortiGate VM
Virtual machines are less efficient than real machines because they access the hardware indirectly.
FortiGate Hardware
Fortigate appliance is purpose built with NPU and SPUs designed to increase throughput while maximizing the ability to decrypt packets in search of malware.
VM deployments are software only and do not include the NPU and SPUs.