Avanan vs Barracuda Email Protection comparison

Avanan, a Check Point Company and Barracuda Networks are both solutions in the Email Security category. Avanan, a Check Point Company is ranked #15 with an average rating of 8.5, while Barracuda Networks is ranked #13 with an average rating of 8.8. Avanan, a Check Point Company holds a 3.4% mindshare in Email Security, compared to Barracuda Networks’s 3.0% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Avanan, a Check Point Company users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Barracuda Networks users who would recommend it.

Avanan

Read 19 Avanan reviews

3,245 Views
2,856 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Barracuda Email Protection

Read 18 Barracuda Email Protection reviews

2,118 Views
1,821 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Avanan

Barracuda Email Protection

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 3, 2024

Avanan and Barracuda Email Protection are two prominent solutions in the realm of cloud-based email security. Avanan holds an edge owing to its advanced AI capabilities and adaptability for fluctuating environments, while Barracuda is recognized for its solid spam blocking and integration with Microsoft 365.

Features: Avanan's key features include AI-powered threat detection tailored for Office 365, seamless deployment across various cloud environments, and real-time email threat mitigation. Its focus on comprehensive protection enhances its appeal. Barracuda stands out for its robust spam and malware filtering, reliable performance in impersonation detection, and AI-driven analysis that easily integrates with Microsoft 365, ensuring a smooth user experience.

Room for Improvement: Avanan can improve by expanding integration with more SaaS applications, refining user training resources, and adjusting pricing strategies for small to medium enterprises. Issues with occasional false positives suggest further enhancements in threat detection. Barracuda faces challenges with pricing complexity, requires further development in fraud detection, and could improve reporting and integration with security awareness training initiatives.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Avanan is lauded for its flexible deployment options in both public and private clouds, backed by effective customer support. Its scalability is beneficial for diverse organizational needs. Barracuda provides a straightforward deployment process, especially for Microsoft 365, and is supported by responsive customer service, although it is more suited to public cloud setups compared to Avanan's versatile approach.

Pricing and ROI: Avanan offers a flexible user-based pricing model, beneficial for dynamic environments like film production, achieving significant ROI through reduced phishing incidents. Barracuda provides moderate, stable pricing that offers value for email protection with predictable usage. Both solutions deliver satisfactory returns on investment, with Avanan's pricing structure being more responsive to shifting user numbers.

To learn more, read our detailed Avanan vs. Barracuda Email Protection Report (Updated: September 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Avanan vs. Barracuda Email Protection

September 2025

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Helped 867,370 peers since 2012

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

Avanan

Ranking in Email Security

15th

Average Rating

9.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Data Loss Prevention (DLP) (26th)

Barracuda Email Protection

Ranking in Email Security

13th

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Email Archiving (2nd), Office 365 Protection (5th)

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Email Security category, the mindshare of Avanan is 3.4%, down from 3.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Barracuda Email Protection is 3.0%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Email Security Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Barracuda Email Protection	3.0%
Avanan	3.4%
Other	93.6%

Email Security

Featured Reviews

Robert Melendez

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.

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LeeMiles

Director, Information Technology at St Albans High School For Girls

Very good threat protection, spam filtering, and cloud backups

Considering it integrates with Azure, I would like to be able to effectively set up policies where people are by default included in certain settings. For instance, for email quarantine, I can't set up a global setting. Users must go through an induction session where I guide them in configuring quarantine alerts rather than having default settings based on group membership. This seems like an oversight since they already use Active Directory details. They should assign policies based on group membership, which configures these settings by default.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Easy to use for non-technical users."

"Spam protection is the most valuable feature."

"It can retract unsafe emails and remove them from the entire communication channel."

"The ease of installation and the AI capacity of the product are valuable."

"If we look at four to five years ago, we had close to six or eight people click a link in an email per month. Now, we are probably down to about five or six clicks a year, if not less."

"It can detect corrupted files and filters out documents with viruses."

"The most valuable feature of Avanan is its effectiveness. When scanning incoming emails for threats it can in an automated fashion, quarantine suspicious attachments."

"The threat detection tools enable us to ascertain malware and phishing messages across the email network infrastructure."

More Avanan pros

"The most helpful aspect for me is the out-of-the-box configuration, which is fairly good."

"We check the reports sometimes to see that frequent attacks and malicious emails are being blocked by the solution."

"The best feature of Barracuda Email Protection is that it provides protection for Microsoft 365."

"The most valuable aspect includes attempts to spoof or compromise domains from external sources."

"The most valuable features of Barracuda Email Protection are flexibility and customization."

"The solution's most valuable feature is impersonation detection."

"I'm quite satisfied with the graphical user interface for Barracuda products."

"The most valuable features of Barracuda Essentials are it's a trusted name and is rated very high on review sites. It blocks high percentages of spam and junk email and it's in the cloud. They have hardware appliances, but this is in the cloud. The solution is very effective at blocking malware and blocking spam and this is what we are looking for. There's not a whole lot of complexity, you want a solution that is very good at blocking out all of the unwanted emails."

More Barracuda Email Protection pros

Cons

"It is complicated for new users unfamiliar with the modern cloud networking infrastructure."

"It is very difficult to find the required documentation."

"Being cloud first and because we are in the movie business, we use a lot of Macintoshes. So, there is absolutely no reason for us to have Active Directory whatsoever. However, if you are using Office 365, you must have Active Directory in order to reset passwords. Even though we have a single sign-on provider, we must have Azure Active Directory for Office 365, which is really stupid. As a cloud application, you would think that I don't need Active Directory, which I don't need for anything else except Office 365. We have one server inside that space to help us manage Active Directory just for Office 365. This is a very sore point, but it is what it is."

"Sometimes it seemed like the allow list wasn't working. I've created many allow list rules however, they still seem to be blocked; the same is true with the blocked list rules."

"In Avanan, the email channel is one of the channels where data leakage happens, and they need to consider it from a DLP perspective."

"The customer service team could come up with clear tutorials on how to use this platform to help new teams."

"When sending bulky emails, the system slows down and takes a long time before it responds effectively to our requests."

"The user experience must be improved."

More Avanan cons

"The product must enable bulk user management."

"Considering it integrates with Azure, I would like to be able to effectively set up policies where people are by default included in certain settings."

"The platform's pricing needs improvement."

"I would like to see some additional functionality in terms of employee monitoring, as part of a work-from-home security solution."

"The customer service and support could be improved if the support were available directly in Europe. Currently, the support is often managed from India, so we sometimes need to wait due to the time zone difference. It would be quicker and better if the support were provided by European staff."

"Barracuda Essentials can improve by continually adding more features."

"Considering it integrates with Azure, I would like to be able to effectively set up policies where people are by default included in certain settings."

"The policies are set up in Barracuda by default; we don't have any control over them."

More Barracuda Email Protection cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is not the cheapest in the market."

"Having the flexibility and modeling to do the pricing that best fits the needs of the organization is incredibly ideal. That is what Avanan does. They know exactly how many users are using it, etc. We can tune the invoicing associated with how we are using the product so we can charge it back to the shows appropriately."

"The pricing of Avanan is reasonable."

"Good pricing arrangement as an SaaS offering."

"Avanan’s price is comparable to Barracuda."

"The solution's pricing is moderate, where it is neither cheap nor expensive."

"We pay annually. They never charged us for anything else. And they were quite a bit under that $20,000 mark. It was $19,074. And they've been pretty good about not skyrocketing the price or anything like that. It has gone up. It's gone up to $24,000 in 2020."

"The price is similar to that of Microsoft 365."

"The price of Barracuda Essentials is better than some of the competing products."

"Barracuda licensing model is good."

"Despite a list price possibly around $40 per user, their market price allows customers to easily buy the solution."

"The product is expensive."

"We didn't have to pay a lot for the solution because we got it from a good vendor with a good user volume."

More Barracuda Email Protection pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

16%

Manufacturing Company

Construction Company

Comms Service Provider

Computer Software Company

17%

Manufacturing Company

Construction Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	8
Midsize Enterprise	8
Large Enterprise	6

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	12
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	3

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Avanan?

Spam protection is the most valuable feature.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Avanan?

Avanan’s price is comparable to Barracuda.

See all answers

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...

See all answers

What do you like most about Barracuda Email Protection?

Barracuda Email Protection is easy to deploy and maintain. It doesn't require a specialized resource to manage this tool.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Barracuda Email Protection?

Their list price is too high, but in India, the selling price is affordable at around $10 per user per year. Despite a list price possibly around $40 per user, their market price allows customers t...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Barracuda Email Protection?

See all answers

Comparisons

Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs Avanan

Compared 12% of the time

Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration vs Avanan

Compared 11% of the time

Abnormal Security vs Avanan

Compared 11% of the time

Perception Point Advanced Email Security vs Avanan

Compared 7% of the time

IRONSCALES vs Avanan

Compared 5% of the time

More Avanan Competitors

Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 33% of the time

Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 16% of the time

Abnormal Security vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 8% of the time

Mimecast Email Security vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 6% of the time

Sophos Email vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 5% of the time

More Barracuda Email Protection Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Avanan

September 2025

Download Avanan product report

Buyer's Guide

Barracuda Email Protection

September 2025

Download Barracuda Email Protection product report

Also Known As

No data available

Barracuda Essentials

Overview

Avanan offers advanced threat detection for protecting against phishing and malware, utilizing strong AI algorithms and seamless integration with platforms like Office 365. Its cloud-based, customizable security rules ensure efficient data protection suitable for diverse organizational sizes.

Avanan's platform is designed for email security across cloud and on-premises environments, protecting against threats like ransomware and DDoS attacks. With features such as real-time threat detection and advanced filtering, it integrates effortlessly with Microsoft 365. Organizations appreciate its user-friendly interface that allows for easy deployment and management. While possessing cost-effective qualities, Avanan might improve in SaaS integration, AI logic, and technical support with Check Point. Some users suggest enhancements like better mobile compatibility and faster threat response. The system's documentation and querying functionalities could also see refinement, addressing concerns for SMEs.

What are Avanan's key features?

Advanced Threat Detection: Quickly identifies phishing and malware.
Anti-Malware: Supports Office 365 and Box.com with strong AI algorithms.
Sandboxing Capability: Quarantines suspicious emails efficiently.
Seamless Integration: Compatible with tools like Office 365 and Slack.
Customizable Security: Offers cloud-based, always-on protection.

What benefits should users consider?

Cost-Effectiveness: Ideal for organizations of all sizes.
Ease of Implementation: Quick and easy setup process.
User-Friendly Management: Simplifies threat management and data protection.
Enhanced Data Protection: Comprehensive security across environments.

In industries such as finance and healthcare, Avanan is implemented widely to protect sensitive communications and ensure compliance with data protection regulations. Its flexibility makes it suitable for sectors requiring robust security measures, leveraging cloud-based solutions for real-time threat mitigation and data leak prevention.

Avanan, a Check Point Company

The popularity of Microsoft 365 means criminals test and design their attacks to bypass its native security features. And that means you need additional layers of defense. With Advanced Threat Protection enabled, Barracuda uses multiple layers of detection, including signature, static, and behavioral analysis, along with CPU-emulation sandboxing to accurately detect and block zero-hour targeted attacks and ransomware.

Traditional email gateways use static rules and policies—reputation analysis, block lists, and malicious payloads—to determine if an email is malicious.

Barracuda protects your Microsoft 365 inbox against evasive threats with a powerful AI engine that learns the unique communication patterns within your organization through access to internal and historical emails. Once it understands what legitimate emails looks like for each user, it can detect anomalies that signal malicious intent. This context-based detection is more effective at blocking targeted attacks, which are designed to bypass traditional rule-based email security.

Barracuda Networks

Sample Customers

Bethel School District, ServiceSource, Capital Caring

ACT Government, Acumen Group, AGIP, Delta Dental Plans Association, Desai/Nasr Consulting Engineers, Inc., Equinox Information Systems

Buyer's Guide

Avanan vs. Barracuda Email Protection

September 2025

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