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Azure Firewall vs Azure Firewall Manager comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Azure Firewall
Ranking in Microsoft Security Suite
11th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Firewalls (11th)
Azure Firewall Manager
Ranking in Microsoft Security Suite
26th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
4.8
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
Firewall Security Management (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Microsoft Security Suite category, the mindshare of Azure Firewall is 2.9%, down from 4.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Azure Firewall Manager is 1.1%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Microsoft Security Suite Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Azure Firewall2.9%
Azure Firewall Manager1.1%
Other96.0%
Microsoft Security Suite
 

Featured Reviews

AD
Technical Solution Architect at liwa
Has enabled us to manage internal access securely but lacks accessible documentation for deeper integration
We haven't required any support, but overall, Microsoft support is good. Whenever we raise any concern, they are supporting us on time. Currently it is good. We are not a public-facing company; it is a retail company only, so that's why I don't think it is required. We don't have an e-commerce solution on Azure. For that, we are using a different stack for the e-commerce portal, so that is not in Azure. We are only using it for business applications, and I think L3 filtering in network security suffices for our problem currently. Regarding scalability for Azure Firewall, we don't need it here because the request to the application is internal. All are internal users. So there is not much request to get into the application, so scalability is not required for us in the current scenario.
Sikkander  Batcha - PeerSpot reviewer
DevOps Engineer at CloudIQ
Has managed traffic effectively but lacks visibility and advanced control features
Azure Firewall is typically behind other vendor firewalls because we don't see what kind of traffic is traveling through it. That is one drawback. The main drawback is that we need log support from Azure Firewall, which can be quite costly. There is no login feature in Azure Firewall because only the IAM feature is available in the Azure site; we manage it only through the Azure portal, not through any other portal. Other vendors, such as Palo Alto, provide GUI or CLI interfaces to manage their firewalls, whereas we only manage Azure Firewall through the Azure portal. In the future, I would like to see additional features in Azure Firewall Manager to make it more competitive, such as technologies like App-ID and User-ID that Palo Alto has. Azure Firewall currently only allows traffic based on layer four and sometimes layer seven, so they need to improve in those areas compared to other vendors.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The ability to provide better control of the traffic is the solution's most valuable aspect."
"With Azure products, customer support is really good."
"Azure's cost-effectiveness is its major advantage."
"It provided ease of maintenance, if a new firewall was needed, we only had to run the pipelines for this, so the maintenance was very easy and it reduced work by 30% while saving maintenance and operational costs by 15%."
"Microsoft's technical support is very good. They're quite knowledgable and responsive."
"It's auto-scalable, which is a great feature."
"For small and medium-sized organizations that are not ready to invest in a third-party firewall, and clients who are not so concerned about data security, Azure Firewall is the best solution."
"With Azure Firewall on the cloud, you just need to subscribe to the firewall, configure it, and it will help you protect your environment."
"The best feature of Azure Firewall Manager is that it is easy to maintain and configure."
"The solution is very easy to set up."
"It is easy to install and does not require any plugins for your browser."
"The solution has improved our organization with its firewall."
"From a traffic management perspective, it's a good firewall because it's automatically scalable based on the traffic availability."
"The most valuable feature is the web firewall, as it is easy to install and does not require any plugins for your browser."
"We are utilizing Azure Entra ID for group labeling, so Active Directory, or now it is Entra ID, securing our application for everyone who accesses it, and Azure Firewall Manager is definitely securing our projects and all its features are fine."
"The tool's support is good."
 

Cons

"The solution doesn't offer the same capabilities of Fortinet. It should offer intrusion prevention and advance filtering. These are two very useful features offered on Fortinet that Azure lacks."
"Compared to FortiGate and Palo Alto, Azure Firewall is not very flexible."
"Diagnosing blocked traffic was initially challenging because we didn't know how to diagnose and integrate Azure Firewall with other Azure services for storing logs in Log Analytics."
"Right now, with Azure Firewall, we cannot have a normal inbound traffic flow. For inbound, Microsoft suggests using application gateways, so the options are very limited. I cannot use this firewall as an intermediate firewall because of the limitations, and I cannot point routing to another firewall. So if I want to use back-to-back firewall architecture in my environment, I cannot use Azure Firewall for that type of configuration either."
"It's a little heavy compared to a FortiGate or other firewalls."
"Currently, it only supports IP addresses, so you have to be specific about the IPs that are in your environment."
"For larger enterprises, they need to adjust the scalability."
"Azure Firewall has limited visibility for IDPS, no TLS inspection, no app ID, no user ID, no content ID, no device ID."
"For Azure Firewall Manager, the learning curve for new people is a bit challenging, but the integration should be more straightforward for configuring a centralized system."
"The tool's security features need to improve. It needs also to include a monitoring system for logs. It is also complicated to find a query on the Azure firewall."
"The configuration and settings require substantial time for learning, particularly for new users."
"The solution can improve the integration with open-source tools."
"With Azure Firewall, the problem is that the NAT-ing still has to be improved."
"We could do only one-way NAT-ing, where the traffic comes from outside to internal, to Azure, which is fine. However, when we actually do NAT-ed traffic to hit the firewall, that way is not working."
"There should be a simple one-click deployment for a firewall, rather than a set of setup instructions that include steps such as the DNS configuration, et cetera."
"Azure charges for many aspects including scaling, automated scaling deployment, and traffic management, which leads to higher costs."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Azure Firewall comes with Azure native services. We did not buy any kind of license for it. Whether you have a free subscription or a pay-as-you-go model, you can deploy the Azure Firewall service... The amount that you use will determine how much you pay."
"Azure Firewall is expensive."
"Azure Firewall is quite an expensive product."
"The licensing module is good."
"Azure Firewalls operate on a pay-as-you-go model, similar to cloud services."
"It is pay-as-you-go. So, you pay based on the usage. If I remember it well, there is a basic fee, and there is a traffic fee. It is not per month. It is per hour or something like that. It is not so expensive."
"It is expensive, especially with the premium functions. For one of the clients, it was very expensive. You have to use it more at an enterprise level, and there, it was not at an enterprise level. So, it was very costly, but security-wise, it was a very wise decision to use it that way."
"The solution is cheaper than other brands. My company has an enterprise contract and we finally got a good price with Azure."
"The price of the solution is reasonable but it is reasonable for the features."
"The solution is certainly expensive in comparison with other cloud services."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Construction Company
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Educational Organization
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise12
Large Enterprise22
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise2
 

Questions from the Community

What is a better choice, Azure Firewall or Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls?
Azure Firewall Vs. Palo Alto Network NG Firewalls Both solutions provide stellar stability and security. Azure Firewall is easy to use and provides excellent support. Valuable features include int...
How does Azure Firewall compare with Palo Alto Networks VM Series?
Both products are very stable and easily scalable. The setup of Azure Firewall is easy and very user-friendly and the overall cost is reasonable. Azure Firewall offers a solid threat awareness, can...
Which would you recommend - FortiGate VM or Azure Firewall?
Both of these solutions are excellent options that provide flexible scalability and solid security. Fortinet Fortigate VM integrates well and has excellent centralized reporting. It is very easy to...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Firewall Manager?
The pricing for Azure Firewall Manager is expensive. In our project, we have used both Palo Alto Firewall and Azure Firewall. Azure charges for many aspects including scaling, automated scaling dep...
What needs improvement with Azure Firewall Manager?
Azure Firewall is typically behind other vendor firewalls because we don't see what kind of traffic is traveling through it. That is one drawback. The main drawback is that we need log support from...
What is your primary use case for Azure Firewall Manager?
My customers are using Azure Firewall Manager, so I'm learning from both documentation and practical knowledge. I usually recommend Azure Firewall Manager for projects such as an animal hospital pr...
 

Overview

Find out what your peers are saying about Azure Firewall vs. Azure Firewall Manager and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
893,915 professionals have used our research since 2012.