Azure Firewall vs Palo Alto Networks K2-Series comparison

Microsoft and Palo Alto Networks are both solutions in the Firewalls category. Microsoft is ranked #11 with an average rating of 8.3, while Palo Alto Networks is ranked #31 with an average rating of 8.7. Microsoft holds a 2.2% mindshare in Firewalls, compared to Palo Alto Networks’s 0.1% mindshare. Additionally, 80% of Microsoft users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 96% of Palo Alto Networks users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 16, 2024

Azure Firewall and Palo Alto Networks K2-Series are two prominent firewall solutions. Based on user reviews, Azure Firewall excels in pricing and customer support, while Palo Alto Networks K2-Series is favored for its advanced features and overall performance.

Features: Azure Firewall offers scalability, seamless integration, and a straightforward deployment process, making it suitable for large environments. Palo Alto Networks K2-Series is known for its comprehensive security features, robust threat intelligence, and detailed documentation. The K2-Series stands out for its superior security capabilities.

Room for Improvement: Azure Firewall could improve its threat detection and management tools, streamline configuration processes, and reduce costs. Palo Alto Networks K2-Series could focus on simplifying the configuration process, enhancing user-friendliness, and reducing hardware costs.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Azure Firewall is noted for its straightforward deployment and responsive customer support. Palo Alto Networks K2-Series, despite its comprehensive documentation, may require a more complex setup and users sometimes experience longer support response times.

Pricing and ROI: Azure Firewall is considered cost-effective with a transparent pricing structure and quick return on investment. Palo Alto Networks K2-Series, although delivering high-quality security, is seen as a more expensive option, potentially impacting ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed Azure Firewall vs. Palo Alto Networks K2-Series Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Azure Firewall vs. Palo Alto Networks K2-Series

July 2025

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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

Fortinet FortiGate

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 20.8%, up from 17.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Azure Firewall is 2.2%, down from 2.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Palo Alto Networks K2-Series is 0.1%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Firewalls

Featured Reviews

Vasu Gala

Manager, Information Technology Operation/Presales at TechMonarch

A stable solution with an intuitive interface and quick customer service

I have been working with Fortinet FortiGate, WatchGuard, Sophos, and SonicWall. I'm not as comfortable with SonicWall because of their UI and limitations. I prefer Fortinet above all other options. When it comes to configuration, I am confident in my ability to handle various tasks, including creating policies such as firewall rules, web policies, and application policies. Additionally, I can configure VPNs and implement load balancing, among other tasks. Overall, I feel much more comfortable working with Fortinet. Fortinet has made significant improvements by integrating AI with firewalls for threat analysis and prevention. In the past 2-3 years, they have launched FortiSASE and SIEM, and they also provide SOC services. Both Palo Alto and Fortinet FortiGate are excellent. While Fortinet FortiGate comes at higher prices, the functionality and support justify the cost. They promptly resolve firmware issues and inform all support providers about configuration changes.

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Rashedul Khan

Senior Software Engineer at cimsolutions

Seamless integration enhances security while reducing manual effort

We didn't use TLS termination or malware filtering extensively because those are part of the premium features for Azure Firewall. At this point, I cannot see much improvement needed for Azure Firewall, because it served my purpose; having used it for four months, I am satisfied with the features and performance that I needed for my project. Features that integrate AI functionalities into Azure Firewall could be added, which can also address costing issues. We have features that we require, but they are in the premium offerings. If some features with limitations, for example, limited users, could be made available in the standard Azure Firewall, it would be easier for beginners choosing Azure Firewall at a very first level to test those features without needing to upgrade to premium.

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Krishnakumar M

enterprise architect at a tech services company with 1-10 employees

One of the best tools for the prevention of evasive threats

There is a feature called granular application controls, which I liked. Instead of relying on ports and IP addresses, they use AMP ID. This kind of solution is very good. Another valuable feature is the prevention of evasive threats, which is one of the best tools I've encountered. SSL decryption and app ID-based SSL decryption are also impressive, along with the integration with user ID. Identity-based policies ensuring only authorized users can access specific resources are excellent features. Normally, there is something called SIM or SCIM in IDA IDM, but this feature is provided on the box, which is exemplary.

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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

"The most valuable features of Fortinet FortiGate are the ease of use and there are several operating systems that can include the hardware capacities. In the newer releases, the resources were more useful because they were included in the operating system."

"Whenever we raise a complaint with FortiGate, their response and resolution times are minimal."

"It's comprehensive and time-saving. It covers several areas regarding security."

"Fortinet FortiGate has a very simple configuration, is easy to set up, and includes SD-WAN features at no additional cost."

"It is easy to use. We chose this product for the possibility to have virtual domains (VDOMs). We are building another company in the group, and we would like to split the firewalling rules and policies between these two companies. Each company would be able to manage its own policies and security rules, which is an advantage of Fortinet FortiGate. We can define VDOMs, and every company can manage its own VDOM as if it has its own physical firewall, but in fact, we would be using the same physical appliance because we are also using the same internet lines. So, it allows us to reuse the existing resources without the disadvantage of having to compromise on policies and security. Each company can choose its own way of working."

"The application control features, such as Facebook blocking and Spotify blocking, are the most valuable."

"SSL-VPN is very useful for us and has been very reliable."

"The most valuable features of Fortinet FortiGate are its SD-WAN capabilities, such as dynamic routing, and other features, including security options such as antivirus, IPS, and IDS—all integrated into one device."

More Fortinet FortiGate pros

"The solution has FQDN integration."

"The firewall policy control, URL content control, and antivirus are all the most valuable aspects. Threat prevention is as well quite good."

"Azure Firewall is integrated well with Microsoft ecosystem."

"I like that you can deploy the policies separately from the firewall."

"Among the most valuable features are the DDoS protection that protects your virtual machines, the threat intelligence, and traffic filtering."

"Microsoft's technical support is very good. They're quite knowledgable and responsive."

"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."

"Azure Firewall simplifies everything, securing our APIs and systems so that suspicious IPs do not access our sophisticated systems."

More Azure Firewall pros

"We've found the solution offers us good stability."

"Mainly, it is very easy to understand, and the logs are very good."

"Prevention of evasive threats is one of the best tools I've encountered."

"The scalability of the product is quite high."

"The most valuable feature of Palo Alto Networks K2-Series is the configuration, it is very clear."

"Overall product rating: Nine out of ten."

"The application ID on the Palo Alto Networks K2-Series is able to understand the application traffic, and WildFire is also good."

"Palo Alto has better and finer controls than, say, Cisco or Check Point."

More Palo Alto Networks K2-Series pros

Cons

"The price of FortiGate should be reduced because there are some other leading products that are cheaper."

"There is one big configuration file with no separations for the unique VDOMs. Maybe they could separate individual VDOM configuration files with the root VDOM configuration file referencing the individual VDOM config files."

"I believe there is room for improvement in machine learning and AI in Fortinet FortiGate."

"FortiGate can only retain logs for 24 hours or 7 days. I'm not sure if it holds them for a longer period, such as for a month. It will be useful for assessing our strategy and monitoring our environment without investing in FortiGate Analyzer. It would be beneficial if Fortinet could enhance the FortiGate by providing more statistical and monitoring views for a longer timeframe, rather than requiring access to FortiGate Analyzer."

"In the past six to seven years with the Fortinet FortiGate, we've had two major downtimes, both caused by firmware upgrades."

"Some of the filtering is not robust, you can escape it with a VPN. Some of the users bypass some of the filters. It catches some but it also misses some, that area could be improved. It's functioning reasonably but there's room for improvement in that area."

"I face difficulties integrating Fortinet FortiGate with Active Directory."

"It is somewhat expensive compared to other solutions such as Sophos."

More Fortinet FortiGate cons

"You have to have a defined IP range within your network to associate it with your network. The problem is you have to plan ahead of time if you expect to use the firewall in the future so that you don't have to reconfigure your subnets or that specific IP range. Other than that, I don't any issues. I use it for basic configuration for a single application, so I really don't try to leverage it for multiple applications where I might find some complexity or challenges."

"They can improve the pricing of Azure Firewall."

"Azure has new versions including a premium firewall. But I would like to see them not put the premium features on Azure Firewall Premium alone because it is quite expensive."

"For large organizations, a third-party firewall would be an added advantage, because it would have more advanced features, things that are not in Azure Firewall."

"The tool needs to improve the onboarding and transition process for on-prem users."

"The interface could be improved, it's not very user friendly."

"It's a little heavy compared to a FortiGate or other firewalls."

"It would be nice to be able to create groupings for servers and offer groups of IP addresses."

More Azure Firewall cons

"The scalability for on-premises version is limited as it depends on the model."

"The solution needs a series of OS changes."

"If we have issues, they take anywhere from two days to a week to respond. I even wrote to their CEO because there was no response. When it comes to support, this is the worst company."

"The product should get frequent updates allowing us to add new signatures."

"In the past, we've had trouble with Palo Alto's application filtering not getting it right. I would not be recommending layer 7 application filtering yet."

"The ease of management and configuration should be improved."

"It would be nice if it could easily be integrated with Elasticsearch or Nagios."

"They could improve by providing more features in the solution."

More Palo Alto Networks K2-Series cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"If you purchase a one-year subscription with the hardware and then you want to renew for the second year, it is very costly."

"The price of Fortinet FortiGate is reasonable."

"Their licensing costs are annual. The UTM feature license along with their support is called FortiCare. We include that as a part of the annual maintenance cost. Palo Alto or Juniper also have an annual subscription charge for UTM. Price, of course, can always be more competitive, but it is not the most expensive product. The price-performance ratio is quite high for FortiGate."

"Its price is reasonable. They have a clear pricing policy. It is not complicated by the number of VPN users at a time. We know what the price is. The yearly subscription for the security license is rather high, but it is all included for whatever number of users you have and the kind of functions you need."

"It is an inexpensive solution."

"The price could be lower."

"I would say that all things considered, the pricing is pretty good."

"It is quite affordable for our customers. There is a separate cost for IPS, antivirus, web filtering, and other features. They have a great choice of licenses. You can go for the license that you want, which is quite useful."

More Fortinet FortiGate pricing and cost advice

"Azure Firewall is more expensive. If Microsoft can make Azure Firewall cheaper, I can see that all clients will think of using it. One client used FortiGate because it is much cheaper. Some clients ask me for Cisco, but in the cloud estimate, I found its cost is the same as Azure Firewall."

"I rate the product pricing a five out of ten."

"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."

"The total cost of ownership is much less than Palo Alto, Cisco, or any other brand."

"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."

"Before choosing this solution, we evaluated others, and we found this to be the most cost-effective."

"Azure Firewalls operate on a pay-as-you-go model, similar to cloud services."

"Azure Firewall is expensive."

More Azure Firewall pricing and cost advice

"If you compare K2-Series' quality with its price, I think it is reasonable."

"Pricing is a sensitive issue because the cost is high in this market."

"The price of the solution is expensive."

"This product is designed for large companies. The price would not be suitable for a small or medium size company."

"Palo Alto Networks K2-Series is an expensive solution, the price could be reduced. They are more expensive than some of their competitors."

"Palo Alto firewalls are very expensive."

"Products by the leader in the field are justifiably a bit more expensive compared to other vendors."

"The price of this solution is too high."

More Palo Alto Networks K2-Series pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

16%

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

15%

Government

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Performing Arts

23%

Computer Software Company

16%

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

Which is the better NGFW: Fortinet Fortigate or Cisco Firepower?

When you compare these firewalls you can identify them with different features, advantages, practices and usage a...

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What is the biggest difference between Sophos XG and FortiGate?

From my experience regarding both the Sophos and FortiGate firewalls, I personally would rather use FortiGate. I know...

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What are the biggest technical differences between Sophos UTM and Fortinet FortiGate?

As a solution, Sophos UTM offers a lot of functionality, it scales well, and the stability and performance are quite ...

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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 Firew...

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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...

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Which would you recommend - FortiGate VM or Azure Firewall?

Both of these solutions are excellent options that provide flexible scalability and solid security. Fortinet Fortigat...

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Features comparison between Palo Alto and Fortinet firewalls

In the best tradition of these questions, Feature-wise both are quite similar, but each has things it's better at, it...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Palo Alto Networks K2-Series?

The pricing for the Palo Alto Networks K2-Series solution is affordable and there are no complaints about the licensing.

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What needs improvement with Palo Alto Networks K2-Series?

The graphical user interface is a little complex and difficult to manage. L1 engineers cannot work on the Palo Alto N...

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Comparisons

Sophos XG vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 20% of the time

Cisco Secure Firewall vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 12% of the time

Netgate pfSense vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 11% of the time

Cisco Meraki MX vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 5% of the time

SonicWall TZ vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 4% of the time

More Fortinet FortiGate Competitors

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls vs Azure Firewall

Compared 18% of the time

Fortinet FortiGate-VM vs Azure Firewall

Compared 16% of the time

Palo Alto Networks VM-Series vs Azure Firewall

Compared 7% of the time

Azure Front Door vs Azure Firewall

Compared 5% of the time

Check Point Quantum Force (NGFW) vs Azure Firewall

Compared 4% of the time

More Azure Firewall Competitors

Cisco Secure Firewall vs Palo Alto Networks K2-Series

Compared 61% of the time

Juniper SRX Series Firewall vs Palo Alto Networks K2-Series

Compared 39% of the time

More Palo Alto Networks K2-Series Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Fortinet FortiGate

August 2025

Download Fortinet FortiGate product report

Buyer's Guide

Azure Firewall

August 2025

Download Azure Firewall product report

Buyer's Guide

Palo Alto Networks K2-Series

August 2025

Download Palo Alto Networks K2-Series product report

Also Known As

FortiGate 60b, FortiGate 60c, FortiGate 80c, FortiGate 50b, FortiGate 200b, FortiGate 110c, FortiGate, Fortinet Firewall

No data available

Overview

Fortinet FortiGate offers comprehensive network security and firewall protection across multiple locations. It effectively manages data traffic and secures environments with features like VPN, intrusion prevention, and UTM controls.

Organizations rely on Fortinet FortiGate for its robust integration with advanced security policies, ensuring significant protection for enterprises, cloud environments, and educational sectors. It facilitates network segmentation, application-level security, and authentication management, securing communication within and between locations such as branches and data centers. Its efficient SD-WAN and UTM features enable streamlined data management and enhanced threat protection capabilities. Users appreciate its centralized management, facilitating seamless operations across diverse environments.

What are the key features of Fortinet FortiGate?

VPN Capabilities: Ensure secure remote access for users and seamless site-to-site connections.
Intrusion Prevention System (IPS): Detect and prevent security threats and vulnerabilities.
Advanced Firewall: Offers robust firewalling with application control and web filtering.
SD-WAN: Optimizes application performance and enhances bandwidth management.
SSL VPN: Provides reliable and secure access for remote workers.

What benefits should users expect from Fortinet FortiGate?

High-performance Security: Delivers effective threat mitigation with high availability.
Centralized Management: Simplifies network operations with cloud-based management tools.
Detailed Analytics: Provides comprehensive insights into network activity and security threats.
Load Balancing: Ensures optimal resource distribution and traffic management.

Fortinet FortiGate is crucial in sectors like education, offering robust networks for secure data flow between campuses and facilitating remote learning. In enterprise environments, it allows efficient management of application traffic and security across multiple branches, while in the cloud, it seamlessly integrates with diverse platforms to enhance security infrastructure.

Fortinet

Azure Firewall is a user-friendly, intuitive, cloud-native firewall security solution that provides top-of-the-industry threat protection for all your Azure Virtual Network resources. Azure Firewall is constantly and thoroughly analyzing all traffic and data packets, making it a very valuable and secure fully stateful firewall as a service with built-in high availability and unrestricted cloud scalability. Azure Firewall allows users to create virtual IP addresses and provides for secure DDoS protection for the virtual machines on your network. It also provides fast and efficient east-west and north-south traffic security.

Azure Firewall is a managed, cloud-based network security service built to protect your Azure Virtual Network resources. It is a fully stateful firewall as a service with built-in high availability and unrestricted cloud scalability.

Azure Firewall has two significant offerings, Standard and Premium.

Azure Firewall Standard works directly with Microsoft Cyber Security and supplies excellent L3-L7 filtering and threat awareness. The proactive real-time threat awareness will quickly alert you and immediately deny all traffic to and from any known problematic or suspicious domains or IP addresses. Microsoft Cyber Security is updated continually to protect against all new and known potential threats at all times. To learn more about Azure Firewall Standard, click here.

Azure Firewall Premium provides everything the standard version does, and additionally adds extra levels of data encryption, network intrusion detection, extended URL filtering, and Web category filters. To learn more about the added features of Azure Firewall Premium, click here.

Key Benefits and Features of Azure Firewall:

High availability - You do not need load balancers with Azure Firewall; it's already built in and ready to go.
Self-scalability - Azure Firewall is intuitive and will auto-scale as needed based on traffic flow to be ready for peak traffic times.
Threat awareness - Using Microsoft Cyber Security to filter traffic, Azure Firewall will deny any known problematic threats to keep your network safe.
Additional IP addresses - You can securely add up to 250 public IP addresses with Azure Firewall
Improved web category filtering - You can set up specific protocols to allow or deny categories within websites that are deemed inappropriate for use within your network. You have the ability to organize categories based on a defined set of descriptions.

What our real users have to say:

Many PeerSpot users found Azure Firewall to be very user-friendly and easy to use. They liked that it offers seamless integration to the cloud and were especially pleased with the threat filtering options.

Regarding integration and threat intelligence, our users wrote:

“The most valuable feature is the integration into the overall cloud platform.”

“The most valuable feature is threat intelligence. It is based on filtering and can identify multiple threats.”

“I think that one of the best features is definitely the premium version, along with the IDPs in terms of the intrusion detection and prevention system.”

Microsoft

Designed to handle growing throughput needs due to increasing amounts of application-, user-, and device-generated data, the K2-Series offers amazing performance and threat prevention capabilities to stop advanced cyberattacks and secure mobile network infrastructure, subscribers, and services.

Palo Alto Networks

Sample Customers

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Dell, HP, Oracle, Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Vodafone, Orange, BT Group, Telstra, Deutsche Telekom, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, CenturyLink, NTT Communications, Tata Communications, SoftBank, China Mobile, Singtel, Telus, Rogers Communications, Bell Canada, Telkom Indonesia, Telkom South Africa, Telmex, Telia Company, Telkom Kenya

Information Not Available

State of North Dakota, SEGA, Alameda County Office of Education, Temple University, VERGE, CAME

Buyer's Guide

Azure Firewall vs. Palo Alto Networks K2-Series

July 2025

Free Report: Azure Firewall vs. Palo Alto Networks K2-Series

Find out what your peers are saying about Azure Firewall vs. Palo Alto Networks K2-Series and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.

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