Barracuda Email Protection vs Google Vault comparison

Barracuda Networks and Google are both solutions in the Email Archiving category. Barracuda Networks is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.7, while Google is ranked #4 with an average rating of 8.5. Barracuda Networks holds a 17.8% mindshare in EA, compared to Google’s 5.3% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Barracuda Networks users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Google users who would recommend it.

Barracuda Email Protection

Read 18 Barracuda Email Protection reviews

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600 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Google Vault

Read 13 Google Vault reviews

1,873 Views
281 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Barracuda Email Protection

Google Vault

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 29, 2025

Google Vault and Barracuda Email Protection are competitors in the email security and management market. Barracuda Email Protection is perceived more favorably in pricing and support, whereas Google Vault's integration with Google services provides significant advantages.

Features: Google Vault stands out with its seamless integration with Google Workspace, effective search capabilities, and robust data retention controls. Barracuda Email Protection offers outstanding threat detection, real-time alerts, and advanced archiving capabilities. Users highlight Barracuda's extensive security features as a notable point of differentiation.

Room for Improvement: Google Vault could benefit from enhanced export options, more comprehensive security features, and improved flexibility in data management. Barracuda Email Protection may need to address its reporting weaknesses, integration issues with security awareness training, and policy flexibility.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Google Vault is easy to deploy within Google's ecosystem, complemented by its dependable customer support. Conversely, Barracuda Email Protection offers a versatile deployment strategy that adapts to different environments, backed by a proactive customer service approach. Users often note Barracuda's superior support and flexible deployment.

Pricing and ROI: Google Vault tends to have lower setup costs due to its integration with Google Workspace, offering a satisfactory ROI for users within the ecosystem. Barracuda Email Protection requires a higher initial investment but provides substantial returns through its comprehensive security features, with its added value generally seen as justifying the expenditure.

To learn more, read our detailed Barracuda Email Protection vs. Google Vault Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Barracuda Email Protection vs. Google Vault

December 2025

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Helped 880,435 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

Barracuda Email Protection

Ranking in Email Archiving

2nd

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Email Security (13th), Office 365 Protection (4th)

Google Vault

Ranking in Email Archiving

4th

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

eDiscovery (2nd)

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Email Archiving category, the mindshare of Barracuda Email Protection is 17.8%, down from 25.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Google Vault is 5.3%, down from 7.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Email Archiving Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Barracuda Email Protection	17.8%
Google Vault	5.3%
Other	76.9%

Email Archiving

Featured Reviews

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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Rahul Gill

GWS/M365 Consultant at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees

Has supported data retention and export tasks while leaving room for greater automation and feature expansion

If we can have more APIs open for Google Vault, that would be great, and instead of doing it manually, it would be better to do it programmatically. I think there is an API available with Google Vault, though I'm not certain about it. I have never used Vault programmatically, but if APIs exist, then it's beneficial, and if there aren't any, we should have the capability for programmers to create some sort of scripting so they can fetch the data. I assess the export feature in Google Vault in terms of ease and efficiency as quite efficient because most of the data we want to see is available in MBOX and PST formats. If possible, I would want to see Google Vault support additional formats such as iCal, iCad, or CardDAV, which are for iPhone users.

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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 archiving and search features are very good."

"The product is easy to deploy and maintain."

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

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

"The solution is straightforward to set up."

"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."

"We now have a secondary backup of Office 365 that's much easier to retrieve compared to Microsoft. If someone deletes something in Office 365, we can get it back within Office 365, but it's difficult. Barracuda is much easier. There is a lot less management needed using Barracuda. The management becomes much easier for Office 365 and it's no longer on-prem, so there are fewer hours managing on-prem devices, servers, and things of that nature. We don't have network appliances anymore for the backup of our information."

More Barracuda Email Protection pros

"Search feature is valuable for our customers."

"You can retrieve any type of data; for example, if a user accidentally deletes data, as an admin with access to Google Vault, you can easily restore the deleted data."

"It is a very stable solution...It is a very scalable solution."

"What I appreciate about Google Vault is that one of the best features is the ability to use retention policies; it covers mail, chat groups, calendars, sites, Drive, and Google Voice, and the data will remain in Google Vault even if it gets deleted by the user accidentally or intentionally."

"Overall, I would rate Google Vault a ten out of ten."

"The most valuable features are automatic document and email retention."

"My impression is that the initial setup process is not that difficult."

"Google Vault acts as a great method for retrieving files from Google Drive and Gmail."

More Google Vault pros

Cons

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

"The product must enable bulk user management."

"Two to three months back, we got fraudulent emails in which someone in the organization was being blamed."

"There is room for improvement, particularly in reaching out to technical support during deployment."

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

"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."

"They could simplify the licensing and the pricing."

"Sometimes it is somewhat laggy, especially on the Archiver side. It should have improved performance on their Message Archiver."

More Barracuda Email Protection cons

"The knowledge base is not as in-depth as it should be."

"It would be nice if Google would let us download the data in different formats."

"Although it does a good job of searching through data and exporting it, I feel that Google Vault should have more export options available to the user. As a reseller, our customers demand a lot from their Google products, and exporting is one area where there's a lot of improvement needed."

"Google Vault needs to improve its data export timing because sometimes, it takes a very long time to export the data."

"Customer service has been a bit lacking."

"Google Vault lacks speed."

"Searching could be improved. There's a lot of limitations when searching with Google Vault."

"eDiscovery could be improved with additional information and an easier way to retain it."

More Google Vault cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

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

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

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

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

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

"Barracuda licensing model is good."

"The product is 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."

More Barracuda Email Protection pricing and cost advice

"If you have Google Enterprise, then Google Vault is free to use."

"Google Vault is a cheaply priced product. Monthly payments are to be made towards the licensing costs attached to the solution. There are no extra costs apart from the licensing costs attached to the solution."

"The solution is expensive."

"The pricing is fairly cheap."

"Google Vault comes as part of a package deal for us."

"Last year, the price was randomly increased and our customers were really facing a challenge around this. Google launched new pricing under different plans, where formerly there were only three plans, and now there are four, each with their own separate usage allowances. I think it's good, though. The basic plan is now the Business Starter plan, and many customers find this plan very convenient and minimal in price. Overall, the pricing for all the plans is good."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

14%

Manufacturing Company

Construction Company

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

Educational Organization

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

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

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	5
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	3

Questions from the Community

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

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google Vault?

There is no setup cost; it's only the pricing which one needs to pay upon subscribing to Google Vault services.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Google Vault?

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Google Vault?

A few use cases for Google Vault involve using it for custodian purposes where we have to store their mails, calendars, and mostly the mails, which we have done as a custodian process in order to s...

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 23% of the time

Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 21% of the time

Mimecast Email Security vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 11% of the time

Proofpoint Email Protection vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 8% of the time

Abnormal Security vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 4% of the time

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Microsoft Purview eDiscovery vs Google Vault

Compared 70% of the time

Barracuda Cloud Archive vs Google Vault

Compared 8% of the time

Commvault Cloud vs Google Vault

Compared 5% of the time

Proofpoint Intelligent Compliance Platform vs Google Vault

Compared 4% of the time

Mimecast Mailbox Continuity vs Google Vault

Compared 3% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Barracuda Email Protection

January 2026

Download Barracuda Email Protection product report

Buyer's Guide

Google Vault

January 2026

Download Google Vault product report

Also Known As

Barracuda Essentials

No data available

Overview

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

Google Vault lets you retain, hold, search, and export data to support your organization’s archiving and eDiscovery needs. Vault supports:

Email messages
Chats in classic Hangouts with history turned on and Google Talk chats that are on the record
Google Groups
Files in Google Drive and Team Drives
Conversations in Hangouts Chat

Vault is entirely web-based, so there's no need to install or maintain any software. Vault is included with G Suite Enterprise, Business, Education, or Drive Enterprise edition. (Compare editions) Or you can buy Vault licenses for an additional $5 per user, per month.

Google

Sample Customers

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

Broadcom, Dr. Agarwal’s Eye Hospital, Globeflight, Maven Wave, McClatchy, NII Holdings, Safetec, Sheboygan County

Buyer's Guide

Barracuda Email Protection vs. Google Vault

December 2025

Free Report: Barracuda Email Protection vs. Google Vault

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