Barracuda Email Protection vs KerioConnect comparison

Barracuda Networks and GFI are both solutions in the Email Archiving category. Barracuda Networks is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.8, while GFI is ranked #8 with an average rating of 7.5. Barracuda Networks holds a 30.7% mindshare in EA, compared to GFI’s 1.6% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Barracuda Networks users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 57% of GFI users who would recommend it.

Barracuda Email Protection

Read 18 Barracuda Email Protection reviews

2,071 Views
497 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

KerioConnect

Read 10 KerioConnect reviews

1,754 Views
53 Comparison Views

57% willing to recommend

Barracuda Email Protection

KerioConnect

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 29, 2025

KerioConnect and Barracuda Email Protection compete in the email security and management space. Barracuda Email Protection tends to have the upper hand due to its advanced security features, despite KerioConnect offering better pricing and support.

Features: KerioConnect provides a strong email management platform with calendar and contact synchronization, easy-to-use interface, and ActiveSync support. Barracuda Email Protection offers real-time threat intelligence, comprehensive spam filtering, and advanced security features.

Room for Improvement: KerioConnect could enhance its security features and expand integrations. Barracuda Email Protection might improve its reporting capabilities, address integration issues with its security awareness training platform, and streamline policy configuration for better flexibility.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: KerioConnect is known for straightforward deployment and efficient customer service. Barracuda Email Protection offers an effective deployment model and responsive customer support, but its additional security layers may add complexity to implementation.

Pricing and ROI: KerioConnect is a cost-effective solution, providing significant ROI with low setup and ongoing expenses. Barracuda Email Protection has a higher cost structure yet offers greater security returns, making it a valuable investment for users prioritizing robust protection.

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

Buyer's Guide

Barracuda Email Protection vs. KerioConnect

July 2025

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Helped 865,384 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 (14th), Office 365 Protection (5th)

KerioConnect

Ranking in Email Archiving

8th

Average Rating

6.8

Reviews Sentiment

7.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Email Applications (10th)

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Email Archiving category, the mindshare of Barracuda Email Protection is 30.7%, up from 21.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of KerioConnect is 1.6%, down from 2.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

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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David Bloomer

Senior Technician at Computers At Work

Lightweight, simple, and robust; easy to maintain and doesn't require a lot of system resources to run

Kerio Connect does as advertised, so there are no real issues with the product itself. It's developed regularly, so there are constant updates. Possibly, the support and development have lessened since they've sold the company, but as far as the product itself is concerned, there isn't anything that I would suggest needs improvement. If I'm being picky, Kerio Connect uses a proprietary, mappy atom for Outlook, and it would be nice if they used a native mappy connection instead, but that's the only additional feature that I would like to see in its next release. If they have native Outlook map integration, that would be great, but other than that, it's got all the functions that I think a mail server should have.

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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 solution is straightforward to set up."

"The most valuable features are security and ease of use."

"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."

"I would rate the solution nine out of ten."

"The archiving and search features are very good."

"The product is easy to deploy and maintain."

"Barracuda email protection is stable. I would give it a nine because of its strong cybersecurity features."

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

More Barracuda Email Protection pros

"The most valuable features are its ease of use, excellent pricing, and it is platform agnostic."

"We have contacted technical support a handful of times and received some assistance."

"What I like most about Kerio Connect is that it supports ActiveSync, and that is its most critical feature. The solution is also a nice, simple, robust, and stable mail server."

"KerioConnect has integration with 365. We can use Outlook, which has its client and can be used with Apple devices. It integrates with the App Store and Microsoft Office. It has a smart router. The spam filtering and antivirus are good."

"It's relatively simple to use."

"The user interface is good."

"The solution is easy to maintain, unlike Exchange. It's easy to create multiple domains and back up and restore if needed. It also has good security features like anti-spam and antivirus."

"Kerio Connect is secure, flexible, and easy to control from the user interface. It has many security features able to be controlled from one place, such as anti-spam. I have found it very convenient. Additionally, you can analyze log files and share folders which is helpful."

More KerioConnect pros

Cons

"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."

"I would like to see better integration with other products."

"The product must enable bulk user management."

"The solution's reporting mechanism is a little poor and could be improved."

"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 technology works on a supervised engine, but it would be better if it ran on an unsupervised engine."

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

"The platform's pricing needs improvement."

More Barracuda Email Protection cons

"We are considering switching to Microsoft Exchange. One reason is that it doesn't improve our workflow and doesn't integrate well with Microsoft 365 applications."

"The solution could improve the redundancy because we only have one copy of the Kerio Connect server on our hardware. The next step for us is to move to the cloud and if Kerio does not have a cloud version available they should release one"

"The search and archiving documentation capabilities need to be stronger."

"It could be simpler to use and install, but I still wouldn't use it because there isn't a compelling use case."

"KerioConnect continues to improve with regular updates throughout the year. They must be added to the roadmap, which requires approval."

"Having a native Outlook map integration would make Kerio Connect better."

"You cannot integrate with other services like Google Docs, Google Assistant, Google Calendar, etc."

"Most of our clients use Outlook and Kerio Connect. Occasionally, Kerio can be a bit slow. They could make it faster to get onto the web interface without so much load time. It's just slow with Outlook, however, for some reason."

More KerioConnect cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a seven out of ten."

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

"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."

"Barracuda licensing model is good."

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

"Price-wise, this product is middle-of-the-road."

"The product is expensive."

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

More Barracuda Email Protection pricing and cost advice

"The pricing is about $3 per mailbox per month."

"The price of Kerio Connect is better when comparing it to others solutions."

"The solution's pricing depends on how long you plan to keep it because you pay on a per-year basis. You might have a one-time setup cost for something like Microsoft Exchange or a Linux mail server. I'd say this solution is expensive on a per-year basis, almost 2000-3000 dollars annually. It doesn't seem to pay off yet, so we're considering switching to another product."

"KerioConnect has a first-time cost and yearly subscription. It is not expensive."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

17%

Construction Company

Manufacturing Company

Government

Computer Software Company

14%

Comms Service Provider

11%

Manufacturing Company

Retailer

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

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.

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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 do you like most about KerioConnect?

The most valuable features are security and privacy because you installed it on your server, within your company premises, not in the cloud.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for KerioConnect?

KerioConnect has a first-time cost and yearly subscription. It is not expensive.

See all answers

What needs improvement with KerioConnect?

KerioConnect continues to improve with regular updates throughout the year. They must be added to the roadmap, which requires approval. In larger organizations, the server's capabilities and the da...

See all answers

Comparisons

Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 32% of the time

Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 17% of the time

Abnormal Security vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 7% of the time

Avanan vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 6% of the time

Mimecast Email Security vs Barracuda Email Protection

Compared 6% of the time

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Microsoft Exchange vs KerioConnect

Compared 49% of the time

Zimbra Collaboration vs KerioConnect

Compared 28% of the time

IceWarp vs KerioConnect

Compared 9% of the time

Microsoft Exchange Online vs KerioConnect

Compared 8% of the time

Google Workspace vs KerioConnect

Compared 5% of the time

More KerioConnect Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Barracuda Email Protection

August 2025

Download Barracuda Email Protection product report

Buyer's Guide

KerioConnect

August 2025

Download KerioConnect 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

Kerio Connect, a messaging and collaboration solution, meets the needs of small and mid-sized businesses while offering a robust feature lineup. Business users enjoy support for their favorite email client and easy web-based access. Kerio Connect is highly stable—so you can focus on business rather than unexpected downtime and recovery.

GFI

Sample Customers

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

Southern Tier Brewing Company, Innotta, Baustoff + Metall, Hamifleurs, Chanson TV, Ryman Stationery

Buyer's Guide

Barracuda Email Protection vs. KerioConnect

July 2025

Free Report: Barracuda Email Protection vs. KerioConnect

Find out what your peers are saying about Barracuda Email Protection vs. KerioConnect and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.

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