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Barracuda Email Security Gateway vs Proofpoint Email Protection vs Symantec Messaging Gateway 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:
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Secure Email Gateway (SEG) category, the mindshare of Barracuda Email Security Gateway is 6.2%, down from 8.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Proofpoint Email Protection is 21.6%, up from 18.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Messaging Gateway is 2.6%, up from 1.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
 

Featured Reviews

RobertSmith15 - PeerSpot reviewer
Email security offers superior protection with good personalization
I have experienced the Barracuda team as very cooperative, and they are readily available for calls with technical support via email. I have had no issues with ongoing support throughout the product's lifecycle. Assistance was provided to me when transferring archived information from a legacy email service. They also recommended an additional service to streamline the process, making it as easy as possible.
AhmedRamadan - PeerSpot reviewer
Optimize email security with effective sandboxing and auto Pull for quarantine
Proofpoint is used as an email security gateway for big enterprises, primarily for their on-premises servers. Many customers also use it alongside Office 365 Proofpoint offers a complete solution for email security with features like DLP, email archiving, and encryption. The most valuable…
Girish Vijay - PeerSpot reviewer
A stable and reasonably priced solution that performs well and has a very good malware database
Since Symantec merged with Broadcom, they might have lost some good technical engineers. Maybe that’s the reason why the product is performing poorly. When we have a good marketing and sales team, even though our product cannot perform, we will sell it at a high price because of the buzzwords. However, at the end of the day, the product should perform. Most of the products might not perform. Symantec is a very good product, but the services are basic. I rate the technical features of the product a nine out of ten. However, I would rate the services provided by the solution a six out of ten. Overall, I rate the tool an eight out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution helps us to block some blacklisted emails."
"The most valuable feature of the Barracuda Email Security Gateway is the cloud ATP functionality not available on the on-premise version. Most of the zero-day attacks can be mitigated with ATP. Additionally, the reporting functionality is good."
"It is very simple to whitelist addresses."
"The client has the option to blacklist or whitelist any email address or domain based on the sender and recipient filters. If they want, they can restrict any IP addresses so email won't be received from those IP addresses."
"This product is powerful and quite simple to use."
"Barracuda Email Security Gateway has a good feature of email spooling, which acts as a first line of security."
"We find the product to be scalable."
"The most important features of Barracuda Email Security Gateway are the simple and quick configuration, interactive console, and easy-to-understand logs."
"Proofpoint Email Protection is stable enough and does its job of virus, malware, and email scam detection. Setting it up is not too complicated."
"The most valuable feature of Proofpoint Email Protection is the dashboards and their visibility, easy configuration, and artificial intelligence. Additionally, the reports are very important and helpful."
"They have customized security rules, mature rules, anti-virus protection, as well as email authentication similar to SPF, DKIM, and DMARC."
"I like all the features with Proofpoint, such as how it filters the spam and marketing mail, lost reality mail, blocks phishing attacks, blocks malicious attachments, and stops phishing links. Also it can defend against the business email compromise impersonation technique. It is a complete solution for all email attacks. It filters for the bad, malicious attachments. If there is any executable file, it can be deleted. It is a good, complete solution."
"The most valuable feature of Proofpoint Email Protection is the central location dashboard for viewing all the related information for risk."
"Its main defense is to stop malicious emails from coming through. There is a sandbox environment where you can open malicious or suspicious emails to make sure that they're not malicious, instead of taking the risk of having your employees do it. This is definitely something that everybody needs nowadays, especially with the rise in cyber attacks."
"The initial implementation is pretty easy to handle."
"I would recommend Proofpoint Email Protection to others because it is useful, simple to use, and provides whatever is required."
"Symantec’s spyware and malware signature database is very good compared to other products."
"The solution is highly customizable. You can make rules for domains and configure policies for spam or malware. Messaging Gateway is an on-prem solution, so it's useful for companies without a cloud presence."
"The most valuable features of Symantec Messaging Gateway are advanced content filtering, malware, and antivirus defense."
"Messaging Gateway is stable."
"Symantec is a secure product."
"It is a solid and stable product."
"I like that it's simple and easy to configure, deploy, and manage. The reporting function has all the features we're looking for, and we are fine with that."
"The setup is pretty simple."
 

Cons

"Barracuda could improve its log and export options like PDF and HDML. It can also bring in more detailing in their console so that it could be better. Some new features should be expanded and made accessible for better protection."
"Barracuda has shown difficulty in providing us with the solutions we sought."
"This product can always be made more secure."
"The reporting can be improved."
"We still have critical threats coming into our environment and delivered to our users. When we compare it with other solutions, these other solutions can already detect those threats."
"Few customers require an on-premises fabric ATP box for attack detection and response."
"Barracuda's spam database isn't on par with its competitors. Users complain about the spam email they're receiving, and we report the issue. Barracuda said they are going to update their system to block the malicious email we received, but we're still getting the same spam. The signatures are not in their database. They need to update their spam signatures because spam is bypassing Barracuda."
"We detect some failures in some mails; not all mails pass through consistently. Some mails pass while others are dropped without any apparent logic, despite having the policy set for specific recipients or senders."
"There is room for improvement in detecting and preventing phishing attacks. While the solution performs well in some aspects, it struggles with phishing threats."
"The product's deployment is complex and requires technical knowledge."
"Proofpoint has a lot of false alarms."
"The stability and UI are the two areas of the solution with certain shortcomings that need improvement."
"It's scalable, but the devil's in the details — you have to know your email volumes."
"In terms of improvement, the price could be better. Additionally, more security could be implemented."
"The incident reporting on offer needs to be improved. It's lacking right now. It should be on the platform somewhere."
"Sometimes it doesn't detect actual spam emails, and sometimes it catches normal emails."
"The solution interface is from 2003 and is outdated. Symantec Messaging Gateway needs to update the interface."
"The false positive submissions must be improved."
"They really need to create a good package that competes with Microsoft."
"It is a nice product but is not user friendly in terms of the graphical interface. It is poor and is not rich in terms of the human interface."
"The documentation could have more detailed examples of how to use the product in various situations. As more companies shift to the cloud, they could better integrate the on-prem and cloud versions through an on-prem client."
"The product must improve the user dashboards."
"It will provide Excel reports and PDF reports, but it would be great if they supported the concept of Crystal Reports."
"What's lacking when you compare it with Proofpoint and other threat protection solutions is that it does the basic stuff, but we need more advanced threat handling."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Barracuda Email Security Gateway is a cost-effective solution."
"I rate the price of Barracuda Email Security Gateway a ten on a scale of one to ten, where one is low price and ten is high price."
"Barracuda has the best price. Every year we need to renew our license, and every year I need to compare Barracuda to two or three other players in the market. Barracuda always has a price that is 30 to 40 percent less than the other players' prices."
"The price of the solution should be reduced. The price in the USA is less than where we are. Our local distributor of the solution is manipulating the market."
"It is an expensive solution and I would rate it 5 out of 10."
"We paid for an annual license."
"The licensing fees are part of a bundled support package that we pay for."
"e solution's pricing is exceedingly high, and it continues to increase."
"The solution uses a licensing model that is reasonable compared to other products."
"Proofpoint is fairly expensive."
"Proofpoint Email Protection has comparable pricing."
"The licensing is basically $8/user."
"The end customer is buying our solution, which can be for monthly or annual usage depending on our payment and business model."
"Clients pay for an annual subscription of Proofpoint Email Protection. Every client always finds it expensive."
"They are competitively priced, but I have been forced to get quotes for other solutions now because they haven't been responding to requests to do the work that we would like them to do."
"The solution charges per user per month to use it. There are not any additional fees in addition to the standard living fees."
"They're a little costly compared to Microsoft."
"A subscription for technical support costs extra."
"The cost of Symantec Messaging Gateway is too expensive in general. However, the appliance also includes the price of the license in the same bundle."
"For 150 users, we pay INR 1,60,000."
"It's a bit expensive compared to its competitor Barracuda Email Security Gateway but cheaper than Sophos Email."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway’s pricing is very cheap."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Educational Organization
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
22%
Computer Software Company
17%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Barracuda Email Security Gateway?
Barracuda Email Security Gateway is very simple to use.
What needs improvement with Barracuda Email Security Gateway?
Barracuda Email Security Gateway should include ATP in the next release.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Proofpoint Email Protection?
In terms of pricing, it is okay compared to others. I would say it is normal. Additional costs do come in, but it enh...
What needs improvement with Proofpoint Email Protection?
It became very expensive due to the nature of local circumstances, and I may advise Proofpoint to adjust marketing so...
What needs improvement with Symantec Messaging Gateway?
The solution takes up a lot of memory. The system becomes slow. The performance must be improved.
What is your primary use case for Symantec Messaging Gateway?
We use the solution to secure our data and emails.
 

Also Known As

Barracuda Spam and Virus Firewall, Barracuda Sentinel
Proofpoint Enterprise Protection, Cofense PhishMe, Proofpoint Digital Protection
Symantec.cloud, Symantec Email Security.cloud
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Evolution Recruitment Solutions, Evans Delivery Company, Osoyoos Credit Union, Synovis Life Technologies, Camden County Technical Schools, DEK, Evans Delivery Company, Colgate Rochester Crozer, Hemmera, South Carolina Heart Center, Ferma Corporation, Major League Baseball (MLB), Healy Brothers Automotive Group
Blocket, University of Waterloo, Lincoln Memorial University, WellSpan Health, U-Haul, Carestream Health, Westinghouse
Doric, Joblink Plus, Our Lady of Mercy College, Parramatta, PPB Advisory, Slater & Gordon Lawyers, Sydney Adventist Hospital Ltd.
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Abnormal Security, Proofpoint and others in Secure Email Gateway (SEG). Updated: July 2025.
862,514 professionals have used our research since 2012.