

Illumio and Check Point Cloud Firewall (formerly CloudGuard Network Security) compete in the network security category, focusing on enhancing enterprise security. Based on feature availability and deployment flexibility, Check Point appears to have the upper hand with its extensive hybrid deployment capabilities and comprehensive cloud protection features.
Features: Illumio centers on micro-segmentation, strong visibility, and flexible policy management. Its zero trust security model provides effective threat containment by offering extensive control over internal traffic, enhancing enterprise value with scalable policy management. Check Point Cloud Firewall excels in advanced threat prevention, offering centralized management and automation features. Its ability to scale across hybrid environments ensures robust protection for both on-premises and cloud infrastructures.
Room for Improvement: Illumio requires enhancements in support, better integration capabilities, and a user-friendly GUI. Users find onboarding complex and desire improvements in automation and reporting. Check Point Cloud Firewall seeks better cloud service integration, simplified licensing, and better documentation. Users express the need for improved clustering and support services, aiming for more seamless deployments.
Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Illumio offers adaptable deployment across environments and receives positive feedback for its responsive customer support, although users note an initial learning curve. Check Point Cloud Firewall is praised for its extensive hybrid cloud capabilities, although users experience occasional deployment complexity and slower support. Illumio stands out in customer service responsiveness, whereas Check Point advantages from its hybrid deployment strengths.
Pricing and ROI: Illumio is considered cost-effective, with features like micro-segmentation offering significant security ROI. Users report cost savings and successful implementation of zero trust policies. Check Point Cloud Firewall, while perceived as more expensive, is justified by comprehensive cloud protection features. Pricing flexibility makes it appealing, although ROI is realized over time through enhanced security across multi-cloud environments.
The value lies in maintaining operational integrity with zero downtime or incidents, facilitating secure, ongoing business operations.
Implementing CloudGuard has resulted in an excellent return on investment over one hundred percent ROI.
The unified policy is comprehensive and helps me to create firewall policies that are shared across all our facilities and plants.
I observe extensive return on investment with Illumio.
Illumio serves as a single endpoint technology where I can implement various features, including a zero-trust network, north-to-south and east-to-west configurations, and micro-segmentation, all coming from one platform, which ultimately saves us time and money.
Illumio definitely demonstrates its value in money-saving capabilities, enhancing our lateral environment inside the organization and providing effectiveness overall once integrated.
They usually respond quite fast, and they are very knowledgeable about what they do.
We had an endless loop of emails trying to fix this, and the suggestion was to reinstall the gateway and do it from scratch, which was not an option at that point because it would leave that specific location without access.
Available twenty-four by seven.
Whenever I raise a case with their support team, regardless of the priority level—P1, P2, P3, or P4—they generally reply within an hour
Even if we raise an issue on non-working days like Saturdays or Sundays, we receive prompt responses.
The customer support is very prominent.
It is capable of managing the increased load and performs well as our needs expand.
I can deploy it everywhere I need it.
We have transitioned from 1,000 to 500 users without any issue.
Scaling it to a large level is not an issue for us.
By employing Linux scripting or other methods, I can push the policy to all devices at once, making it easy to scale.
Illumio's scalability is very good; it is quite easy to scale.
I have not observed any downtime.
For instance, when we are working on a release and do an upgrade, we start experiencing unexpected issues.
The solution is stable.
Illumio is a stable solution with no glitches or bugs reported, making it a reliable product for us.
Scalability could be improved as well; needing to purchase a new license each time I want to add a new interface is not ideal.
Better documentation would be welcome.
The user interface could be more intuitive, and the initial setup and configuration can be complex, requiring a technical team.
They need to install an agent in the container world, while Akamai Guardicore does not need to install an agent, so they have native support that Illumio lacks.
There could also be more examples of how the automations can be done using Illumio.
Another improvement might be around scalability, ensuring that as organizations grow, Illumio can handle even larger, more complex environments seamlessly.
The pricing and licensing are expensive, costing between seven thousand to eight thousand dollars.
Check Point is expensive, however, with the features and capabilities, I can justify the cost.
It is the highest in the market.
I know that Illumio is the cheapest solution in the security area.
But when you compare it to firewalls, then it may not be that expensive.
I think it's not very expensive if we compare it with Guardicore.
One of the most valuable features is the automated threat prevention, which helps us detect and block potential cyberattacks in real-time, minimizing data breaches.
Centralized management is the feature I like best, resulting in reduced workload and more continuous policy.
Network Security provides us with unified security management across hybrid and cloud as well as on-prem.
Illumio helps in audit purposes by saving data and showing blocked traffic, ensuring no outside traffic is allowed.
The most important feature is the traffic review analysis, where we use the draft view and the reported view that helps us understand how the application interacts with other applications in the environment, and based on that, we are able to define the policies.
Illumio is a powerful tool for micro-segmentation and zero trust security that provides strong visibility, flexible policy management, and effective threat containment, enhancing an organization's internal security posture.
| Product | Mindshare (%) |
|---|---|
| Illumio | 16.1% |
| Check Point Cloud Firewall (formerly CloudGuard Network Security) | 3.7% |
| Other | 80.2% |


| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 71 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 41 |
| Large Enterprise | 79 |
| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 4 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 1 |
| Large Enterprise | 12 |
Check Point Cloud Firewall delivers advanced threat prevention and administration ease with centralized management of hybrid clouds. It offers seamless cloud platform integration, maintaining consistent security policies and enhancing efficiency.
Check Point Cloud Firewall is designed for comprehensive cloud security, ensuring perimeter protection, traffic inspection, and threat prevention. It is often used for safeguarding workloads and applications in public cloud settings like AWS and Azure. The firewall effectively controls both east-west and north-south traffic and supports hybrid cloud setups. Utilizing features like VPN, IPS, and URL filtering, it secures environments across multiple platforms, helping manage compliance effectively while addressing latency, API integration, and onboarding challenges.
What are the key features?Check Point Cloud Firewall sees frequent use in sectors needing robust perimeter protection, such as finance and healthcare, where compliance is critical. Its capabilities suit businesses utilizing public cloud infrastructures, managing complex hybrid models, or requiring strong VPN services and traffic control.
Illumio enhances security through micro-segmentation and real-time traffic control, offering detailed network visibility and precise application communication management. It supports scalability across environments, improving security posture and reducing lateral movement.
Illumio's features include real-time traffic control, micro-segmentation, and scalable policy management, allowing organizations to establish strict security measures against threats like ransomware. Its visibility map offers granular security insights essential for creating effective policies and auditing traffic. Centralized rule distribution and comprehensive traffic mapping augment security across environments. The platform's design ensures ease of deployment and compatibility, reducing unauthorized access by focusing on threat isolation and breach containment. While Illumio excels in flexibility and visibility, it requires advancements in technical support, third-party integrations, and user-friendly policy management to better support diverse operating systems and larger environments. Improved reporting, analytics, and automation for policy creation are necessary alongside reduced dependency on agents and enhanced data security measures.
What are Illumio's most important features?Illumio is frequently deployed in industries where network segmentation is critical, such as finance and healthcare, offering detailed network visibility and control over application communication. Organizations integrate it seamlessly with existing infrastructures, facilitating the deployment of VENs and effective policy management to secure hybrid cloud and on-premises environments, ensuring compliance and defending against evolving threats.
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