Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Check Point Quantum Force (NGFW) vs Smoothwall Firewall comparison

Sponsored
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 17, 2025

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
Sponsored
Ranking in Firewalls
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
575
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (2nd), Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) (1st), Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (1st), WAN Edge (1st), ZTNA (2nd), Unified Threat Management (UTM) (1st)
Check Point Quantum Force (...
Ranking in Firewalls
5th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
332
Ranking in other categories
Unified Threat Management (UTM) (2nd)
Smoothwall Firewall
Ranking in Firewalls
42nd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
8.3
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 20.4%, up from 19.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Check Point Quantum Force (NGFW) is 2.8%, down from 2.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Smoothwall Firewall is 0.3%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Firewalls Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Fortinet FortiGate20.4%
Check Point Quantum Force (NGFW)2.8%
Smoothwall Firewall0.3%
Other76.5%
Firewalls
 

Featured Reviews

Vasu Gala - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
Hailemichael Yigrem - PeerSpot reviewer
Advanced security features enhance threat detection and prevention
Check Point NGFW provides granular application control and detailed visibility over application and user activity. It integrates with the ThreatCloud ecosystem, enabling real-time threat detection and prevention. The User Identity Awareness blade integrates with Active Directory, identifying user traffic sources. Check Point NGFW is highly scalable and has centralized management through SmartConsole, which manages policies, logs, and threat data. It reduced our incidents and decreased the time to analyze cyber threats by 70 percent.
Himanshu-Sharma - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers good scalability and monitoring features
There is room for improvement in the UI. They can improve it by making it so that everything is in one place, so we don't have to jump around to different pages. For example, if we're creating a rule, we should be able to do everything on the same page. Just a drop-down thing or something. This would improve productivity.

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 used in my company since its management is very comfortable"
"I like that you are able to manage FortiGate from the FortiManager to create a more centralized environment."
"The initial setup is very straightforward and easy, with wizards helping to configure the device efficiently."
"User-friendly and affordable security solution that's recommended for SMB customers. This solution has good technical support."
"The user interface (UI) is very, very good."
"Stateful packet inspection is valuable. It also does SSL packet inspection. It is able to provide a VPN for remote users with secure connectivity."
"The product is user-friendly and not complex."
"It is a reliable solution."
"The different hardware models focus on a wide spectrum of the market, so any company can choose a model that makes sense for them from the range."
"The AI-powered intelligence from Check Point NGFW has helped my organization to detect faster threats and requires less manual intervention."
"By far, it's the best security solution one can adopt for their organization."
"My customers cite performance and ease of configuration as two of the solution's most valuable features."
"What gives me the most value is undoubtedly the security that the anti-bot and anti-virus blades provide."
"The VPN tunnels are very effective in terms of stability and quick connection."
"The most valuable feature of Check Point NGFW is the unparalleled distribution of the network traffic. The central management station they have allows you to manage everything from one place."
"It offers a range of models to enhance network security and it can be customized to secure endpoint client machines or user devices by deploying features like malware detection, antivirus, and mail security blades."
"It was easy to initially deploy it."
 

Cons

"Fortinet should focus on enhancing the capabilities of FortiGate by consolidating its various products, such as FortiGate Cloud, FortiManager, and FortiAnalyzer."
"Fortinet FortiGate can be integrated with different platforms. They have integrations in place, but I can't say they're 100%."
"There are some problems that support cannot give you a logical reason as to why it happened. For example, I had a case where I was dealing with a WhatsApp application that was giving issues. Technical support gave more than one reason it could be giving issues, but none of them solved the problem. Eventually I solved the problem, but it was far from the solutions that support had given."
"In my opinion, Fortinet FortiGate could be improved by making the appliance smaller than what we have here, as it is pretty big."
"The central management for the FortiGate Fortinet Firewall needs improvement. They have the manager to do the essential management for both SD-WAN and for the security policy. They should also improve the SD-WAN function."
"Improvements could be made when companies expand and need better equipment and more licenses."
"They have to just improve its performance when we enable all UTM features. When you enable all the features, the performance of FortiGate, as well as of Sophos and SonicWall, goes down."
"I believe there is room for improvement in machine learning and AI in Fortinet FortiGate. I would like to see more automation regarding AI and machine learning in Fortinet FortiGate."
"Log queries are slow and take time to load."
"It could be easier to access the installation of the Hostfix for VSX solutions. The CLI commands help us understand how virtual firewalls behave in terms of processor, memory, and other aspects. More graphic visualizations of CPUSE commands would be a welcome improvement, and Check Point could expand scripts to run within the solution for multiple tasks."
"In the past year, we faced severe downtime that lasted many days due to a misconfiguration."
"Heavy load causes a higher CPU to peek which causes us to need to reboot the device. Malicious activity database corrupts the directory or path and restoring it takes a lot of time."
"Hopefully, in the future, these will be much more plug-and-play and orchestrated from a single administration console."
"With the increase of volume of traffic, the required resource/hardware to properly run goes up. Therefore, the hardware engineering to architecture flow has to be more efficient."
"Unfortunately, the API is not fully complete and also it is not an API which I would refer to as a RESTful API as there are different endpoints for the same entity."
"Error logs can be more specific."
"There is room for improvement in the UI. They can improve it by making it so that everything is in one place, so we don't have to jump around to different pages."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool is a bit pricey for small businesses, but it is still bearable in terms of cost."
"Its pricing is good. The advantages of Fortinet FortiGate over its competitors include good pricing and meeting our requirements at a lower cost."
"The price is highly competitive when compared to other brands that offer similar functionality."
"When comparing this solution to others, I would rate it a ten out of ten in terms of pricing. However, the issue of requiring a separate license for redundancy is a drawback, and I would rate it a nine out of ten."
"The price of FortiGate is good."
"It's a year based license."
"While slightly more affordable than competitors, it remains relatively expensive due to its inclusive subscription."
"Fortinet FortiGate SWG is an affordable solution."
"It's reasonably priced, but competitors offer much cheaper options."
"I rate the pricing of Check Point NGFW a five on a scale of one to ten, where one is high price, and ten is low price."
"If you use the features then it's cost-effective. Otherwise, it's expensive."
"The pricing is good. It is less than Palo Alto's firewalls. Check Point has the same features as Palo Alto, but the licensing and cost of these firewalls are not too expensive. It is one of the best firewalls in the market in this range."
"Licensing is on a yearly basis and I am happy with the pricing."
"They sell it in one box. In that one box, they sell Antivirus and Threat Prevention. They have everything, so we are not required to purchase additional IPS hardware for it."
"The pricing and licensing are the worst part of Check Point. I usually don't know what I really am buying. When I have to do an inventory of the license, I don't know what it is being used for. Sometimes I feel I am being cheated, and the others times, I feel it is a bargain. Nobody knows! Even the Check Point representatives, they aren't clear on somethings, such as, what is the right license for what I need."
"Pricing is a little high compared to competitive firewalls, but it is easy to go through the licensing steps."
Information not available
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Firewalls solutions are best for your needs.
869,883 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Computer Software Company
20%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Educational Organization
11%
University
11%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business351
Midsize Enterprise130
Large Enterprise187
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business135
Midsize Enterprise97
Large Enterprise195
No data available
 

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...
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...
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 ...
How does Check Point NGFW compare with Fortinet Fortigate?
I have experience on both from Disti and channel experience. Please find below my comments (nothing new as such). -Ch...
Which would you recommend - Azure Firewall or Check Point NGFW?
Azure Firewall is easy to use and provides excellent support. Valuable features include integration into the overall ...
What do you like most about Check Point NGFW?
Check Point NGFW provides essential security, featuring no-obligation access for secure connections, strong intrusion...
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

Also Known As

No data available
Check Point NG Firewall, Check Point Next Generation Firewall
No data available
 

Overview

 

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
Control Southern, Optimal Media
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Fortinet, Netgate, OPNsense and others in Firewalls. Updated: September 2025.
869,883 professionals have used our research since 2012.