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Cisco Duo vs Fortinet FortiToken comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 15, 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

Cisco Duo
Ranking in Authentication Systems
2nd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.9
Number of Reviews
74
Ranking in other categories
Single Sign-On (SSO) (2nd), ZTNA as a Service (6th), Cisco Security Portfolio (3rd), Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) (2nd)
Fortinet FortiToken
Ranking in Authentication Systems
4th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Authentication Systems category, the mindshare of Cisco Duo is 9.6%, down from 11.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortinet FortiToken is 6.2%, down from 7.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Authentication Systems
 

Featured Reviews

Chandan Tripathi - PeerSpot reviewer
Starts quickly with quick deployment but needs more support for older applications
Cisco Duo ( /products/cisco-duo-reviews ) is quick to deploy and easy to start. A valuable feature of the solution is its hybrid structure, which involves proxy agents running on-premises while other services are on the cloud. This setup makes it scalable, as the deployment section is in the cloud, allowing the installation of agents according to needs.
Sachin Vinay - PeerSpot reviewer
Facilitates secure 2FA for admins, facilitates OTP generation, and enhances security
One suggestion is to develop a more user-friendly solution that is cost-effective so that a hardware-based solution can be provided to all users using VPN services or any configuration service requiring confidentiality. This would allow for broader distribution among a larger number of system admins and software engineers, which is currently not feasible with the existing hardware-only approach.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The single pane of glass management is very important and it is part of the reason we went with Duo. Anything we can do to save time for our administrators, help desk staff, and engineers, is valuable to us."
"The feature that my organization started using more recently in Cisco Duo is offline authentication."
"What I most appreciate about Cisco Duo is the ease of use."
"The ease of deploying Cisco Duo Security and onboarding has greatly benefited our customers."
"Cisco Duo has made us more secure. We've managed to stop some threats with it and keep our users and devices safe."
"Another feature is the single pane of glass management. That's important for analytics and also for troubleshooting. It means there's one place that you go to at least start the troubleshooting process."
"The solution is easy to use."
"For me, the biggest return on investment when using Cisco Duo is my time."
"I would rate the overall solution an eight out of ten. The solution is a smart product that anyone can easily access and manage. The solution is a good product for multi-factor authentication and to secure remote authentication in the corporate environment."
"Bangladesh is a price-sensitive market, and FortiToken is popular because it's more affordable than the Palo Alto and Cisco authentication solutions. Fortinet has a local director for Bangladesh, so they can deliver solutions to customers quickly."
"FortiToken is integrated with FortiClient solution for users working from home, providing an additional layer of security by sending OTPs for authentication."
"The solution offers push notifications. When you try to connect to the VPN, FortiToken sends a push notification to our customer's device."
"Fortinet FortiToken is used for double factor authentication."
"Fortinet FortiToken provides security and authenticates that the right external people are working with a company's system."
"The integrated Fortinet security with the app that allows you to easily do the two-factor authentication is most valuable."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its mobile application. It is particularly beneficial as it eliminates the need for hardware management."
 

Cons

"Duo Security should have more customized use cases. For example, if a client needs to have more customization, it would be better to connect directly with Duo's R&D to try to discuss the issues together in order to add customizations."
"Duo Security should better organize its tile feature to organize applications better."
"We use Yubikey for pushing it to the phones. Yubikeys can get expensive because people tend to lose those for some reason. Fifty dollars a device is pretty high."
"An enhancement they might make is if they can log it to Splunk since they're big into Splunk. Instead of me having to go into that portal to look at things when someone is trying to log in and they forgot their password, I can look in and tell them they forgot their password or didn't respond to the prompt."
"There was an issue related to integration with third parties."
"Sometimes, it's a little harder for customers to adopt."
"I'm not a big fan of relicensing products every year or two years, but that's the model at the moment. I prefer to go back to licensing perpetually or permanent licensing."
"Reducing or eliminating the "telephony credits" system used by Duo would be great."
"Fortinet support has some room for improvement. It has taken a long time to resolve some issues or find a workaround."
"We can only use the tool with the FortiToken Mobile app."
"I would rate the scalability a seven out of ten. The migration issue definitely brings it down a bit."
"The Fortinet FortiToken server doesn't have centralized integration with other Fortinet tools and third-party tools."
"Its reporting should be better. The reporting feature is missing. I don't have any reporting of who has done what, what has failed, and what didn't work."
"Support is a pain point in Bangladesh because there aren't many experienced Fortinet engineers in this country. It's easier to find one certified in Cisco, Palo Alto, or Juniper."
"I would like to see complete OAuth support. Also, if they can support it from a SaaS (Software as a Service) or cloud platform, that would be great."
"I would like to see if FortiToken can integrate with Office 365 mail to support the same two-factor authentication experience that I have with ESET. With ESET, when a user logs in, they are easily directed to the ESET authentication page, where they are prompted to enter their OTP after supplying their username and password. I understand from support that FortiToken cannot do this with email integration. That's why I opted for ESET."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Overall, the pricing is fair. Customers can wrap it into their Enterprise Agreement, making it easier for them to solve their issues."
"It's very simple. Its price is fair. We use the hardware tokens as well. You get what you pay for. In terms of licensing, Cisco has very complicated products, but Duo Security was surprisingly easy."
"Duo Security is free."
"The pricing is pretty competitive. It's pretty cheap. Anybody can adopt it."
"The pricing was a lot more than what we were paying for our previous solution."
"Cisco's licensing is always a bit complicated to understand, but the price is fair. It could be more expensive than others, but the way they integrate everything, it has a fair price."
"Price-wise, the solution has been very, very reasonable...Licensing is the last thing I think about Duo Security because it's so easy, and I had no problems with it."
"I rate the product pricing a seven out of ten."
"Fortinet FortiToken is not an expensive solution."
"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a six out of ten."
"The solution’s pricing is moderate and reasonable."
"On a scale of one to ten, where one is the cheapest, and ten is the highest, I rate the pricing an eight."
"It is included as part of our firewall license."
"Although the platform is relatively expensive, it offers significant value. I rate the pricing a nine out of ten."
"The platform's licensing cost is reasonable for our organization."
"I would rate the pricing as an eight out of ten. We purchased the solution at a reasonable price in 2019."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
21%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Government
6%
Computer Software Company
17%
Government
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
University
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How does Duo Security compare with Microsoft Authenticator?
We switched to Duo Security for identity verification. We’d been using a competitor but got the chance to evaluate Duo for 30 days, and we could not be happier. Duo Security is easy to configure a...
What do you like most about Duo Security?
They are users who, as mentioned before, utilize RDPAP and MDPAP. It includes functionalities related to finance, specifically in single sign-on.
What do you like most about Fortinet FortiToken?
The solution is simple and similar to Google Authenticator. It follows time-based authentication. We use it for hardware and software in one environment. The tool offers simple and fast authenticat...
What is your primary use case for Fortinet FortiToken?
I am using FortiToken for logging into the Fortinet hardware. I have four FortiGate hardware units. I am connected through a simulator on FortiToken.
 

Also Known As

Duo Security
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Duo vs. Fortinet FortiToken and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
856,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.