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Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) vs Ruckus Cloudpath comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 2024

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 Identity Services Eng...
Ranking in Network Access Control (NAC)
1st
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
142
Ranking in other categories
Cisco Security Portfolio (1st)
Ruckus Cloudpath
Ranking in Network Access Control (NAC)
11th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Network Access Control (NAC) category, the mindshare of Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) is 25.8%, down from 31.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Ruckus Cloudpath is 2.1%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Access Control (NAC)
 

Featured Reviews

SunilkumarNaganuri - PeerSpot reviewer
Enhanced device administration hindered by complex deployment and security limitations
Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) needs to improve the profiling preauthentication. They are very poor in asset classification and should focus on improving the preauthentication profiling, especially for NAC use cases. This will give them a roadmap for software-defined access (SDA) use cases and network segmentation. Threat detection capabilities are very weak. Additionally, the product is vulnerable and has many bugs.
Xander Janse Van Rensburg - PeerSpot reviewer
Helps to onboard corporate users based on certificate-based authentication
The tool's most valuable features include the phenomenal functionality of DPSK. The ease of use, particularly when it is correctly set up, is remarkably simple. Tracking users is straightforward and dynamic. This allows us to identify where a user might encounter issues within the process. Its most valuable feature is CA certification. You cannot get access without this. The tool's device policy enforcement feature has had a positive impact on customer network security. Customers are now more at ease, knowing that their employees connect to a secure network, and unauthorized individuals cannot easily access the corporate network. Overall, it has positively influenced their security measures. The user experience when connecting to networks via Ruckus Cloudpath is seamless. I would highly recommend it to anyone in need of an onboarding system for multiple users. Whether you want to move away from the standard connection, Active Directory, or even free keys, it is a reliable choice. Additionally, the product's licensing is user-based, not device-based. This means that regardless of the number of devices, the licensing is per-user.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The live logs and live sessions for troubleshooting are the most valuable features because they provide a detailed report of any issues."
"SGTs are valuable because they make it easy to enforce policies, instead of pushing them across all the other platforms."
"The solution offers automation and real-time visibility, which aids in monitoring and troubleshooting issues with endpoints."
"It's easy to change and add policies."
"Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) is very stable."
"It has allowed us to pull in multiple authentication databases, then centralize them into a captive portal system."
"Our clients like Cisco ISE because they already use various Cisco solutions. It's easy for them to use this solution because they have an engineer with Cisco certifications."
"The most valuable features are the ability to retrieve information about Active Directory user names, viewing the log files to see which MAC address tried to connect with the created SSIDs, portal designing for your company, hotspot tools, and creating network rules for WiFi access."
"I find the solution to be very rich in features."
"Ruckus Cloudpath is very stable."
"The most valuable features of Ruckus Cloudpath include its long-range capabilities, smooth and uninterrupted service, and reliability."
"The tool's most valuable features include the phenomenal functionality of DPSK. The ease of use, particularly when it is correctly set up, is remarkably simple. Tracking users is straightforward and dynamic. This allows us to identify where a user might encounter issues within the process."
"Ruckus technical support is very good and helpful whenever we need them."
"I have found it easy to use with no significant issues once the small initial problems were resolved."
"The solution is easy to use, well designed, robust, and has good traffic capacity."
"The solution has good features for authentication, policies, and allowing users to self-provision devices for network access via their logins."
 

Cons

"I would rate this solution a 7.5 out of ten. To make it a ten they should have more people on tech support. They need to invest more in the product. It's a good product. They should just work on tech support. More support for the customer. It's not that easy to get somebody to understand this product. I have had some issues with tech before for the solution. One of them brought the solution down due to some of his activity. They need to hugely invest in their tech support."
"I would like to see integration with other vendors, and the RADIUS integration needs to be improved a little bit."
"This product doesn't work in isolation."
"I don't see as many customers as I should adopting the onboarding feature. I think Cisco should make that process a lot easier and less intrusive on the end users' devices."
"It is a good product, but in order to use all of the functions of the product, you must have a good understanding of the product. You must know how to use and manage it. It is a little bit complicated to configure and manage. It must be simplified to make it easy to manage for end users. In the initial stage, we found ISE complicated for end users. It was not easy to manage it or to write authentication and authorization protocol. They must improve its management and make it easy for end users. The monitoring and reporting capabilities can be improved because end users want to quickly see what is happening in their network. There were some restrictions in working with other vendors. It should also have a better and easy integration with other vendors."
"Cisco ISE could be simplified somewhat. I would also prefer certificate-based authentication over confirmation-based authentication for all the processes. It's possible for us to do a workaround, but the process needs to be simplified."
"Cisco ISE integration with Cisco ACI is something that can be done in a less complex way. And the simplification in that area may help us do better."
"An issue with the product is it tends to have a lot of bugs whenever they release a new release."
"There is room for improvement in deployment. I would like to see more effort put into troubleshooting."
"I believe the solution is missing some great features which are present in other solutions like Aruba, UiPath, and Cisco ISE."
"The scalability could be better."
"Ruckus Cloudpath needs more API features and enhanced automation capabilities."
"The solution could improve by adding more detailed information that customers have available on the dashboards."
"The tool needs to support multi-vendor environments. Currently, my experience with it has been primarily within Ruckus environments. However, I haven't explored it for multi-vendor scenarios. It would be great to see newer builds that are multi-vendor capable of full integration."
"The hardest part we've had to deal with is trying to find some physical product recently as everything is going like hotcakes."
"The setup had a few initial small problems, however, everything was resolved and it is very good now."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"According to my sales and account team, the prices we're getting are pretty good."
"Cisco ISE's licensing can get pricey."
"In general, licensing can be quite complex with Cisco products. It would be nice if it was a bit more intuitive and had fewer "gotchas" in there."
"The licensing is subscription-based and based on the user account."
"The price is okay."
"Being fully honest, the Cisco licensing model right now is really confusing. We don't know what licenses we have where. We have Smart licensing, but the different levels are way confusing."
"We are running Version 2.9 because Version 2.9 of the ISE has a persistent license — it's a one-time payment. The latest version (3.1) is only available if you do a yearly subscription."
"I get very good pricing from Cisco, so I don't have a problem with that. I also don't have a problem with licensing because we get enterprise or global licensing."
"The pricing is a little bit high."
"I would rate the tool's pricing as a seven on a scale of one to ten. Compared to others, it's not overly expensive, but it does come with a cost. Since it's a licensed-based product, it can become expensive, especially if there is a need for additional licenses."
"The licensing of the solution is user-based and the price is good."
"The cost was somewhere around $700 for the access points, however, there was a discount."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
24%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Government
7%
Comms Service Provider
16%
Computer Software Company
12%
Construction Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Which is better - Aruba Clearpass or Cisco ISE?
Aruba ClearPass is a Network Access Control tool that gives secure network access to multiple device types. You can adapt the policies to VPN access, wired, or wireless access. You can securely ...
What are the main differences between Cisco ISE and Forescout Platform?
OK, so Cisco ISE uses 802.1X to secure switchports against unauthorized access. The drawback of this is that ISE cannot secure the port if a device does not support 802.1x. Cameras, badge readers, ...
How does Cisco ISE compare with Fortinet FortiNAC?
Cisco ISE uses AI endpoint analytics to identify new devices based on their behavior. It will also notify you if someone plugs in with a device that is not allowed and will block it. The user exper...
What do you like most about Ruckus Cloudpath?
The tool's most valuable features include the phenomenal functionality of DPSK. The ease of use, particularly when it is correctly set up, is remarkably simple. Tracking users is straightforward an...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Ruckus Cloudpath?
The pricing of Ruckus Cloudpath is on the expensive side. I would rate the pricing as an eight out of ten, with ten being very expensive.
What needs improvement with Ruckus Cloudpath?
Ruckus Cloudpath needs more API features and enhanced automation capabilities. I would like to improve the automation aspect, ensuring that if any issues arise or alerts are detected, the cloud pla...
 

Also Known As

Cisco ISE
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Aegean Motorway, BC Hydro, Beachbody, Bucks County Intermediate Unit , Cisco IT, Derby City Council, Global Banking Customer, Gobierno de Castilla-La Mancha, Houston Methodist, Linz AG, London Hydro, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Molina Healthcare, MST Systems, New South Wales Rural Fire Service, Reykjavik University, Wildau University
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Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) vs. Ruckus Cloudpath and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
849,686 professionals have used our research since 2012.