Cisco IOS Security vs Menlo Secure comparison

Cisco and Menlo Security are both solutions in the Firewalls category. Cisco is ranked #41 with an average rating of 8.0, while Menlo Security is ranked #52. Cisco holds a 0.6% mindshare in Firewalls, compared to Menlo Security’s 0.4% mindshare. Additionally, 91% of Cisco users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Menlo Security users who would recommend it.

Cisco IOS Security

Read 49 Cisco IOS Security reviews

3,637 Views
2,073 Comparison Views

91% willing to recommend

Menlo Secure

Read 5 Menlo Secure reviews

3,322 Views
864 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Cisco IOS Security

Menlo Secure

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 16, 2024

Cisco IOS Security and Menlo Secure compete in the cybersecurity platform category. User satisfaction with Cisco IOS Security is higher for overall security features, while Menlo Secure is preferred for threat isolation.

Features: Cisco IOS Security is known for comprehensive security protocols, robust network protection, and integration capabilities, ensuring reliability and coverage. Menlo Secure excels in advanced threat isolation, seamless browsing experience, and strategies to minimize direct threat exposure through isolation techniques.

Room for Improvement: Cisco IOS Security users highlight the complexity of configurations, performance lags under heavy traffic, and a need for more intuitive setup processes. Menlo Secure users suggest improvements in support documentation, occasional issues with integrating third-party applications, and some challenges in deployment.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Cisco IOS Security has a steeper learning curve for deployment with users needing more intuitive setup and better customer service. Menlo Secure offers easier deployment, faster setup times, and more responsive customer support.

Pricing and ROI: Cisco IOS Security requires higher initial investment, justified by its robust feature set and long-term reliability, offering good ROI. Menlo Secure, while costly, is cost-effective due to enhanced threat isolation, reducing potential cyber attack costs, with upfront costs seen as more balanced with isolation benefits.

To learn more, read our detailed Cisco IOS Security vs. Menlo Secure Report (Updated: August 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Cisco IOS Security vs. Menlo Secure

August 2026

Download the complete report

Helped 909,725 peers since 2012

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 IOS Security

Ranking in Firewalls

41st

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) (16th)

Menlo Secure

Ranking in Firewalls

52nd

Average Rating

9.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (25th), ZTNA (26th), Cloud Security Remediation (9th)

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Cisco IOS Security is 0.6%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Menlo Secure is 0.4%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Firewalls Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Cisco IOS Security	0.6%
Menlo Secure	0.4%
Other	99.0%

Firewalls

Featured Reviews

Danijel Cerovecki

Head of Cyber Defense Department and Network Technologies Department at Verso Altima

Have faced challenges in keeping licensing clear and consistent while ensuring reliable network protection

We are a Gold Partner with Cisco. Our customers come from various industries, including service providers, and we target service providers and enterprise customers.We do not extensively use Zone-Based Firewalls in Cisco IOS Security, instead typically deploying standalone firewalls such as Cisco FTDs or Cisco ASA devices. For threat analytics and vulnerability scanning, we utilize third-party vendors with dedicated devices and software. We use products such as Tenable from Nessus for this type of analysis. We have implemented Secure Access Control Server in Cisco IOS Security, which combines multiple security mechanisms including AAA, 802.1X for network access control with Cisco ICE, TrustSec for identity-based segmentation, and Cisco DNA Center. Cisco IOS Security's VPN support is comprehensive and increasingly important in daily communication, from basic site-to-site tunnels to remote access VPNs and SD-WAN secure VPNs. Protecting and encrypting communication is essential in modern networks. The challenges with Cisco IOS Security are more operational than product-related. There is an understaffing issue, making automation and orchestration capabilities particularly valuable. For the products themselves, we only encounter routine operational matters such as addressing new vulnerabilities and patching. For those considering Cisco IOS Security, it is important to understand that Cisco offers a complete ecosystem. When embracing the Cisco ecosystem fully, customers receive excellent products and comprehensive solutions. On a scale of 1-10, I rate Cisco IOS Security a 9.

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reviewer2701794

Head Of Bluechip Enterprise at a manufacturing company with 51-200 employees

Provides strong protection and multiple use cases but struggles with market recognition

There aren't specific areas for improvement; however, they're not as well known as the big vendors such as Palo Alto. Menlo Secure is a smaller company with limited resources and funding, which makes it challenging to compete with larger companies such as Palo and Cisco. What can be improved is market awareness and adoption of the technology. When selling it in the channel, regardless of how good the technology might be, success depends more on market adoption and awareness.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I'm able to transfer data over internet network security. With the GRE I'm able to transfer data within one bunch to another bunch in a public way, like the internet. The communication is encrypted and is private. It gives me added privacy."

"This has improved the way our organization operates very well."

"You can forget about it, it's going to work unless the hardware fails."

"We use the product for firewalls."

"The solution effectively integrates with Umbrella."

"We use Cisco IOS Security mostly for routers to route off the firewall. It's a next-generation device."

"The stability of this solution is excellent."

"In terms of advice, I would suggest others should use it; it is quite a good product, it is one of the market leaders."

More Cisco IOS Security pros

"The fact that it is a cloud proxy solution is another feature we like. For example, if you acquire a new company, you can use it to protect that new company without the need to install anything physically on their networks."

"For us, the primary goal is protection on the web, and that's extremely important. We're not using any of the other services at this time. The web part is key to the success of the organization. It gives us the ability to protect. It can isolate. It opens the session in an isolated format so that the code isn't running locally. It is running over in the Menlo environment, not in ours. It is not running on the local computer, whereas if you were to go to a normal website, it would run Java or something else on the local machine and potentially execute the malicious code locally. So, it does give us that level of protection."

"Either you have access to something or don't have access to it, and if you do, we can ensure, 100 percent of the time, that there is nothing malicious that is going to impact our system in any way."

"This security technology addresses risk and enables people to conduct business without that risk, which is where the ROI is realized."

"We are not aware of a single compromise from the web since implementing the solution."

"The solution is invisible to our end users, so it doesn't have any impact on their work or performance."

"We have definitely seen ROI, as we save a ton of money and time because the numerous hits that we were receiving from our security tools prior to implementing them had to all be chased down, dispositioned, and endpoints had to be reimaged."

"It has reduced security events to follow up on. While it is not 100%, there has been probably a 90% or more reduction. We were getting hit left, right, and center constantly from people browsing the Internet and hitting bad websites. It was not just bad websites that were stood up to be malicious, but good sites that were compromised."

More Menlo Secure pros

Cons

"We cannot directly upgrade the system. The tool's deployment is also very difficult in legacy environments. The tool needs to have bigger ports as well."

"I wish it would be more like the next generation firewall technology. There should be more selection between the application and filtering."

"The whole process can be complex."

"As it is a tailored solution, it is not very scalable, but this is a trade off; you need a hammer or a scalpel."

"Cisco IOS Security should improve its functionalities."

"Their support was very bad. We have a very bad experience on the support."

"It is stable but is missing functionalities."

"An area for improvement in Cisco IOS Security is the performance because it's not as stable sometimes. There's also some latency in the solution, which could be improved. Cisco IOS Security integrates with other solutions, but you'll encounter many errors after integration, so this is another area for improvement. I'd like to see enhanced performance and a simplified setup in the next version of Cisco IOS Security."

More Cisco IOS Security cons

"Currently, I don't have a good way to see which of my rules are being used in the access control lists."

"We are now transitioning to another solution. The main reason for that is that managing all of the exceptions and troubleshooting all of the issues our users have had connecting to the internet has become too significant in terms of workload, compared to what we hope we will have with another solution."

"The user monitoring could still be improved."

"In the best of all worlds, we wouldn't have to make any exceptions. However, that is a big ask because a lot of that depends on how websites are constructed. For example, there are some very complex, application-oriented sites that we end up making exceptions for. It is really not that big an issue for us to make the exceptions. We feel like we are doing that without a huge impact on our security posture, but we do have to make some exceptions for complex sites, e.g., mostly SaaS-type sites and applications."

"Currently, I don't have a good way to see which of my rules are being used in the access control lists. I have numerous entries, but are they all still needed? A report that would show me my list of who is allowed and whether we're actually using it would be useful because I can then go clean up my list. It would be easier to manage. We would eliminate the vulnerability of unused services."

"Menlo Secure is a smaller company with limited resources and funding, which makes it challenging to compete with larger companies such as Palo and Cisco."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is necessary to pay for a license in order to use the solution. It is on a yearly basis and the price is high."

"The pricing is average and includes all features with support."

"The licenses for this solution are expensive."

"They have smart licenses that can be provided for one year, two years, three years, five years, and seven years. Alternatively, they have perpetual licenses available."

"Cisco IOS Security price could be reduced, it is more expensive than many of the other solutions, such as Sophos and Fortinet FortiGate."

"The licensing is on a subscription basis, and it is fairly costly. I would prefer a one-time payment."

"The pricing is okay. It is competitive. It costs more when you need get more features."

"Price is certainly something that the IOS technology has fallen behind the competition on."

More Cisco IOS Security pricing and cost advice

"We save a ton of money and time. Previously, the numerous hits that we were receiving from our security tools, prior to implementing them, had to all be chased down, dispositioned, and endpoints had to be reimaged. It was just a ton of effort to do all that. That is where the savings from time and money come in."

"The solution is expensive. It's more expensive than the solution I previously used. Compared with the other cloud-based solutions, it's very competitive."

"It is appropriately priced for what they're doing for us. Considering the protection provided, I feel their pricing is spot-on."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Construction Company

19%

Outsourcing Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

13%

Construction Company

12%

Retailer

Financial Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	20
Midsize Enterprise	14
Large Enterprise	18

No data available

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco IOS Security?

The cost of Cisco IOS Security for customers is on the higher end of pricing compared to the competition, depending on the targeted customers.This can be a major issue as enterprise customers are o...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Cisco IOS Security?

Regarding improvements in Cisco IOS Security, what consistently confuses me is the inability of Cisco to maintain a clear licensing policy.This is an issue that I have observed for years now. Cisco...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Cisco IOS Security?

The main use cases for Cisco IOS Security include elementary device hardening, access control, control-plane policing, AAA (Authentication, Authorization, and Accounting), network security, Layer 2...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Menlo Security Secure Web Gateway?

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Menlo Security Secure Web Gateway?

People are mainly using it for zero trust web access. Menlo Secure is built from the ground up to provide zero basic access, and by doing it that way, it has multiple use cases. For example, it man...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Menlo Security Secure Web Gateway?

Secure file sharing and data protection is not exactly what Menlo Secure is designed to do. While it can handle some of these functions, people typically choose another technology for those specifi...

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 10% of the time

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Compared 6% of the time

OPNsense vs Cisco IOS Security

Compared 6% of the time

Cato SASE Cloud Platform vs Cisco IOS Security

Compared 5% of the time

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Prisma Access Browser vs Menlo Secure

Compared 16% of the time

Check Point Harmony SASE (formerly Perimeter 81) vs Menlo Secure

Compared 14% of the time

Netskope Next Gen Secure Web Gateway vs Menlo Secure

Compared 11% of the time

Cloudflare One vs Menlo Secure

Compared 10% of the time

Fortinet FortiGate vs Menlo Secure

Compared 6% of the time

More Menlo Secure Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cisco IOS Security

August 2026

Download Cisco IOS Security product report

Buyer's Guide

Menlo Secure

August 2026

Download Menlo Secure product report

Also Known As

IOS Security

Menlo Security Web Security, Menlo Web Security

Overview

Cisco IOS Security integrates advanced VPN capabilities, IPsec security, and firewall features, ensuring scalable and reliable protection suitable for enterprise networks.

Cisco IOS Security offers comprehensive firewall integration, robust AAA capabilities, and encryption, empowering organizations with a reliable network environment. EEM provides flexibility and programmability, while integrated threat detection, intrusion prevention, and centralized management enhance its security profile. Despite its reliability, challenges include complexity in configuration, high pricing, and confusing licensing policies. Performance issues and the need for enhanced integration, automation, and better monitoring tools are areas for improvement.

What are the key features of Cisco IOS Security?

VPN Capabilities: Ensures secure remote connectivity.
IPsec Security: Offers robust encryption for data protection.
Firewall Integration: Enhances network defense with built-in firewalls.
AAA Capabilities: Provides secure authentication, authorization, and accounting.
Threat Detection: Identifies and mitigates threats proactively.

What benefits should organizations look for in reviews?

Reliability: Recognized for its stable network performance.
Scalability: Supports growing network demands seamlessly.
Comprehensive Security: Offers robust protection against diverse cyber threats.
Ease of Configuration: Facilitates efficient network setup and management.

Industries leverage Cisco IOS Security to protect against zero-day attacks, deploy secure VPNs, and facilitate network access control and compliance checks. Organizations utilize its features for firewalls, routing, and switching, integrating technologies like Cisco ICE and TrustSec to enhance security across enterprise environments.

Cisco

Menlo Security Secure Application Access

Menlo Security Secure Application Access makes zero trust access easy, giving users secure connectivity to private applications, including web and legacy applications. At the core of Secure Application Access is the Menlo Secure Cloud Browser, which fetches, secures and delivers the content for users.

In addition to providing simple-to-deploy, clientless ZTA, Secure Application Access and the Menlo Secure Cloud Browser protect applications from attacks such as session hijacking, cookie manipulation, and other tactics that employ protocol manipulation.

Secure Application Access protects applications from Internet threats and provides granular controls for added protection of the application and associated data. These security controls include Read-only/Read-write, Upload/download, Copy/paste, AV scanning, Sandboxing, and Data Loss Prevention.

Last Mile Data Protection

Menlo Last-Mile Data Protection identifies and prevents sensitive data from leaving your company by meticulously inspecting all file uploads and user input across browsing sessions. Leveraging the Secure Cloud Browser, users are protected from the internet and you can protect your organization from data loss with comprehensive traffic monitoring and controls. This approach addresses the growing concerns surrounding data leakage in the age of AI tools like ChatGPT.

By identifying sensitive data through file types, regular expressions, or predefined libraries, Menlo Last-Mile Data Protection empowers security teams to regulate data input into AI platforms and prevent unauthorized uploads. This capability provides crucial protection for intellectual property, PII, and other confidential information.

The solution leverages the Menlo Cloud Security Platform's visibility and control over traffic to reliably detect and prevent data leaks originating from both browser submission forms and non-browser traffic. With the ability to inspect encrypted web traffic, Menlo Last-Mile Data Protection enforces DLP policies consistently across all users and devices, ensuring comprehensive data protection.

Menlo Security

Sample Customers

Arup Group, Brunel University London, City of Biel, Gobierno de Castilla-La Mancha, K&L Gates , New South Wales Rural Fire Service, Offshore Northern Seas, Transplace

Information Not Available

Buyer's Guide

Cisco IOS Security vs. Menlo Secure

August 2026

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Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco IOS Security vs. Menlo Secure and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.

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