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Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) vs Ivanti NAC 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)
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
145
Ranking in other categories
Cisco Security Portfolio (4th)
Ivanti NAC
Ranking in Network Access Control (NAC)
14th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Network Access Control (NAC) category, the mindshare of Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) is 21.7%, down from 27.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Ivanti NAC is 2.3%, up from 1.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Access Control (NAC) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE)21.7%
Ivanti NAC2.3%
Other76.0%
Network Access Control (NAC)
 

Featured Reviews

NF
Network and Technology Information Manager at Akkodis
Has improved authentication management and simplified visitor network access
The log capacity in Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) could be enhanced because today natively on the ISE can only have a look at the logs from the day before. You cannot search into the oldest logs; you have to use another tool for that. This can be blocking if you don't have any log consolidation solution. To do a search for an issue or something that happened two days ago, you cannot search directly in there. The capacity of Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) could be enhanced. Something between one week and one month for the log capacity would be nice.
Le Ban - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Security Manager & Chief IT Engineer at JVPC
Affordable product with an easy initial setup process
Ivanti NAC's most valuable feature is reasonable pricing The product's performance needs improvement. We are doing the PoC of Ivanti NAC. I rate the platform's stability an eight out of ten. I rate Ivanti NAC's scalability an eight out of ten. We have 150 users for it. I contacted the…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"From a configuration point of view, it's simple."
"Authentication is the most valuable feature because it puts our company at another level of security."
"The interface is pretty easy to use."
"The interconnection with the ecosystem and the ability to force rules all over the network are the most important features."
"The way the ISE works is you can get into defining. Let's say, in my case, I've got a Windows laptop and I've got an Apple product and those have unique identifiers, unique back addresses. It would say that this in my profile so I could get to those apps with either device, 24/seven. That's how granular the ISE or these NAC Solutions can get."
"The most valuable feature is the ASDM - the user interface makes it very easy to configure the firewall."
"The ability to integrate our Cisco AnyConnect connections to the active directory has been great."
"I like the automation of the collection of information."
"Ivanti NAC's most valuable feature is reasonable pricing."
"The profiler option allows me to see every detail in a systematic manner from a switch. I can choose the switch and I can see the port NAC address and time."
"Integration with other vendors is possible."
 

Cons

"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."
"Support and integration for the active devices needs to be worked on. Their features mainly work well with Mac devices. If we use an HP the Mac functionalities may no longer be able to deliver."
"I'm working from China currently and the only real issue is that, within the country, there's some concern around Cisco and its ability to offer the solution for the long term. As the United States has banned the Huawei version in their country, we feel there may be retaliation in ours and Cisco will get banned as a countermeasure from the government. The future of Cisco in China is in question. Our local partners are worried about the situation."
"Some of ISE's features need to be more agile. For example, we couldn't integrate our data because Cisco needs your data to be in its own format."
"The licensing scheme is complex and could use enhancement to provide more options."
"The interface could be more user-friendly and the ability to apply rules to MAC addresses, for example, if I wanted to allow a certain MAC address access at a particular time I cannot make this adjustment."
"The licensing scheme is complex and could use enhancement to provide more options."
"The user interface can be improved."
"The documentation needs to be improved. There are a lot of details that are missed which makes it confusing."
"The product's performance needs improvement."
"At some point, the server got cached and we faced several issues that impacted our customers. We would like to have this resolved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is good. The last time we purchased four new appliances the price was doable for any organization of our size."
"It is fairly expensive and that's part of why we have implemented it in the type of 'hack' that we did, to service multiple clients."
"Pricing and licensing are not my expertise. As far as budgeting is concerned, we run an ELA with Cisco. It's a part of our ELA."
"It's an expensive solution when compared to other vendors."
"Hardware appliances are expensive...Now moving to DNA-styled licensing, we have subscription-based licensing for everything. I hope it will continue to be fair, but we will have to wait and see."
"It's damn expensive and the licensing is terrible... If you have perpetual licenses on 2.7 and you upgrade to 3, you are forced to go with Essentials. That is one of the issues that I'm seeing with my clients now."
"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."
"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 product is cost-effective."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Retailer
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business44
Midsize Enterprise32
Large Enterprise91
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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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...
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Also Known As

Cisco ISE
Pulse Policy Secure
 

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
Entegrus
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) vs. Ivanti NAC and other solutions. Updated: February 2026.
881,757 professionals have used our research since 2012.