Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi comparison

Cisco and WatchGuard are both solutions in the Wireless LAN category. Cisco is ranked #4 with an average rating of 8.2, while WatchGuard is ranked #24 with an average rating of 7.0. Cisco holds a 11.5% mindshare in Wireless LAN, compared to WatchGuard’s 0.5% mindshare. Additionally, 92% of Cisco users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 83% of WatchGuard users who would recommend it.

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Read 120 Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN reviews

11,730 Views
10,440 Comparison Views

92% willing to recommend

WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi

Read 7 WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi reviews

466 Views
457 Comparison Views

83% willing to recommend

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 21, 2025

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN and WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi compete in the wireless networking market. Cisco Meraki seems to have the upper hand in user satisfaction and comprehensive management capabilities, while WatchGuard stands out for its robust security features.

Features: Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN offers centralized cloud-based management, seamless integration with other Cisco products, and detailed analytics capabilities. WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi provides robust security features, secure VPN support, and intrusion prevention.

Room for Improvement: Cisco Meraki can improve in customization capabilities, the depth of security features, and advanced troubleshooting options. WatchGuard could enhance its ease of deployment, integration with third-party solutions, and user interface experience.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Cisco Meraki is noted for its streamlined deployment and intuitive management tools. Customer service support effectively assists with installation and troubleshooting. WatchGuard requires a more intricate setup due to its comprehensive security configurations, though it does feature good customer service.

Pricing and ROI: Cisco Meraki's higher initial investment is offset by quicker ROI through efficient deployment and management. Its subscription costs provide competitive long-term benefits. WatchGuard's lower initial setup cost attracts budget-conscious buyers, yet its comprehensive security may necessitate additional investments.

To learn more, read our detailed Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi Report (Updated: September 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi

September 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 871,358 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 Meraki Wireless LAN

Ranking in Wireless LAN

4th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

4.3

Number of Reviews

120

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi

Ranking in Wireless LAN

24th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Wireless LAN category, the mindshare of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is 11.5%, down from 12.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi is 0.5%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Wireless LAN Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN	11.5%
WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi	0.5%
Other	88.0%

Wireless LAN

Featured Reviews

RezaPradipta

Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk

Streamline network management with a unified dashboard for seamless device integration

The primary use case for Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is mostly for enterprise wireless, including guest Wi-Fi and enterprise Wi-Fi. I use it across various industries with a focus on retail Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN offers a single pane of glass management. It only comes with a controller on the…

Read full review

WarrenWilliams

Senior Account Manager at Bralin Technology Solutions

A solution that offers excellent support and makes it easy to manage networks

To utilize the solution properly, you need some training and guidance on that. Getting it working is easy, but if you're going to use it with feature sets that make WatchGuard worthwhile to use, it's probably not the easiest to set up. I'd rate the initial setup a seven out of ten. The time taken to deploy the solution depends on the project scope you're doing. Do you need ten WiFi access points or one? You could deploy the solution in an hour. We need one person to deploy the solution. But the number of people required for deployment depends on where the access points are deployed. Like, if it's the ceiling or whatever. The way we do it, we usually have an on-site technician who sets up the backend. We usually have two people when deploying the solution, but you can do it with one person. We have a team that manages the solution. But if you have ten people on a site to manage the solution, 15 minutes daily is enough.

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

"The cloud manageability feature is valuable."

"The solution is fast."

"The network security the solution provides is its most valuable aspect."

"The solution provides good coverage and identity management. Additionally, the user interface is straightforward."

"It's simple to manage when there's a problem."

"The most valuable features are the multiple types of user groupings and access management."

"The most valuable aspect of this solution is the single pane of glass management and reliability."

"Cisco Meraki is HIPAA compliant."

More Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN pros

"They're very easy to set up and get running."

"Cloud analytics that provide all its attributes."

"It makes it easy to obtain all information about the client experience."

"The configuration part of WatchGuard is very flexible."

"We like that WatchGuard works and integrates directly with the firewalls we use."

"The solution has been stable."

"The Wi-Fi security features of this solution have been great for our customers who need to strictly control access to their network."

Cons

"Initially, I liked some of the filtering features, but that's one of the components that we ran into problems with."

"Overall the solution needs to have more time to mature."

"The way Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN groups certain things, as far as the devices for either monitoring and or configuring them should be done better. They should be grouped a little bit differently because if I want to configure something, a different setting on an SSID, I have to go to their specific area where I would have thought it should be clumped as a dropdown menu in another area."

"There needs to be some work done on security because, with time, some viruses may emerge that one may not know about."

"The solution should be more secure."

"The error logs need to be much more comprehensive."

"Documentation could be improved, but everything else has been spot-on."

"The customization needs to be improved because it's pretty locked down."

More Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN cons

"One of the things is if you buy it with a certain subscription, you can't easily change the subscription level."

"I don't think they're available at the best price."

"The support response can be time-consuming because sometimes issues are very sensitive and require instant attention."

"The price of this solution needs to reviewed, as it is currently high enough to deter customers from trying it."

"The solution can be scaled but it has limitations from my experience."

"If a client device had issues with authentication due to out of date browser or similar difficulties, it would be nice to have the ability to migrate the client onto the portal via one click."

"Inability to import a user with one click."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"If you are wondering if Meraki can work for you, contact one of their representatives because they will do onsite trials where you can set up their system. If it does not work, you can send it back to them for no charge."

"Meraki is a very good solution, but the price is quite high for small markets."

"Since it's been acquired by Cisco, it's an even higher cost."

"The price of the product could be cheaper."

"Pricing could be better."

"The product is expensive. I rate the pricing a nine out of ten."

"It is expensive."

"The solution's pricing is a little higher."

More Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN pricing and cost advice

"WatchGuard is on the upper scale for pricing."

"Your licensing and cost, as would be required for many other solutions, being considered for eighty to two hundred and eighty different physical locations, is just about the same amount per access point."

"The solution is priced high compared to competitors. However, for the features that are included in the solution, the price becomes more reasonable."

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Wireless LAN solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

871,358 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

16%

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Educational Organization

Computer Software Company

13%

Comms Service Provider

11%

Retailer

Non Profit

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	69
Midsize Enterprise	26
Large Enterprise	31

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	5
Midsize Enterprise	2

Questions from the Community

What are pros and cons of Aruba 515 Series AP vs. Cisco Meraki or Extreme Networks?

Depends. I have personally used both Cisco and Aruba so I am familiar with them. Extreme I am not, so unless they have some feature that I need or want, I wouldn't consider them. Do you have expe...

See all answers

Which is better - Cisco Wireless or Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN?

Cisco Wireless is very robust, very rugged, and can handle indoor and outdoor coverage extremely well. We found it to be very reliable and to consistently run very efficiently. Cisco Wireless helpe...

See all answers

How does Ruckus Wireless compare to Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN?

Cisco’s Meraki Virtual MX is a virtual instance of the Meraki SD-WAN appliance. We liked the Meraki. The Wifi APs are a great feature. The dashboard is a simple interface and easy to learn. It feat...

See all answers

What needs improvement with WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi?

The support response can be time-consuming because sometimes issues are very sensitive and require instant attention. Also, when an incident occurs, the impact can be significantly huge. A recent p...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi?

We use WatchGuard Secure Wi-Fi because we have used different tools as well, like Ubiquiti. The complexity of Ubiquiti is much more compared to WatchGuard, which provides more flexibility and is ea...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi?

We recommend using WatchGuard Secure Wi-Fi, but when incidents occur, it can be very difficult to identify why they happen. Normally, the issues are simple to fix, but we recently faced a major inc...

See all answers

Comparisons

Aruba Wireless vs Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Compared 30% of the time

Juniper Mist Wireless Access Points vs Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Compared 12% of the time

Ruckus Wireless vs Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Compared 11% of the time

Fortinet FortiAP vs Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Compared 6% of the time

Ubiquiti Wireless vs Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

Compared 5% of the time

More Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN Competitors

Ubiquiti WLAN vs WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi

Compared 36% of the time

Aruba Wireless vs WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi

Compared 22% of the time

Ruckus Wireless vs WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi

Compared 22% of the time

Fortinet FortiWLM vs WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi

Compared 20% of the time

More WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN

October 2025

Download Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN product report

Buyer's Guide

WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi

September 2025

Download WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi product report

Also Known As

MR18, MR26, MR32, MR34, MR66, MR72, Meraki Wireless LAN, Meraki WLAN

No data available

Overview

Cisco Meraki access points are built from the highest grade components and carefully optimized for a seamless user experience. The outcome: faster connections, greater user capacity, more coverage, and fewer support calls. The Cisco Meraki dashboard gives visibility into the network users, their devices, and their applications. Armed with rich analytics, administrators can quickly create access control and application usage policies, optimizing both the end-user experience and network security.

Cisco

WatchGuard is a global leader in network security, secure Wi-Fi, and network intelligence products and services for SMBs and Distributed Enterprises worldwide. Our mission is to make enterprise-grade security accessible to companies of all types and sizes through simplicity, making WatchGuard an ideal solution for distributed enterprises and SMBs. WatchGuard is headquartered in Seattle, Washington, with offices throughout North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, and Latin America.

WatchGuard

Sample Customers

Advanced Medical Transport, Banco de Guayaquil, Baylor Scott & White Health, BH Telecom, Bowling Green State University, Calligaris, Children's Hospital Colorado, City of Biel, Del Papa Distributing, Department of Justice, Dimension Data, Dualtec Cloud Builders, Electricity Authority of Cyprus, Grupo Industrial Saltillo (GIS), Hertz, K&L Gates , LightEdge, Lone Star College System, Management Science Associates, Mindtree, NBC Olympics, Quest, Sony Corporation, The Department of Education in Western Australia, Valley Proteins

Portsmouth Grammar School, HILOTEC

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi

September 2025

Free Report: Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi

Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

871,358 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. WatchGuard Secure Wi‑Fi report.

See our list of best Wireless LAN vendors.

We monitor all Wireless LAN reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.