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Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) vs Hillstone S-Series Network Intrusion Prevention System comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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 Secure IPS (NGIPS)
Ranking in Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
10th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
69
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Hillstone S-Series Network ...
Ranking in Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
22nd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) category, the mindshare of Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) is 3.4%, up from 2.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Hillstone S-Series Network Intrusion Prevention System is 1.5%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS)3.4%
Hillstone S-Series Network Intrusion Prevention System1.5%
Other95.1%
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer373227 - PeerSpot reviewer
System Engineer at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
Marketing strengths shine but regaining user trust needs significant effort
There are numerous things that could be improved about Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) to get it back on track. Sollution for small branches: when we have to connect a lot very small branches (or sometimes only an ATM) we need something small, with LTE and with reasonable price. Cisco response is SDWAN but it is not always the case. Recently Cisco released some small firewalls but I have not tried them yet. Central management with FMC is a very good idea, but sometimes local management or monitoring is helpfull. With Cisco You have to decide: central or local. You cannot have both. Regarding usability, when you commit configuration on Cisco, it sometimes takes very long. Commits also take some time for the competition, but Cisco is definitely lagging behind the rest in this respect. Last but not least, for me as a professional is lack of CLI. With CLI, I can configure every firewall on the market except Cisco. CLI is very important in professional working, and IMHO it was an unwise decision by Cisco to remove it. Graphical interfaces are very nice, but when you've got thousands of objects in a big installation and have to configure many things, CLI is a much faster way to do it.
reviewer1080873 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Consultant at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Complements any firewall
The core processors are there and it's able to generate reports for that. It also complements any kind of firewall. For example, if an end user is using Palo Alto as a firewall, they'd need another layer of firewall like the S-Series that will protect internal servers. It's something that complements any firewall in the market.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"NGIPS' best feature is the separate IPSec tunnels, which makes the user's data more secure if they want to access it privately."
"The most valuable features are the intrusion detection ones."
"I've found the performance and stability to be the most valuable features of Cisco NGIPS. It is scalable as well."
"I think their fingerprints are good in terms of how they whitelist and blacklist."
"Cisco is number one in the technical support. It's good technical support and this is actually a problem when we do the recruitment for some other products. Other products you are on hold forever and the support might be not the best compared to Cisco."
"The most valuable features of Cisco NGIPS are protection and reporting."
"The solution is very stable."
"The initial setup wasn't complex or complicated."
"Setup is straightforward with the same reliability and scalability as the firewall series."
 

Cons

"The look and feel of the console could be updated."
"There are certain limitations that need to be addressed."
"I would recommend this solution to others for medium, large, and enterprise businesses only."
"It has room for improvement when it comes to integrating machine learning and AI into it where even if you don't have a baseline that is of length for anomaly detection, it could do more like an AI style machine learning. It learns on its own."
"Cisco can do better on their documentation because the product is really hard to understand."
"I would like to see the sanctions lifted so we could use the full solution and have the speed increased."
"If there was a software-based solution for scaling up then it would be much better."
"I would like to see integration with monitoring tools such as Nagios or BMC."
"Lack of tools to help educate end users"
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The annual licensing tends to be expensive, but in terms of implementing the licenses, it's a very uncomplicated process and as easy as copy-paste in its straightforwardness."
"I would rate the pricing 4 out of 5."
"The price for additional throughput is the highest in the industry."
"The cost of the license depends on the level of support that you have with Cisco."
"We get cut in price since we use other Cisco products. We have the whole bundle of Cisco solutions."
"The licensing can be billed annually or in multi-year contracts such as three, four, or five years."
"It is highly priced but competitive regarding features and support services."
"I usually work with Fortinet and FortiGate which is a lower cost in comparison with Cisco NGIPS."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
University
9%
Educational Organization
9%
Performing Arts
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business27
Midsize Enterprise16
Large Enterprise27
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco NGIPS?
The product's initial setup phase was easy.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco NGIPS?
Cisco is one of the top brands known for cost-effectiveness, making it worth the money. It's cheaper to integrate with existing IT security solutions compared to other expensive brands with subscri...
What needs improvement with Cisco NGIPS?
There are numerous things that could be improved about Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) to get it back on track. Sollution for small branches: when we have to connect a lot very small branches (or sometime...
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

Also Known As

Sourcefire NGIPS, Firepower NGIPS
Hillstone S-Series NIPS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

American Electric Power, Huntington Bank, Keycorp, Nationwide, Transunion, Marriott, Inova Health, Ford, Thomson Reuters, Dow Chemical, Equifax, Chevron, Walmart, Coca Cola
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