Cisco Secure Email vs Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense comparison

Why PeerSpot?

Cisco Secure Email and Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense are both solutions in the Email Security category. Cisco Secure Email is ranked #4 with an average rating of 8.3, while Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is ranked #23 with an average rating of 7.3. Cisco Secure Email holds a 4.5% mindshare in Email Security, compared to Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense’s 1.1% mindshare. Additionally, 93% of Cisco Secure Email users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 93% of Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense users who would recommend it.

Cisco Secure Email

Read 63 Cisco Secure Email reviews

13,171 Views
11,590 Comparison Views

93% willing to recommend

Cisco Secure Email Threat D...

Read 16 Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense reviews

2,587 Views
2,587 Comparison Views

93% willing to recommend

Cisco Secure Email

Cisco Secure Email Threat D...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 3, 2024

Cisco Secure Email and Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense provide advanced email security solutions. Cisco Secure Email is highlighted for its broad adaptability through numerous features, giving it a competitive edge in feature customization and management flexibility, whereas Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense excels in integrating with broader security ecosystems and offering advanced threat detection.

Features: Cisco Secure Email includes robust anti-spam measures, malware protection, and thorough integration with security protocols such as DKIM, DMARC, and AMP. It facilitates easy management and email customization, significantly reducing spam and improving filtering through Talos intelligence. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense focuses on cloud-based threat intelligence and endpoint security integration with capabilities like Threat Grid and AMP that help identify and counteract malicious email threats proactively.

Room for Improvement: Cisco Secure Email requires better integration with third-party reporting tools and enhancements in CLI management. Users have noted challenges with rule-setting, desiring user interface improvements and better hardware reliability. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense could enhance its collaboration with other tools, improve intuitive reporting, and develop a smarter search function. Both products would benefit from better phishing protection and additional sandboxing, along with cost reductions for broader accessibility.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Cisco Secure Email offers versatile deployment options, supporting on-premises, cloud, and hybrid configurations, with seamless setup praised by users alongside reliable technical support. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is optimized for private, hybrid, and public cloud deployments, which can limit on-premises flexibility. Both products are supported by strong service teams, but users appreciate Cisco Secure Email's flexible deployment and satisfaction with customer support.

Pricing and ROI: Cisco Secure Email's pricing reflects its comprehensive features with costs varying by user numbers, though customers consider it worthwhile for its significant ROI in security and reduced email issues. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is seen as high-priced due to its premium features and support but is also viewed as a worthwhile investment for security and business continuity benefits. Potential users should balance premium costs with the specific benefits needed.

To learn more, read our detailed Cisco Secure Email vs. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense Report (Updated: August 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Secure Email vs. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense

August 2026

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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 Email

Ranking in Email Security

4th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Cisco Security Portfolio (6th)

Cisco Secure Email Threat D...

Ranking in Email Security

23rd

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Email Security category, the mindshare of Cisco Secure Email is 4.5%, down from 5.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is 1.1%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Email Security Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Cisco Secure Email	4.5%
Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense	1.1%
Other	94.4%

Email Security

Featured Reviews

Karthik Sathivel

Technical Associate Network Security at Valuepoint Systems

Email security has protected financial data and provides clear tracking for every branch message

The areas of Cisco Secure Email that could be improved or enhanced are the slowness in the console. I don't think it was a database error or something, but we feel some slowness in configuring DLP and other content filters compared to other consoles. It may have been due to on-premises, but it was much noisy at some times while configuring DLP. When we tried to configure a DLP policy, the console became much slower. In that case, we cannot see what had happened in the mail which was blocked at that time. It may take nearly an hour to get back to normal while configuring policies. That is the major issue in the product.

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Nipuna Madhubhashana

Enginner at Millennium Information Technologies

Has faced challenges with configuration, taking actions, and learning curve but benefits from centralized management and good technical support

We have deployed Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense in two customer environments. It is still in development as a new product. Some customer requirements, such as sending logs to a Syslog server, are limited as ETD only supports sending audit logs. Customers have requirements for other system logs as well, which should be developed from their side. Another customer request is to restrict the IPs that can log in, which cannot be done from Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense yet. Any user with login details can log in. We can restrict the IPs in Cloud Mail Gateways, but not from Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense. It would be beneficial to improve this feature. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense can take actions, such as requesting O365 to quarantine mail. In that case, the customer requires notification to the recipient from Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense. This option would be valuable if available. The real-time threat intelligence of Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is an AI-based classification. It took one to two months to optimize the classification, but we still experience some false positives. Reducing the learning period would be beneficial. The learning curve shows that in the beginning, there are numerous false positives. For one month, we had to reclassify the false positives manually until the system learned. Reducing the learning time would be much better. Additional features desired in the next release include IP restrictions and user logging IP restrictions, ensuring only the customer environment can log in to Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense. Logs forwarding needs improvement as currently it only has audit logs. In Cloud Mail Gateway, we can create an IPsec tunnel to forward logs. However, in Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense, there is no option, and we must do API integration to send logs. Only SIM can get logs; Syslog cannot retrieve them.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The system enables end users to manage their own whitelists/blacklists."

"What I find the most valuable about Cisco Secure Email is that the logs are not that difficult to see even if you're not used to them. The logs are reasonably readable and diagnosing the problem is not too hard with them."

"We like the in-built features, like the email filtering based on the IP and domain, and Cisco has its own blacklisted domains and IPs, which is very good because this filters around 70 percent of emails from spam and we are seeing fewer false positives with this."

"Initially, the most valuable feature for us was the SenderBase Reputation, because that reduced the number of emails that were even considered by the system by a huge number..."

"It's definitely worth looking at Cisco's cloud email security offering; it's surprisingly simple to get going with, it really is easier to use than the on-prem because of everything they have built into it, and it is surprisingly cost-effective."

"Cisco Secure Email has strong inbound services."

"It has an intuitive, clear graphical interface where you can deploy your policies and understand the overall flow. There are a lot of things that you cannot handle on the graphic interface, like message filters. For this, you need to go to a lower level where you have more power, like command line interface. So, this solution has the best of both worlds. There are not a lot of bells and whistles. It is more practical with access to most features that you can configure."

"Spam controls are excellent because they are a powerful feature that operates almost effortlessly."

More Cisco Secure Email pros

"I highly recommend it as one of the best choices."

"The features and functionalities are much better than Microsoft's in-built Defender plan, and this product has helped us to protect our organization from any malware attack in the past."

"It has an efficient email filtering feature."

"This solution is easy to use."

"Regarding stability, Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is very stable."

"The ability to see east-west traffic is its most valuable feature. Traditionally, email defense focuses on north-south, inbound-outbound, egress-ingress traffic. With Cisco Secure Email Cloud Mailbox, it's able to quickly identify, track, tag, and categorize emails that are internal. That can typically give us visibility into if there's an internal compromised account (for example). Someone can then use that internal compromised account to email additional accounts with either malicious software or links, but internal within that Office tenant. Effectively, that email message never leaves the tenant. Any of the mail gateways really do not have any method or way of seeing this traffic since it's not leaving the environment."

"Overall, it's certainly a very good idea to integrate another layer on top of Microsoft Advanced Threat Protection."

"Secure Email Threat Defense's scalability is good."

More Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense pros

Cons

"I have some frustrations with the user experience in the interface, specifically with regard to making a list of people for whom I want to allow email access."

"I am not satisfied with the solution's reporting and logging."

"They can do it better with web links, with the URLs. They have a technology called Outbreak but it doesn't work as well as we would like."

"My opinion on the licensing of this solution is that it is a mess that needs sorting out. I am not particularly bothered by pricing as I administer it and make recommendations for people to buy or not to buy."

"The management features of the product are not up to date."

"Cisco Secure Email can be improved from the administrator's point of view. Usually, you have to work with different areas, and they can try to make it easy for the administrator to use different functions."

"I would like to see sandboxing for email, where suspicious emails received by the system are analyzed through online services."

"There are some concerns in the way the architecture is set up, making it an area where improvements are required."

More Cisco Secure Email cons

"The learning curve shows that in the beginning, there are numerous false positives. For one month, we had to reclassify the false positives manually until the system learned."

"This solution could be improved by integration with Sandbox."

"The tool gives false positives and it needs to be more accurate. I would like to see AI as a new feature."

"The solution is a bit expensive. It could be cheaper."

"The search area has room for improvement. When you go to the next page, it remains at the bottom of the current page that you're on. Also, under the reports section, it allows you to see any "convictions," but if you want to search for those convictions you have to remember when they all came in and go back and edit the search accordingly. You cannot click on the list of convictions to actually see if you had a spike at a certain time."

"Cisco Secure Email Cloud Mailbox can improve by adding advanced phishing, then the solution would become the best in the market. However, this could increase the price even more. Additionally, if CES with domain protection could be added it would be an even better solution."

"The search area has room for improvement."

"I wouldn't recommend Cisco to others because I think Fortinet is better."

More Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Licensing costs depend on how many users there are. It could range between $5 and $7 per month, per user."

"The price is significantly high."

"The pricing for the Cisco Email Security Appliance involves recurring costs for licenses based on the contracted time frame, such as one year, three years, or five years. Renewals are required after the license expires."

"I rate the product price as six on a scale of one to ten, where one means it is a very expensive tool."

"We do annual licensing for Cisco Secure Email Gatewayand SMA together, and possibly SmartNet support. Packaged together, the cost is just under $38,000."

"The solution is expensive."

"It's adapted to the market. It's similar to other vendors. We at least don't have many problems regarding that because Cisco is adaptable on that side. When we present the solutions to the customers, we tend to achieve the goals that the customer has in terms of the budget for such implementations."

"The pricing is good."

More Cisco Secure Email pricing and cost advice

"The feedback from vendors and customer is that it is expensive."

"Cisco Secure Email Cloud Mailbox does not have any competition with Sophos, Trend Micro, or other vendors of the world. However, there is a pricing premium for the solution. One has to look at it from that angle that while they are buying Cisco, there will be a premium, and Cisco justifies that premium value. That's why they're charging a high price."

"It is expensive compared to other vendors."

"The solution’s pricing is manageable."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

11%

Outsourcing Company

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Marketing Services Firm

11%

Outsourcing Company

Construction Company

Comms Service Provider

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	22
Midsize Enterprise	18
Large Enterprise	27

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	4
Midsize Enterprise	6
Large Enterprise	7

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Secure Email?

The pricing structure is good as it is user-based or email client-based, which is positive for clients.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Cisco Secure Email?

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Cisco Secure Email?

We are using Cisco Secure Email to monitor the outgoing and incoming mail traffic in our financial institute. We have nearly 900 branches all over India. We have an on-premises mail server in which...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Secure Email Threat Defense?

Comparatively with other products, the pricing of Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is normal. As a technical guide, I am not very aware of the pricing details.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Secure Email Threat Defense?

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Secure Email Threat Defense?

We are working with Cloud Mail Gateway and on-premise mail gateways. We have worked with Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense.

See all answers

Comparisons

Trellix Collaboration Security vs Cisco Secure Email

Compared 31% of the time

Check Point Anti-Spam and Email Security Software Blade vs Cisco Secure Email

Compared 6% of the time

Proofpoint Email Protection vs Cisco Secure Email

Compared 6% of the time

Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs Cisco Secure Email

Compared 4% of the time

Check Point Email Security (formerly Harmony Email & Collaboration) vs Cisco Secure Email

Compared 2% of the time

More Cisco Secure Email Competitors

Check Point Anti-Spam and Email Security Software Blade vs Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense

Compared 16% of the time

Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense

Compared 15% of the time

Kiteworks vs Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense

Compared 11% of the time

Comodo Secure Email Gateway vs Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense

Compared 7% of the time

Proofpoint Email Protection vs Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense

Compared 6% of the time

More Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Secure Email

September 2026

Download Cisco Secure Email product report

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense

September 2026

Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense report

Download Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense product report

Also Known As

Cisco Email Security, IronPort, Cisco Email Security, ESA, Email Security Appliances

Cisco Secure Email Cloud Mailbox, Cisco CMD, Cisco Cloud Mailbox Defense

Overview

Cisco Secure Email provides email security with advanced threat protection, spam filtering, and easy integration with Cisco Talos, ensuring comprehensive protection against cyber threats like phishing and malware.

Cisco Secure Email offers a comprehensive platform for organizations seeking robust email security. With advanced threat protection and seamless integration with Cisco Talos, it enhances threat intelligence. The tool provides easy-to-use spam blocking and granular policy customization. Effective ransomware, phishing, and malware protection ensures stable network performance. It includes logging and reporting features, along with Active Directory integration, delivering enhanced security without extra hardware. Although it addresses threats efficiently, improvements in synchronization with reporting tools and phishing detection are needed. Organizations find cost and licensing complexities challenging for smaller networks and seek more intuitive configuration, advanced AI threat detection, and comprehensive reporting. Enhanced support, documentation, and cross-platform compatibility are desirable for better management and scalability.

What are the most important features?

Advanced Threat Protection: Guards against cyber threats like malware and phishing
Spam Blocking: Efficiently filters unwanted emails to maintain inbox integrity
Policy Customization: Allows granular control over email security policies
Integration with Cisco Talos: Enhances threat intelligence with global insights
Active Directory Integration: Simplifies user management and enhances security

What benefits and ROI should users consider?

Ease of Use: Intuitive interface provides a straightforward user experience
Network Performance: Maintains speed and reliability while securing emails
Comprehensive Reporting: Offers detailed insights into email threats and responses
No Additional Hardware: Provides complete email security without hardware costs
Enhanced Email Security: Protects against a wide range of email-based threats

In industries like finance, healthcare, and IT, Cisco Secure Email is key to securing email communications. It serves as the primary email gateway in datacenters, scanning and filtering emails to defend against phishing, malware, and spam. Many organizations integrate it with Sophos Antivirus and Talos Threat Intelligence for heightened protection. It plays a crucial role in outbound message control and data loss prevention, ensuring compliance with security policies.

Cisco

Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense offers robust email security with features like east-west traffic visibility and seamless SaaS deployment. It enhances cloud email protection by integrating Threat Grid sandboxing and AMP for malware defense, supported by Cisco Talos threat intelligence.

Enhancing email security for Microsoft 365 and cloud emails, Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense acts as an email gateway, blocking phishing, malware, and business email compromise. Users benefit from a centralized management console, efficient graymail administration, and strong filtering capabilities. Despite its strengths, it requires improvements in integration, spam detection accuracy, and enhances phishing protection.

What are the most important features of Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense?

East-West Traffic Visibility: Offers insight into email tenant interactions.
SaaS Application Deployment: Simplifies deployment processes.
Threat Grid Sandboxing: Provides advanced malware protection.
AMP Integration: Enhances malware defense capabilities.
Anti-Spam and Antivirus: Powered by Cisco Talos threat intelligence.
Cloud Mailbox Features: Includes robust email filtering and management.

What benefits or ROI should be evaluated in reviews?

Enhanced Security: Provides protection against advanced threats.
Operational Efficiency: Reduces reliance on help desk services.
User-Friendly Management: Streamlines email administration tasks.
Improved Email Filtering: Ensures effective threat blocking.

Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is highly applicable in industries requiring stringent data protection, such as finance and healthcare. It serves cloud-based environments by closely monitoring email activity to prevent unauthorized access and breaches. Tailored deployment options cater to both on-premise and cloud architectures, allowing flexible integration in existing workflows.

Cisco

Sample Customers

SUNY Old Westbury, CoxHealth, City of Fullerton, Indra

Luiss University, Lone Star College, T-Systems, Magyar Telekom

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Secure Email vs. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense

August 2026

Free Report: Cisco Secure Email vs. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense

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