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Cisco Secure Email vs Cloudflare One comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 28, 2025

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
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
62
Ranking in other categories
Cisco Security Portfolio (6th)
Cloudflare One
Ranking in Email Security
15th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
21
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (14th), Data Loss Prevention (DLP) (14th), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (9th), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (6th), Access Management (7th), Bot Management (4th), ZTNA as a Service (6th), ZTNA (1st), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (9th), Remote Browser Isolation (RBI) (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Email Security category, the mindshare of Cisco Secure Email is 5.6%, down from 7.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cloudflare One is 1.5%, down from 1.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Email Security Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Cisco Secure Email5.6%
Cloudflare One1.5%
Other92.9%
Email Security
 

Featured Reviews

Kostas Karidas - PeerSpot reviewer
Helps prevent security breaches but fails to improve in the area of AI
I have not noticed any impressive advanced threat protection mechanisms in the tool. I don't know if there are any AI features in the product. I don't know if there is any other technology embedded in the solution. Cisco Secure Email successfully mitigated potential email threats. My company has seen plenty of scenarios where Cisco Secure Email successfully mitigated potential email threats, spam emails, and fraudulent domains. The product is good for dealing with spam emails, and it can take care of more than 100 spam emails per day. A huge number of spam emails are monitored with the help of Cisco Secure Email. I would not recommend the product to other businesses because you need to have some kind of expertise in configuring and knowing a bit about the tool's GUI. The tool also lacks in the area of AI mechanics. If I would like to have an overview and review another solution, I would go for another product other than Cisco Secure Email. I can definitely suggest others to look at the product and review it, but I would also recommend that they compare it with the other solutions in the market. I wouldn't prioritize Cisco Secure Email over other tools. Either the support partner of the product or I take care of the tool's maintenance phase by looking into the configurations and doing some fine-tuning. I rate the tool a seven to eight out of ten.
Carlos Alam Hernandez Baruch - PeerSpot reviewer
The solution enables seamless security management and fosters a learning environment
Feedback could be enhanced. While I work efficiently with Clover as a partner in Mexico City, sometimes the information and requests are easier to manage with more concrete solutions. For the solution stopping us for e-learning, I appreciate the concept yet need more resources or courses in Mexico, preferably in Spanish. Certifications are easy, however, I require more real-world environments and instructors.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most significant enhancement we've gained is in terms of security through the upgrade we received."
"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."
"The user interface was quite friendly, it was quite easy to use, unlike some other Cisco products. Anybody could use it. You don't have to be familiar with IT to be able to handle navigating it."
"I love the Advanced Malware Protection feature. It works very well... The appliance has more security such as SDF, DKIM, DMARC, and encryption."
"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 sends us reports, where we can see if there have been attacks, e.g. DDoS. If so, we can switch to a clean IP."
"It's flexible. There are a lot of rules and policies that can be easily applied for certain employees or certain mailboxes."
"The filtering is definitely better at catching both spam and malicious messages, and there's a lot of extremely granular ability for setting up rules. You can do it the way you want to. The Microsoft solution tends to be pretty limited in how it allows some of that to be done."
"Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform removes the risk of exposing the applications to the public."
"Clover is the best product globally."
"Cloudflare is simple to use."
"The blocking feature is very good."
"It will take the blow rather than our applications should an attack occur."
"I'm very satisfied with the environment and the dashboard."
"The solution has different options that can be used to differentiate DDoS attacks."
"Cloudflare, in my opinion, was easy to implement."
 

Cons

"The user interface of the Email Security Gateway should be improved."
"The Forged Email Detection feature needs improvement, particularly with domain. The sensors are not that good and the rules sets are unclear."
"The initial setup was complex because I have two sites with physical clusters."
"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."
"It is not user-friendly, and it is quite complicated. So, it should be more user-friendly."
"Licensing is quite complicated for a number of customers, including ourselves."
"The interface is dated. It has looked pretty much the same for 15 years or so. It would be helpful to be able to do everything from one spot. The centralized quarantine and reporting are completely separate from policy administration."
"The configuration UI should be made more intuitive. Currently, it takes a while to understand how to do the basic configurations."
"For the topic of improvement, providing some training material is one of my suggestions."
"They don't have a person to provide support for customers using the solution under their free plan."
"When there are any dynamic changes in complex applications, the tool takes a lot of time, making its analytics-related area a major matter of concern where improvements are needed."
"The response time for support must be reduced."
"The free plan has limitations. For example, I can only set up three rules, and the application firewall is unavailable."
"The onboarding process can be improved a little bit."
"There are premium tier live service and lower tier live service, so we opted for the lower tier. But there is no medium tier where we pay a little extra and get a bit more service. So if that can be improved."
"Feedback could be enhanced."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is a relatively expensive option compared to other alternatives."
"We do annual licensing for Cisco Secure Email Gatewayand SMA together, and possibly SmartNet support. Packaged together, the cost is just under $38,000."
"It is a super big router that costs a few hundred thousand dollars."
"It is not that costly. We pay for the solution through a contractor and pay an annual fee."
"The licensing was all transferred."
"The price is significantly high."
"Licensing costs depend on how many users there are. It could range between $5 and $7 per month, per user."
"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 of the solution is cheap. The licensing cost is also very low. I rate the cost and pricing a three out of ten."
"My company has to make yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to the solution. There are no hidden charges apart from the licensing costs of the solution."
"Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform's pricing is good."
"The pricing is somewhere in the middle. I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten."
"The price tag is no longer $200,000, but rather $300,000 to $400,000. It's twice."
"The prices are slightly expensive."
"The solution is not that expensive."
"The solution's pricing lacks transparency."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
6%
Computer Software Company
15%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business22
Midsize Enterprise18
Large Enterprise25
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise10
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco Secure Email?
Cisco Secure Email is a budget-friendly solution.
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.
What needs improvement with Cisco Secure Email?
The user interface of the Email Security Gateway ( /products/security-gateway-reviews ) should be improved. It would be beneficial to have the functionality of the Email Threat Defense integrated i...
What do you like most about Cloudflare Access?
The tool also offers good scalability, and the dashboard, along with real-time analytics, is very good.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cloudflare Access?
The price of Cloudflare Access is the same as compared to Akamai, but I get better performance from Cloudflare. My company has to make yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to the so...
What needs improvement with Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access has strong integration with Microsoft, among other platforms. However, when it comes to Kaspersky, we have clients who typically encounter challenges. The usual setup involves con...
 

Also Known As

Cisco Email Security, IronPort, Cisco Email Security, ESA, Email Security Appliances
Cloudflare Area 1 Email Security, Cloudflare Bot Management, Cloudflare Gateway, Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform, Cloudflare DDoS, Cloudflare SASE & SSE Platform
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

SUNY Old Westbury, CoxHealth, City of Fullerton, Indra
23andMe
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Email vs. Cloudflare One and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
872,706 professionals have used our research since 2012.