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Cisco Secure Email vs Microsoft Defender for Office 365 comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 8, 2026

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

Cloudflare One
Sponsored
Ranking in Email Security
20th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (15th), Data Loss Prevention (DLP) (21st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (11th), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (7th), Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (13th), Access Management (12th), Bot Management (3rd), ZTNA as a Service (8th), ZTNA (3rd), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (10th), Remote Browser Isolation (RBI) (3rd)
Cisco Secure Email
Ranking in Email Security
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
63
Ranking in other categories
Cisco Security Portfolio (6th)
Microsoft Defender for Offi...
Ranking in Email Security
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
61
Ranking in other categories
Email Archiving (1st), Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (2nd), Microsoft Security Suite (9th), Secure Email Gateway (SEG) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the Email Security category, the mindshare of Cloudflare One is 1.5%, down from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Secure Email is 5.2%, down from 6.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is 8.8%, down from 13.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Email Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Defender for Office 3658.8%
Cisco Secure Email5.2%
Cloudflare One1.5%
Other84.5%
Email Security
 

Featured Reviews

CV
Network Architect at IP Dimension
Cloud security has improved remote access and has reduced costs for smaller client sites
I have used Cloudflare One's Identity-Aware Proxy, and it is quite straightforward from what I have seen so far. The app registration on the Azure side integrates fully into Cloudflare, and I am very satisfied with that part because it is easy to set up. The integration of Cloudflare One's Secure Web Gateway and Zero Trust Network Access works without any issues. That part is pretty automatic, and if you complete the rest of the setup, it comes together by itself with no issues from my side. What makes it nice is that we can actually start replacing on-site firewalls at this stage for the smaller clients because it does not matter if they go to a coffee shop or work from home; they are still secured by the same connection. The hops get shorter and you get better latency. We have done testing to see if it is better. One thing that we did notice with our proof of concept with our current client is that they have people connecting from the UK. When they used their previous VPN solution, uploading CAD drawings and other files to the server took a long time. They mentioned that it is much quicker on Cloudflare One's solution. I definitely believe that is part of the improved performance, and I am satisfied with that as well. What is nice about Cloudflare One is that it makes the setup easier and also easier to train technicians to maintain it. Compared to legacy systems, we do not need to get fancy firewalls in place that are costly. That is definitely also a cost-saver with Cloudflare One.
KS
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.
Emeka Ndulu - PeerSpot reviewer
Cloud Solutions Architect at a tech services company with 201-500 employees
Improves threat visibility and response while reducing manual tasks and training users against phishing
I appreciate the attack simulation feature whereby I get to train users and educate them on how to identify phishing emails and spam emails, as well as the anti-spam protection. It gives me visibility into my threat environment and threat landscape to ensure that I am one step ahead of any likelihood of threats within my environment. I get to detect it and respond, so the threat intelligence is very effective. Microsoft security solutions save my time. It saves money because once I protect my environment, I don't lose money. It has decreased my detection time and my time to respond.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The blocking feature is very good."
"The capabilities of the software are strong enough for me to do what it's supposed to do. For me, we don't need to do a lot of configuration on our site. We just enable it and monitor it."
"The solution has different options that can be used to differentiate DDoS attacks."
"For Cloudflare Access, I am using the free plan...The most valuable feature is their protection."
"Cloudflare DDoS mitigates DDoS attacks."
"Enables me to work from two locations."
"Cloudflare is simple to use."
"Cloudflare, in my opinion, was easy to implement."
"The product blocks spam emails."
"There are a lot of filters for scam emails and things like that work out of the box. You can also use the antivirus features. I like its features."
"Cisco's Secure Email integrates with Cisco Firewalls, utilizing the AMP as their anti-malware engine, which allows for information sharing between devices."
"We rely heavily on antivirus protection, email content filtering, and authentication mechanisms to ensure compliance with email security. Regarding phishing attempts, while phishing protection features are crucial, we also emphasize user education as a critical defence. The intelligence services Cisco provides, such as the Cisco Intelligence Center, play a significant role in analyzing and validating threats, including phishing attempts, in our email security practices."
"Introducing Cisco Secure Email Gateway systems was a set change for us and reduced the number of unwanted emails by a huge factor, a benefit that has continued from when we first got the devices until today."
"It does a great job of preventing spam, malware, and ransomware. I can only go by what people have told me and what I've seen, but I have not seen spam in a year and a half to two years in my own company mailbox. And there are not a lot of catches where it's catching something that should have gotten through, either."
"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."
"For what you get for the product, the support, and the overall stability, it is definitely a good return on investment."
"It has helped us in improving our security posture; it detects any kind of attack or abnormal behavior in accessing the system and sends an alert to the administrator who can check, understand, and review on time to ensure that all activities are legit."
"At the moment we are satisfied with this product. It's a stable, scalable, and resilient solution for us."
"It’s easy to handle integrations, and we don't need a lot of people in our IT team."
"The features I appreciate most about Microsoft Defender for Office 365 are admin notifications for potential threats along with protecting our Microsoft apps such as Outlook from potential phishing attacks."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 has decreased my time to detection and time to respond by one hundred percent."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 has improved my organization's security. It makes it easier to manage the infrastructure without the help of third-party applications."
"The product's scalability is good."
"Our customers are satisfied with Defender for 365 because Microsoft products are easy to use and customize to meet the client's needs. Everything is in one place, so we can adjust policies as needed for phishing, DLP, ATP, or any other security features that our clients want to apply."
 

Cons

"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."
"Lacks a VPN feature to provide a secure connection to the data center."
"Our customers no longer use Cloudflare because its service is subpar."
"The free plan has limitations. For example, I can only set up three rules, and the application firewall is unavailable."
"The initial onboarding was causing us some confusion."
"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."
"Operating and tuning the product is difficult."
"The response time for support must be reduced."
"I would like them to add some clustering or high availability features."
"We have occasionally had hardware problems because we are using an appliance-based solution, but that might change."
"While Cisco offers excellent solutions and innovations, the pricing may not be suitable for everyone. The cost of the software is relatively high. In the current market, there are numerous competitive alternatives that focus on security, enterprise networks, and various other aspects. Cisco, being a comprehensive provider, extends its expertise across data, servers, storage, and security, making them a preferred choice for many enterprises. However, when it comes specifically to security solutions, there are other vendors that specialize solely in this domain, offering competitive options."
"The user interface of the Email Security Gateway should be improved."
"I would like to see sandboxing for email, where suspicious emails received by the system are analyzed through online services."
"The user interface needs massive improvement. While the device works fine and it's not complicated to write policies, renaming menu items and showing policy flow in conjunction with the application could help."
"The primary areas for improvement are the pricing and the complexity of deployment."
"They could improve the filters. In my time at the company, there were several times we had to contact support to update the filters."
"The cost of Security Copilot is up there right now, and I think it needs to come down for more people to adopt."
"The custom alerts have to improve a lot."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 must improve the overall management style, including the GUI. It also needs to change the filters so that it is easy to whitelist and blacklist data."
"We are always looking for others tools to increase automation on tasks. There can be better integration with other solutions, such as PowerPoint and email."
"We need a separate license and we don't know how to get the license that is required."
"Sometimes I have to recategorize things when it takes the wrong step and I do not want it to classify something as suspicious."
"There needs to be an improvement in integrating the product to work across multiple operating systems, and to have better support for non-Microsoft file types."
"There is a different console for different things; I just want one consolidated console."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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."
"The prices are slightly expensive."
"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."
"The solution is not that expensive."
"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."
"Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform's pricing is good."
"The solution's pricing lacks transparency."
"I would rate the pricing a ten out of ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive."
"It is a relatively expensive option compared to other alternatives."
"We were using Proofpoint and then we switched to Cisco... reportability was one of the main reasons we switched, but the biggest one was cost. If you can get an equivalent functionality for a better price it's wise to do so. That's what our primary decision came down to: We could get equivalent functionality at a lower price point."
"There are additional fees for adding features."
"Cisco Secure Email and the support are priced well. It's not cheap, but there are other solutions that offer less and cost so much. For example, Microsoft is more expensive than Cisco."
"We do annual licensing for Cisco Secure Email Gatewayand SMA together, and possibly SmartNet support. Packaged together, the cost is just under $38,000."
"In my previous organization, avoiding four instances of CryptoLocker within an estimated six month period is approximately $600,000 in lost time and effort. Our five year cost was about a million dollars, and the four outages that we had equated to 65 percent of that five year cost."
"In addition to the standard licensing, there is a cost for SMARTnet as well."
"The license is expensive because the cost is based on the number of users."
"Compared to other brands, Microsoft Defender for Office 365's pricing is competitive."
"Microsoft Defender is expensive. I typically recommend it only if clients have the budget. Otherwise, I would suggest an alternative."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 comes with Microsoft Windows. It is free with the operating system."
"I was working in the government and it was too expensive for us to use our Microsoft products."
"The product is very expensive."
"It's a user-base subscription."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is an add-on to the Office license. Many customers are purchasing this solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
23%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
6%
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise11
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business22
Midsize Enterprise18
Large Enterprise26
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business24
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise31
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access has strong integration with Microsoft, among other platforms. However, when it comes to Kaspersky, ...
What is your primary use case for Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access provides secure access to internal applications for employees, external members of the organization...
What advice do you have for others considering Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access is one of the best integrations available. While about two hundred vendors offer similar services, ...
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 areas of Cisco Secure Email that could be improved or enhanced are the slowness in the console. I don't think it ...
What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
The inbuilt analysis of false positives can be faster. It's not slow, but it can be faster.
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
My use case for Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is for email protection, safe links, protection of links, documents...
 

Also Known As

Cloudflare Area 1 Email Security, Cloudflare Bot Management, Cloudflare Gateway, Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform, Cloudflare DDoS, Cloudflare SASE & SSE Platform
Cisco Email Security, IronPort, Cisco Email Security, ESA, Email Security Appliances
MS Defender for Office 365
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

23andMe
SUNY Old Westbury, CoxHealth, City of Fullerton, Indra
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is trusted by companies such as Ithaca College.
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Email vs. Microsoft Defender for Office 365 and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
885,837 professionals have used our research since 2012.