We performed a comparison between Cisco Secure Firewall vs Palo Alto Network Wildfire based on our users’ reviews in four categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: Based on the parameters we compared, with all other factors being more or less equal, Cisco Secure Firewall comes in a bit ahead of Palo Alto simply because of their stronger support.
"Feature-wise, we mostly use IPS because it is a security requirement to protect against attacks from outside and inside. This is where IPS helps us out a bunch."
"The most important feature is the intensive way you can troubleshoot Cisco Firepower Firewalls. You can go to the bit level to see why traffic is not handled in the correct way, and the majority of the time it's a networking issue and not a firewall issue. You can solve any problem without Cisco TAC help, because you can go very deeply under the hood to find out how traffic is flowing and whether it is not flowing as expected. That is something I have never seen with other brands."
"Cisco tech is always good and helpful. I would rate them as 10 out of 10."
"ASA integrates with FirePOWER, IPS functionality, malware filtering, etc. This functionality wasn't there in the past. With its cloud architecture, Cisco can filter traffic at the engine layer. Evasive encryptions can be entered into the application, like BitTorrent or Skype. This wasn't possible to control through a traditional firewall."
"The security features are the most valuable. My customers find the security products very useful because nowadays there are many threats from the internet and other malicious users. The security products really help."
"The most valuable feature is the anti-malware protection. It protects the endpoints on my network."
"The features that are most valuable within the firewall are the IPS as well as the Unified Communications. We also really like the dynamic grouping."
"We feel that we can trust the security, and our assets and business are well protected. We need to have trust in it, but we also see that it works. We have a security company that has tested that it works."
"WildFire's application encryption is useful."
"The most valuable features are all of the security features in terms of protection and SSL and VPN."
"It gives a more accurate assessment of a virus in terms of whether it's truly a virus, malware, or a false positive. We have some legacy software that could pop up as being something that is malware. WildFire goes through and inspects it, and then it comes back and lets us know if it's a false positive. Usually, when it finds out that it's not a virus, it lets us know that it's benign, and it can exclude it from that scan, which means I don't even have to worry about that one popping up anymore."
"I give the initial setup an eight out of ten."
"The solution has plenty of features."
"The most valuable feature of Palo Alto Networks WildFire is its ability to adapt to environments and its robustness."
"The scalability is acceptable."
"We have found that Palo Alto Networks WildFire is scalable. We currently have six thousand users for the product."
"On the VPN side, Firepower could be better. It needs more monitoring on VPNs. Right now, it's not that good. You can set up a VPN in Firepower, but you can't monitor it."
"It would be nice if you didn't have to configure using a command-line interface. It's a bit technical that way."
"The management of the firewalls could be improved because there are a lot of bugs."
"I have a lot of difficulties with the solution's Firewall Management Center (FMC) and the GUI. Neither is responsive enough and should be improved."
"Sometimes my customers say that Cisco Firewalls are a bit more difficult compared to Fortigate or Palo Alto. There is complexity in the configuration and the GUI could be improved."
"The usability of Cisco Firepower Threat Defense is an issue. The product is still under development, and the user interface is very difficult to deal with."
"The stability could be better because we have a lot of issues with the stability of Cisco Firepower."
"While this applies to all vendors, pricing can be always lower. In my opinion, Cisco is the most expensive. The pricing can be reduced."
"The solution can improve its traffic management."
"The cost of the solution is excessively high."
"High availability features are lacking."
"The technical support response needs improvement."
"There are some formats that the solution cannot support ."
"In terms of what I'd like to see in the next release of Palo Alto Networks WildFire, each release is based on malware that has been identified. The key problem is an average of six months from the time malware is written to the time it's discovered and a signature is created for it. The only advice that I can give is for them to shorten that timeframe. I don't know how they would do it, but if they shorten that, for example, cut it in half, they'll make themselves more famous."
"The only problem with this solution is the cost. It's expensive."
"The cost of this solution could still be improved, in particular, giving product discounts for charitable causes."
Cisco Secure Firewall is ranked 2nd in Firewalls with 115 reviews while Palo Alto Networks WildFire is ranked 2nd in ATP (Advanced Threat Protection) with 23 reviews. Cisco Secure Firewall is rated 8.2, while Palo Alto Networks WildFire is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of Cisco Secure Firewall writes "The ability to implement dynamic policies for dynamic environments is important, given the fluidity in the world of security". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Palo Alto Networks WildFire writes "Intuitive, stable, and scalable zero-day threat prevention solution with a machine learning feature". Cisco Secure Firewall is most compared with Fortinet FortiGate, Meraki MX, pfSense, Juniper SRX Series Firewall and Sophos XG, whereas Palo Alto Networks WildFire is most compared with Proofpoint Email Protection, Fortinet FortiGate, Juniper SRX Series Firewall, Fortinet FortiSandbox and Zscaler Internet Access.
We monitor all Firewalls 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.
