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Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) vs Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 19, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
6.7
Cisco Secure IPS effectively detects threats and integrates with NIST, yielding positive ROI despite setup costs and financial quantification challenges.
Sentiment score
5.7
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention offers financial benefits and high user satisfaction despite its cost, boosting revenues, especially in Italy.
It offers insights into security threats, despite the inability to quantify its impact in numbers.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.2
Cisco Secure IPS customer service is praised for expertise but noted for inconsistent response times and initial contact challenges.
Sentiment score
5.9
Palo Alto Networks' support is praised for expertise but faces inconsistent response times and communication challenges with third-party facilitation.
A few years ago, I had a very bad situation. We lost a lot of money, and I opened for the first time in my life, a case with priority one. The person responsible for the ticket didn't respond for two days.
Fortinet, on the other hand, offers quicker response times and same-day RMAs, which gives them an edge in customer service.
The response was fast, and they provided experts to solve our issues quickly.
Overall, I find the technical support from Palo Alto Networks quite good, although getting a hold of the TAC can be challenging and sometimes requires long phone calls.
I have proof of this rating - when I escalate a case, I receive a reply from TAC support after two days.
I rate technical support from Palo Alto as eight out of ten.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.0
Cisco Secure IPS scalability varies; effective for large environments but may need upgrades for extensive user capacity.
Sentiment score
7.7
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention is scalable, adaptable, and efficient, though cost may constrain its broad deployment.
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention is scalable and works well wherever enforcement points exist.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.5
Cisco Secure IPS is stable but has bugs; continuous improvements are needed to compete with Fortinet and Palo Alto.
Sentiment score
7.7
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention is praised for its superior stability and performance, though requires careful version selection.
The software situation with Cisco is problematic.
Proper sizing of the firewall models ensures that the system does not experience crippling performance issues.
 

Room For Improvement

Cisco Secure IPS needs better SIEM integration, user interface, stability, reporting, scalability, pricing, support, and cloud and endpoint integration.
Palo Alto Networks needs improvements in email filtering, setup ease, user experience, support services, and enhanced security features.
CLI is very important in professional working, and it was an unwise decision by Cisco to remove it.
Incorporating AI capabilities would enhance its functionality.
Palo Alto needs to focus on how to bring that technology to end users and how easy it is to use, especially in a hybrid environment where users work from various locations.
The behavioral detection capabilities could be expanded to address all threats at the perimeter, reducing the reliance on endpoint detection and response systems.
 

Setup Cost

Cisco Secure IPS is costly, especially versus competitors, with pricing influenced by features, support, and potential bundling discounts.
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention is costly but valued for strong threat detection, with pricing challenging for smaller businesses.
It's cheaper to integrate with existing IT security solutions compared to other expensive brands with subscription costs.
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention requires an add-on license and is considered expensive compared to competitors like Cisco AMP and FortiGate firewalls.
 

Valuable Features

Cisco Secure IPS provides robust protection with strong integration, intelligence, and ease of use for comprehensive cybersecurity measures.
Palo Alto Networks excels in threat prevention with features like sandboxing, machine learning, and user-friendly design, enhancing efficiency.
Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) is quite powerful for threat detection and includes botnet detection.
They can discover new versions of malware, which is very beneficial.
As traditional signature-based mechanisms become less effective due to the evolving nature of attacks, this solution's focus on behavioral analysis is crucial.
We are satisfied with the analytic capabilities of Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention, especially the reporting features available in the Palo Alto portal in terms of their application visibility interface, which is very good for us to get visibility on all critical applications and the associated users, as well as the risks associated with every category of traffic.
 

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
Palo Alto Networks Advanced...
Ranking in Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) category, the mindshare of Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) is 4.5%, up from 4.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention is 7.4%, down from 7.6% 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 (%)
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention7.4%
Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS)4.5%
Other88.1%
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
 

Featured Reviews

Yosevan Sinaga Sinaga - PeerSpot reviewer
Effectively identifies malicious behavior while future automation and AI advancements hold potential
Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) is quite powerful for threat detection and includes botnet detection. It effectively blocks unwanted software, hashes, and suspicious behaviors. The tool is easy to integrate with other IT security solutions due to similar protocols. The system offers effective threat detection features, although automation capabilities are not yet fully utilized.
Partha Dash - PeerSpot reviewer
Advanced protection enables us to confidently secure against evolving threats
Palo Alto Networks can improve Advanced Threat Prevention by catering to the growing adoption of AI and agentic tooling. The Threat Protection modules should have the necessary intelligence to protect against those types of threats, as AI will be there to do a human job; this is an evolving area. From an Advanced Threat Protection perspective, the technology associated with Palo Alto Networks, such as their sandboxing environment, is quite good. However, Palo Alto needs to focus on how to bring that technology to end users and how easy it is to use, especially in a hybrid environment where users work from various locations. While Palo Alto excels in certain setups, they need to improve the user experience in distributed working conditions.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
University
17%
Computer Software Company
11%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Educational Organization
7%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise17
Large Enterprise26
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise15
 

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...
Which is the best DDoS protection solution for a big ISP for monitoring and mitigating?
Arbor would be the best bid, apart from Arbor, Palo Alto and Fortinet have good solutions. As this is an ISP, I would prefer Arbor.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Palo Alto Networks Threat Prevention?
Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention requires an add-on license and is considered expensive compared to competitors like Cisco AMP and FortiGate ( /products/fortinet-fortigate-reviews ) fi...
 

Also Known As

Sourcefire NGIPS, Firepower NGIPS
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

American Electric Power, Huntington Bank, Keycorp, Nationwide, Transunion, Marriott, Inova Health, Ford, Thomson Reuters, Dow Chemical, Equifax, Chevron, Walmart, Coca Cola
University of Arkansas, JBG SMITH, SkiStar AB, TRI-AD, Temple University, Telkom Indonesia
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) vs. Palo Alto Networks Advanced Threat Prevention and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
867,349 professionals have used our research since 2012.