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Cisco Umbrella vs IBM NS1 Connect comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 30, 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
7.2
Cisco Umbrella enhances security, reduces costs, and integrates easily, offering quick deployment and significant financial returns within a year.
Sentiment score
8.6
IBM NS1 Connect enhances uptime, automation, and stability, optimizing processes and DNS management for improved performance and operational efficiency.
Cisco is a big brand in the networking domain, but in security, they are pushing a lot and improving day by day.
Chief Technology Officer at Binary Global Limited
From my point of view, the biggest return on investment when using the solution is that it makes it a lot easier to delegate some of the tasks that were traditionally used, such as building policies on the firewalls and doing it through Cisco Umbrella.
Network Engineer at a tech consulting company with 501-1,000 employees
The biggest return on investment when using Cisco Umbrella for me is the ease of use of the fact that we've deployed this with our Cisco VPN Secure Client, so every computer has the Umbrella module in it.
Senior Network Engineer at Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C.
I have definitely seen a return on investment with IBM NS1 Connect as it has given our organization more control and flexibility in managing DNS at a global scale, which almost was impossible before.
Senior Software Engineer at PwC
I have seen a return on investment with IBM NS1 Connect, as application uptime has improved by 40% to 45%.
Software Engineer at Abbott
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
8.0
Cisco Umbrella offers professional, reliable customer support with expertise, though some users desire faster response times and streamlined processes.
Sentiment score
9.3
IBM NS1 Connect delivers reliable, responsive support with expert teams and dedicated managers ensuring efficient, personalized customer assistance 24/7.
I would rate customer support ten out of ten due to the excellent assistance throughout the POC process.
Manager Cyber Security Department at Mana
Cisco's support is fantastic, providing assistance when needed, especially during the initial installation process.
Director at Infosonik Systems Ltd
If I don't need to go to support all the time, that means the product is working fine, so I'm very happy with them.
Network Engineer at a tech consulting company with 501-1,000 employees
They are very proactive and supportive, available 24/7.
Software Engineer at Abbott
The customer support for IBM NS1 Connect is very proactive and responsive twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.
Senior Software Engineer at PwC
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
8.2
Cisco Umbrella offers a scalable, adaptable, and efficient solution for various company sizes, simplifying user and site management.
Sentiment score
8.7
IBM NS1 Connect scales effortlessly, integrates well, and supports global operations, ensuring reliability and flexibility amidst growing user demands.
Cisco Umbrella scales incredibly with the growing needs of my organization.
Network Engineer at a construction company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Cisco Umbrella scales really well with the growing needs of my company, bringing the ability to ensure that people are safe and connected.
Senior Network Engineer at Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C.
Cisco Umbrella scales effectively with the growing needs of my company; it's excellent, and I have experienced no issues.
Senior Network Engineer at Boys Town
It has managed to handle all my organization's growth.
Software Engineer at Abbott
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.3
Cisco Umbrella is praised for its stability, reliability, minimal maintenance, and quick resolution of rare connectivity issues.
Sentiment score
8.4
IBM NS1 Connect is praised for exceptional stability and reliability, maintaining 99.99% uptime and handling DDoS attacks effortlessly.
I have not experienced any major stability issues with Cisco Umbrella.
Director at Infosonik Systems Ltd
Cisco Umbrella Secure Access is pretty stable in my mind, and we have not seen many glitches that would have interrupted services at customer locations.
Chief Technology Officer at Binary Global Limited
The stability and reliability of the Cisco Umbrella platform have been great.
Senior Network Engineer at Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C.
IBM NS1 Connect is very stable as I have not experienced any lagging or downtime.
Senior Software Engineer at PwC
IBM NS1 Connect is very stable.
Software Engineer at Abbott
 

Room For Improvement

Cisco Umbrella needs enhancements in reporting, integration, user-friendliness, protection, licensing, infrastructure, and support for an improved user experience.
IBM NS1 Connect users seek faster APIs, better UI, enhanced features, secure DNS management, and comprehensive reporting and testing tools.
Making it more flexible and easy to deploy, particularly when integrating with other technologies like Active Directory and proxies, would be beneficial.
Manager Cyber Security Department at Mana
The product can only shield a small area, making it less effective for larger spaces or multiple users.
Director at Infosonik Systems Ltd
I have to write an email to Umbrella support to get assistance, unlike the other products where I can call the Cisco technical assistance center and get an engineer.
CTO at Next Technologies Ltd
Pricing can be more transparent, especially when dealing with tight budgets.
Senior Software Engineer at PwC
DNS timeout issues should be resolved.
Software Engineer at Abbott
 

Setup Cost

Cisco Umbrella's pricing is fair yet varies, offering value in security coverage with opportunities to bundle for discounts.
IBM NS1 Connect offers competitive pricing with strategic agreements, balancing cost-effectiveness and functionality, despite potential overage costs.
We've bundled that with our firewall stuff and our VPN, which brings the price down and adds the ability to grow.
Senior Network Engineer at Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C.
The only cost associated is the license cost unless additional solutions need to be integrated with Umbrella, which would incur extra costs.
Director at Infosonik Systems Ltd
The prices need to be lower as the current pricing is exceedingly high.
Network Solutions Architect at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing of IBM NS1 Connect has been that it is one of the most cost-effective tools and very affordable.
Software Engineer at Abbott
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing is that the cost can be more transparent, especially for organizations working on a tight budget.
Senior Software Engineer at PwC
 

Valuable Features

Cisco Umbrella offers DNS-based protection, ease of use, and integration, enhancing productivity, security compliance, and visibility across networks.
IBM NS1 Connect boosts user satisfaction with automation, reliability, Terraform integration, efficient routing, and economic value, enhancing performance.
The DNS layer security provided by Cisco Umbrella is very effective for our security posture, offering us vast improvements in visibility over DNS queries and potential threats.
Manager Cyber Security Department at Mana
The most valuable feature of Cisco Umbrella is its DNS security.
Network Solutions Architect at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
The best possible thing is that it is very easy to deploy, easy to configure, and very fast to get onboarded with a customer because this is a cloud-based service.
Chief Technology Officer at Binary Global Limited
The best features that IBM NS1 Connect offers include routing based on user verification, endpoint switching based on latency, DNS response time, real-time monitoring, intelligent traffic routing capabilities, API-driven functionality, HTTPS redirects, secondary DNS, and API integrations.
Senior Software Engineer at PwC
The intelligent traffic routing and API-driven features of IBM NS1 Connect have helped my team by allowing routing based on user location, endpoint switching based on latency, and DNS response time.
Software Engineer at Abbott
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Umbrella
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
123
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (1st), Internet Security (1st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (2nd), Domain Name System (DNS) Security (1st), Cisco Security Portfolio (2nd)
IBM NS1 Connect
Average Rating
9.4
Reviews Sentiment
8.1
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
Managed DNS (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

Cisco Umbrella and IBM NS1 Connect aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Cisco Umbrella is designed for Domain Name System (DNS) Security and holds a mindshare of 20.5%, down 25.2% compared to last year.
IBM NS1 Connect, on the other hand, focuses on Managed DNS, holds 2.0% mindshare, up 1.2% since last year.
Domain Name System (DNS) Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco Umbrella20.5%
Infoblox Advanced DNS Protection10.7%
Palo Alto Networks DNS Security8.1%
Other60.7%
Domain Name System (DNS) Security
Managed DNS Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IBM NS1 Connect2.0%
Cloudflare29.2%
Quad927.5%
Other41.3%
Managed DNS
 

Featured Reviews

BB
Senior Network Engineer at Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C.
Ensures comprehensive protection with seamless threat logging and efficient policy management
My favorite feature of Cisco Umbrella is probably just the DNS and the fact that when a security threat happens, all of that gets logged in their Umbrella portal, and it's very easy to find who's been accessing the site and how many people have accessed it, so that we can go to them and make sure they're not compromised. The features of Cisco Umbrella benefit my company by providing less time to search for things through logs, to look for what we need. It's just one place to go, and we just search for it, and we find it really fast. The fact that there's a virtual database that has all that information is great on our portal.
DavidJackson1 - PeerSpot reviewer
Software Engineer at Abbott
Smart routing has improved uptime and performance and enables real-time automated traffic control
The best features IBM NS1 Connect offers, in my opinion, are real-time monitoring, intelligent traffic routing capabilities, and being API driven. The intelligent traffic routing and API-driven features of IBM NS1 Connect have helped my team by allowing routing based on user location, endpoint switching based on latency, and DNS response time. Additionally, IBM NS1 Connect has API integration. IBM NS1 Connect positively impacts my organization by making our website load faster and enhancing the user interface to be more intuitive and user-friendly. It's very economical and cost-effective. I also love it because it saves time through automation, saving around 30% to 35% of our time and also saving man-source. Our application uptime has improved by 40% to 45%. Although there have been a few outages, the service uptime has significantly improved our trust with clients. It is very cost-effective and affordable, hence providing a great return on investment.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Domain Name System (DNS) Security solutions are best for your needs.
884,976 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business50
Midsize Enterprise30
Large Enterprise51
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise10
 

Questions from the Community

Which is the better security solution - Cisco Umbrella or Zscaler?
Cisco Umbrella and Zscaler Internet Access are two broad-spectrum Internet security solutions that I have tried. Zscaler Internet Access is a good option for carrying out multiple security functi...
Which is the better security solution - Cisco Umbrella or Microsoft Cloud App Security?
Cisco Umbrella is an integral component of the Cisco SASE architecture. It integrates security in a single, cloud-native solution, unifying multiple features like DNS-layer security, threat intelli...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Umbrella?
The pricing for Cisco Umbrella is fair compared to other platforms out there for DNS security. We acquired it as a bundle with other Cisco purchases.
What needs improvement with NS1 Managed DNS?
IBM NS1 Connect can be improved by providing learning materials depicting flows that can help users who are completely new to networking, which would be great. Pricing can be more transparent, espe...
What is your primary use case for NS1 Managed DNS?
My main use case for IBM NS1 Connect is to improve user experience, and it offers smart routing, which helps sites to be reliable and performance gets improved. In my organization, the use case inv...
What advice do you have for others considering NS1 Managed DNS?
IBM NS1 Connect is an excellent traffic management system. It helps us to route traffic based on location, latency, and many other factors. The ability to automate DNS management is a key feature t...
 

Also Known As

OpenDNS
NS1 Managed DNS, NS1
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Chart Industries, City of Aspen, Eastern Mountain Sports, FLEXcon, George Washington University, Jackson Municipal Airport Authority, Ohio Public Library Information Network, PTC, Richland Community College, Smart Motors, Tulane University, VeriClaim
Avast Software, Bloomberg L.P., BBC, Carfax, CNBC LLC, Deloitte Consulting LLP, Disney Streaming, Dropbox, EBAY Inc, Gannett Media Corp, Salesforce, Wayfair, Workday
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco, Infoblox, Palo Alto Networks and others in Domain Name System (DNS) Security. Updated: March 2026.
884,976 professionals have used our research since 2012.