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Cisco Umbrella vs Qualys Exposure Management comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 2026

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
7.1
Cisco Umbrella improves security, reduces costs, and boosts productivity with easy deployment and effective cloud-based threat prevention.
Sentiment score
5.8
Qualys Exposure Management enhances security and efficiency by reducing vulnerability risks, costs, and incident resolution times for increased ROI.
I have seen a return on investment, specifically in terms of time saved and needing fewer employees.
SVP IT at AS IT Consulting Pvt. Ltd.
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
We saw a return on investment through significant savings in time, money, and resources.
System Admin at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
We have seen a return on investment through reduced employee counts and decreased incident resolution times.
Senior Technical Lead at Numeric Technologies
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.9
Cisco Umbrella's customer service is praised for expertise and professionalism, though some experience delays, particularly with email support.
Sentiment score
6.6
Qualys Exposure Management's customer service is praised for availability, but issues include overseas support, slow responses, and direct communication.
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
The GUI in Qualys Enterprise TruRisk Management is excellent.
Senior Manager at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
We usually get on calls with tech support, and they are very helpful.
Works at a comms service provider with 1-10 employees
False positives are the main issue that we encounter and need to be handled by the support team.
Senior Project Engineer at CDACINDIA
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
8.1
Cisco Umbrella adapts seamlessly to user growth, offering scalable, cloud-based security with efficient centralized management and flexible licensing options.
Sentiment score
7.9
Qualys Exposure Management offers robust scalability, praised for handling large asset volumes, though integration and cost challenges exist.
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 is flexible and scalable, and we can use it and modify it as per our needs.
Junior Associate at ESDS Software Solution Pvt Ltd.
Scalability depends on the license and the number of assets being monitored.
System Admin at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Scalability is not a challenge.
Senior Manager at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.3
Cisco Umbrella is renowned for its exceptional stability, delivering near-100% uptime and reliable performance with minimal connectivity issues.
Sentiment score
7.8
Qualys Exposure Management is stable and efficient, with minimal downtime, excelling in vulnerability identification and handling heavy usage.
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.
Qualys VMDR is stable.
Cyber Security Solution Engineer at a computer software company with 201-500 employees
This tool has good and excellent performance in the companies that we sell to in the last months for customers, so stability is evident.
QA Manager at a consultancy with 51-200 employees
I rate the stability of Qualys Enterprise TruRisk Management at eight point five out of ten because I occasionally find bugs that are frustrating, and I have already commented on the support issues.
Senior Manager at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
 

Room For Improvement

Cisco Umbrella faces criticism for high pricing, complex integration, support delays, and usability issues, needing streamlined features and documentation.
Qualys Exposure Management needs interface upgrades, simplified setup, better integration, improved support, and expanded IoT/SCADA assessment features.
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
The main issue is the reporting delay, and sometimes the Qualys Enterprise TruRisk Management agent will not scan the system, which means we do not receive accurate reports in a timely manner.
System Engineer at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees
It does not automate patching unless the patch management module is purchased separately.
System Admin at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
If AI features were integrated, it could enhance the capabilities significantly.
Information Security Analyst at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
 

Setup Cost

Cisco Umbrella is deemed costly but valued for security, though license complexity and cost competitiveness could improve.
Qualys Exposure Management is costly but valued for its comprehensive features; discounts and pricing negotiations are available.
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
I would rate the pricing between seven to eight out of ten.
System Admin at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
I have a notion that Qualys might be more expensive than Rapid7.
Information Security Analyst at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Qualys offers better pricing and is feature-packed compared to other tools.
Works at a comms service provider with 1-10 employees
 

Valuable Features

Cisco Umbrella enhances network security with DNS protection, easy management, remote integration, and proactive threat detection for organizations.
Qualys Exposure Management excels in risk prioritization, AI-powered analysis, and user-friendly dashboards for comprehensive security insights.
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 prioritization of vulnerabilities has improved our remediation efforts by around thirty to thirty-five percent.
Works at a comms service provider with 1-10 employees
It impacts my workflow overall, with the patch management features as it has the missing patches listed in detail, making it easier to get a comprehensive report and providing some dashboards that offer visual representation.
JMS, RPSG Ventures Limited at RP Sanjiv Goenka Group
Qualys VMDR's continuous monitoring capabilities help us respond to emergent threats by enabling my team to reach out to the security engineers whenever there is any detection of a vulnerability, informing them about it, and creating an incident.
Soc Lead & Edr Administration at Persistent Systems
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Umbrella
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
125
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (1st), Internet Security (1st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (3rd), Domain Name System (DNS) Security (1st), Cisco Security Portfolio (2nd)
Qualys Exposure Management
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
102
Ranking in other categories
IT Asset Management (5th), Vulnerability Management (2nd), Configuration Management Databases (4th), Container Security (11th), Risk-Based Vulnerability Management (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Security Software solutions, they serve different purposes. Cisco Umbrella is designed for Domain Name System (DNS) Security and holds a mindshare of 17.0%, down 22.5% compared to last year.
Qualys Exposure Management, on the other hand, focuses on Vulnerability Management, holds 4.0% mindshare, down 6.6% since last year.
Domain Name System (DNS) Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco Umbrella17.0%
Palo Alto Networks DNS Security11.0%
Cloudflare6.2%
Other65.8%
Domain Name System (DNS) Security
Vulnerability Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Qualys Exposure Management4.0%
Wiz4.7%
Tenable Nessus3.6%
Other87.7%
Vulnerability Management
 

Featured Reviews

KamranJameel - PeerSpot reviewer
Head Of IT at a financial services firm with 51-200 employees
Secure browsing has protected users from DNS threats and improves malware defense
The major issue is that sometimes when you install the client, it shows you protected and displays that it is live with the backend servers and everything. However, in reality, it was not getting any feed from the main client and is just sending your traffic to open DNS, which sometimes causes an issue because the protection you have implemented can be breached by users. The primary thing that Cisco Umbrella lacked most of the time is their client. Previously, they had a separate Cisco client. Now they have merged everything into the Cisco Secure Endpoint client—one client for everything, for Cisco Endpoint, for Cisco AnyConnect, and for Cisco Umbrella, which they did probably in 2025.
Ajay Paul - PeerSpot reviewer
System Engineer at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees
Vulnerability management has prioritized high‑risk patching and simplified bulk system reporting
The primary issue is with the reporting functionality. Even though we fix vulnerabilities, the reports do not reflect the changes immediately. Sometimes we need to manually run a script to scan the systems before Qualys Enterprise TruRisk Management will update the scan results. The main issue is the reporting delay, and sometimes the Qualys Enterprise TruRisk Management agent will not scan the system, which means we do not receive accurate reports in a timely manner. Additionally, there are many metrics for calculating vulnerabilities, such as the Qualys ID, severity scores, CVSS scores, and other metrics. The abundance of information can be confusing. These two aspects are the most significant negatives I have experienced with this tool.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Domain Name System (DNS) Security solutions are best for your needs.
920,043 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business51
Midsize Enterprise31
Large Enterprise51
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business21
Midsize Enterprise12
Large Enterprise75
 

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?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing reveals that the pricing is acceptable, but it is marginally a bit high. However, the services provided are much better, leading to a good retu...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Qualys VMDR?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing shows that we can consider both time and money saved.
What needs improvement with Qualys VMDR?
I haven't explored Qualys VMDR's vulnerability lifecycle automation yet. One of my analysts mentioned that queries lack grouping operators in Qualys VMDR. From my experience, I would appreciate imp...
What advice do you have for others considering Qualys VMDR?
I have some understanding about PeerSpot, and I have visited the website. PeerSpot is similar to TrustRadius. It takes reviews from customers or end users who are using the tools and technologies i...
 

Also Known As

OpenDNS
Qualys VM, QualysGuard VM, Qualys Asset Inventory, Qualys Container Security
 

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
Agrokor Group, American Specialty Health, American State Bank, Arval, Life:), Axway, Bank of the West, Blueport Commerce, BSkyB, Brinks, CaixaBank, Cartagena, Catholic Health System, CEC Bank, Cegedim, CIGNA, Clickability, Colby-Sawyer College, Commercial Bank of Dubai, University of Utah, eBay Inc., ING Singapore, National Theatre, OTP Bank, Sodexo, WebEx
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco, Palo Alto Networks, Infoblox and others in Domain Name System (DNS) Security. Updated: October 2026.
920,043 professionals have used our research since 2012.