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Cisco Umbrella vs Twingate comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 9, 2025

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

iboss
Sponsored
Ranking in Internet Security
3rd
Ranking in Secure Access Service Edge (SASE)
9th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (7th), Web Content Filtering (3rd), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (8th), ZTNA as a Service (11th)
Cisco Umbrella
Ranking in Internet Security
1st
Ranking in Secure Access Service Edge (SASE)
3rd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
113
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (1st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (2nd), Domain Name System (DNS) Security (1st), Cisco Security Portfolio (2nd)
Twingate
Ranking in Internet Security
9th
Ranking in Secure Access Service Edge (SASE)
17th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
Network Access Control (NAC) (14th), Enterprise Infrastructure VPN (14th), ZTNA as a Service (15th), ZTNA (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Internet Security category, the mindshare of iboss is 3.4%, up from 2.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Umbrella is 36.4%, down from 37.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Twingate is 0.9%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Internet Security
 

Featured Reviews

Matt Crockford - PeerSpot reviewer
It's easy to roll out, and their understanding of our business made it seamless
One aspect we value about iboss is its simplicity. Their customer service is brilliant, and they are super responsive and knowledgeable. It's easy to roll out, and their understanding of our business made it seamless. We were impressed by the solution's mental health function, which can detect if someone needs help. It scans what users are browsing and flags warning signs so we can check to see if they are okay. We've had to use it a couple of times. The user interface is highly intuitive. Our IT team picked it up with minimal training. It's arranged so that it's easy to find where things are. Another advantage is the single pane of glass console, which gives you visibility into what's happening. We're not fully there yet because we haven't implemented zero trust, but we're excited about the possibilities from the demos we've seen. We launched a POC of iboss' ChatGPT Risk Protection feature two weeks ago. AI is a great tool, but you need to be careful what you put into it. My biggest fear is employees inputting sensitive corporate information or customer PII data into one of these chatbots. I was impressed by our trial of the feature. It's exactly what we wanted. Now, when a user goes to ChatGPT, there's a banner warning them not to share information, and we can block conversations containing customer data like bank details and email addresses. I don't want to stop people from using it, but we need visibility. We've only tried it on a test group of 15 people. You can configure it to look for specific keywords or integrate it with your DLP policy if you have that configured
Rohan Singh - PeerSpot reviewer
Protects endpoints wherever they are, always pushing people to the right locations to avoid malicious intent
The most valuable thing is how easy it is to deploy. We did it with 9,000 users at my last job, and it took a week to get to all the endpoints. Doing that without having to physically touch all those endpoints was very simple. The single pane of glass management makes it very easy to manage your rollout. We get a lot of "single panes of glass" and, eventually, you need a pane of panes of glass. But it's always good to have a clear and graphical view, and Umbrella's is nice and easy to read. Definitely, of the panes of glass that we do have, it's one of the easiest to use. The single pane of glass is good to group users together and separate people out. Some people need different types of security. Some people are more vulnerable. Some have more highly valuable assets, like C-suite people. It's really good to be able to have end-users defined inside of that. You don't have to jump around. You don't have to figure out who's who. It's all done through one pane of glass. What most people don't realize is that it's running in the background, which is a really nice aspect when it comes to security. Often, when you deploy a security tool, it takes up CPU performance. Everything slows to a grind. But Umbrella is so simple and easy and it doesn't affect the end-user experience. It's the best of all worlds. It's nice when people realize that they're being protected when they go to the wrong site. I think people are happy that they're protected, but it's nice that they rarely notice it. It's generally easy to maintain network connectivity, but with Umbrella, the nice part is that whichever connectivity you're on, you're always secure. With Umbrella, as long as you're online, you're going to be protected.
Joey Benamy - PeerSpot reviewer
Helps reduce access-related support tickets, is quick to deploy, and streamlines onboarding
We were able to add Twingate into our infrastructure without having to change our infrastructure or how people work. We reaped the benefits of Twingate immediately because it replaced an alternative solution with a lot of overhead. Twingate helped reduce access-related support tickets by 80 percent. Twingate streamlines onboarding for our company, especially for the engineering team, by automating resource access through directory integrations. New employees generally require no manual configuration within Twingate, saving us significant time and effort. The resiliency is directly proportional to the level of control we exert over its components. We can manage Twingate connectors to support high availability, ensuring the system is as reliable as needed. This flexibility and control enhance Twingate's resiliency capabilities significantly.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"iboss is pretty scalable. They provide good support. The case managers you work with to coordinate what you need are pretty good."
"iboss is among the few products providing inline filtering where no application is needed on the device. It operates on the network side and is not device-based. This feature was one of the main reasons why we stayed with them for so long."
"It was a very easy product to install. It can be deployed very fast."
"The security aspect of the solution, particularly the malware behind it, is excellent. That's something that really helped us out. It's not just a simple proxy that just blocks the insights of potential threats that come on behind it. They do malware detection and that helps us a lot."
"I would rate the technical support of iboss a solid 10 without a shadow of a doubt."
"The iboss system is highly reliable. The false positive rates are small compared to some other systems we've experienced through other partner agencies who use competing solutions."
"From a use-case scenario, what I like the most is the plug-in. I like the fact that we can do the filtering of these devices offsite independent of the network they are connected to, and we do not have to have traffic coming back inside our network."
"First of all, the security policies are essential. I do not have to rely solely on Active Directory for our users."
"Provides dependable DNS monitoring of external devices."
"It has helped reduce my unit's security events."
"The implementation is pretty easy."
"We are very new users of the solution and are still in the exploration stages, but we are happy with the product thus far."
"The insight into what our users are doing via Cisco Umbrella is valuable. Knowing that we're protecting our users as they leave our network is also valuable now because we've got more hybrid working."
"It has improved our organization from a security posture perspective. We feel more confident now knowing that we can block phishing attempts or any type of malware that is DNS-related. This is a very nice feature that provides peace of mind."
"It offers good visibility for the Administrator. The administrator has full visibility of what is blocked or has the knowledge of where users go when they are surfing the internet."
"We can have a full overview and a quick overview of all the DNS requests. For us, it's quite important."
"I appreciate Twingate's developer-first approach, particularly its excellent developer tools for deployment and management."
 

Cons

"Our biggest problem with their service was it did not recognize the device and filtering did not always work correctly."
"To scale up, a new iboss Node Blade Chassis must be purchased."
"Regarding pricing, setup costs, and licensing, iboss is not cheap, and that's my only concern."
"Sometimes the agent stops working in iboss, and we have to reinstall the agent."
"I'd like to see them accelerate development on the security side, particularly around data loss prevention."
"Iboss is growing so fast that it is often hard for them to keep up with the challenges."
"I am currently doing a PoC of the zero trust aspect of it. Compared to other similar solutions, it is hard to get around each feature. It takes a while to get used to it."
"Sometimes, obviously, there are bugs."
"Cisco Umbrella should introduce an on-premises device."
"Cisco Umbrella should add some more documentation on proxies."
"They need to improve analytics so they report on more of the specifics of user activity."
"In the future, they should combine some of the Cisco AMP features that they already have, for anti-malware purposes."
"Lower costs including licensing, support, and renewals would be beneficial."
"It would be good to have more extensions to third-party products and a client for other device types."
"Having ready-to-go templates with best practices is definitely something that would be an improvement. Deployment, from day one, is something that definitely needs to be improved for Cisco customers."
"In my experience with Umbrella support, sometimes the response times take a bit more time than we would like... sometimes, if you go through email, it can take quite a while to get a response."
"Twingate's lack of native support for Windows Server is a significant limitation."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is probably in line with other solutions, but I do not deal with the financial side."
"The overall pricing for iboss is very competitive and transparent."
"It is expensive compared to one of its competitors."
"We have not priced the solution recently, but they were competitive with other vendors in the past."
"We had the cost of purchasing a new appliance along with the implementation and licensing costs. However, the following year, the cost of just licensing was similar to what was paid the previous year for a new appliance along with the implementation and licensing costs."
"It is not expensive, and it is also not cheap. iboss is priced right in the sweet spot for the number of features it offers."
"Cisco Umbrella is not a cheap product. However, it's not a matter of the cost; it's more a matter of the value of security. It is easy to measure this value when you have a security incident. I think the price is a good trade-off for a product that can help you avoid security threats."
"The product is pricey compared to Cisco Firepower."
"There are three models for licensing with different feature sets."
"There are no hidden costs with Umbrella. Everything is included in the package."
"Pricing depends on the automation requirements of the organization."
"Cisco has a set price for a single license up to 100, but whenever we get over 100, we have to ask for a quote."
"Cisco should make the solution cheaper."
"Licensing with Cisco can be a little complex, but I think it's comparable with that of other similar products. It's always hard to put a price on security, but the price is fair for the value it provides."
"Twingate's pricing is fair."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
6%
Educational Organization
24%
Computer Software Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
17%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
7%
University
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about iboss?
Content filtering is the most useful feature of iboss.
What needs improvement with iboss?
I have a couple of thoughts for improvement, but usually when I address them with my rep, they put it into the featur...
What is your primary use case for iboss?
We use it primarily for simpler filtering because we're a K12 entity.
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. Zs...
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-nat...
What do you like most about Cisco Umbrella?
Cisco Umbrella is easy to monitor, manage, and deploy.
What needs improvement with Twingate?
Twingate's lack of native support for Windows Server is a significant limitation. While it hasn't directly affected m...
 

Also Known As

iBoss Cloud Platform
OpenDNS
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

More than 4,000 global enterprises trust the iboss Cloud Platform to support their modern workforces, including a large number of Fortune 50 companies.
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
Blend, Modern Health, Webflow, Liberis, Cerebral, Homebase, Bloomreach, Cameo, Hippo and Bitpanda
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco, Zscaler, iboss and others in Internet Security. Updated: April 2025.
850,671 professionals have used our research since 2012.