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ConnectWise SIEM vs WatchGuard Firebox comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 5, 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

Fortinet FortiGate
Sponsored
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
411
Ranking in other categories
Firewalls (2nd), Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (1st), WAN Edge (1st)
ConnectWise SIEM
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (52nd), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (55th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (25th), Managed Detection and Response (MDR) (29th)
WatchGuard Firebox
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
125
Ranking in other categories
Data Loss Prevention (DLP) (11th), Firewalls (14th), Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) (8th), Anti-Malware Tools (12th), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (20th), Application Control (7th), Unified Threat Management (UTM) (2nd)
 

Featured Reviews

Vasu Gala - PeerSpot reviewer
A stable solution with an intuitive interface and quick customer service
I have been working with Fortinet FortiGate, WatchGuard, Sophos, and SonicWall. I'm not as comfortable with SonicWall because of their UI and limitations. I prefer Fortinet above all other options. When it comes to configuration, I am confident in my ability to handle various tasks, including creating policies such as firewall rules, web policies, and application policies. Additionally, I can configure VPNs and implement load balancing, among other tasks. Overall, I feel much more comfortable working with Fortinet. Fortinet has made significant improvements by integrating AI with firewalls for threat analysis and prevention. In the past 2-3 years, they have launched FortiSASE and SIEM, and they also provide SOC services. Both Palo Alto and Fortinet FortiGate are excellent. While Fortinet FortiGate comes at higher prices, the functionality and support justify the cost. They promptly resolve firmware issues and inform all support providers about configuration changes.
Giulio Valeri - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficiently monitoring and detecting suspicious activities
One valuable feature of ConnectWise Fortify is the ability to add other teams and receive notifications when customers make changes or remove multi-factor authentication in Microsoft or SAP environments. For instance, once we were connecting different parts in China, and we had to reserve resources for the blue source of the login of task no v. ConnectWise Fortify successfully mitigated the issue and monitored any suspicious activity in the Microsoft environment. Despite the inconvenience, the Microsoft environment is still active and susceptible to cyber threats. We do a lot of research and utilize ConnectWise Fortify to restart and restore the system. It's essential to have a solution like ConnectWise Fortify to protect against cyber threats.
Rajesh  Makwana - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient bandwidth management and secure network access with a strong firewall
The primary use case of the Firebox mainly revolves around bandwidth management, unnecessary web blocking, application control, and protection against brute force attacks. It is also implemented for load balancing, SD-WAN, and branch-to-branch connectivity from one location to another. We also use…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"There are lots of features and most of them are deployed for internet security. Users are protected if they accidentally go to some malicious sites."
"The technical support in our region is excellent."
"We have found it to be very reliable and that's why our teams and various users in our company use it as our main firewall every day."
"It's inexpensive compared to some of the other technology out there."
"The best features of Fortinet FortiGate include its easy configuration and user interface."
"For the performance they provide, the price is acceptable."
"From the firewall perspective, the rules and policies are very sufficient and easy to use."
"It's a user-friendly firewall. Most of the tasks are very simple. It's simple to configure and troubleshoot this firewall."
"The integration capabilities of ConnectWise SIEM are off the shelf, making it easy to buy and use; you just unpack it and use it."
"One valuable feature of ConnectWise Fortify is the ability to add other teams and receive notifications when customers make changes or remove multi-factor authentication in Microsoft or SAP environments."
"We have found the solution has great functionality and it is easy to use."
"Management and visibility are the most valuable features."
"I like intrusion detection the most."
"Intrusion Prevention is my primary focus so that's what I find most useful. The why is straightforward: It's to prevent intrusion."
"The solution is very easy to use."
"The set up was quite straightforward and we handled it in-house. It took a few hours to deploy the product."
"WatchGuard Firebox is the most powerful firewall for Wi-Fi security."
"WebBlocker has the best URL category database ever."
"The solution has increased productivity with our outside salespeople being able to connect into their computers and use those remotely."
 

Cons

"FortiGate can only retain logs for 24 hours or 7 days. I'm not sure if it holds them for a longer period, such as for a month."
"They could simplify their deployment process, especially when customers have existing devices."
"We sometimes have issues with FortiGate's routing table in the latest firmware update. We had to downgrade the device because our customers complained about bugs."
"Fortinet should improve its software, as we are seeing lots of firmware versions generated for each vulnerability issue. It becomes difficult for us to keep updating the firmware frequently due to bugs."
"They could do more work on FortiAnalyzer in terms of the data and the information coming from it."
"The configuration part was challenging, especially converting configurations from another OEM to FortiGate."
"Fortinet FortiGate needs to improve the logging and reporting. Additionally, the next-generation application's policies should be improved. When they were released they had bugs."
"The security of Fortinet FortiGate could improve."
"ConnectWise Fortify could work on covering more areas, like phishing messages, which have become more complicated to detect."
"ConnectWise SIEM is primarily focused on notifications and is limited in that aspect, while Wazuh can automate the elimination process."
"The manage portion of the solution is complicated and should be simplified by having different versions to meet the needs of different size companies."
"Cloud-based central administration of all devices from one point would be nice"
"I'm not really impressed with the reporting side of it. It may be something I just haven't figured out very well, but it's hard to filter down on reporting of the actual valuable information that you would want. There is a lot of information out there so you have to have some kind of tool capture it and then filter through. So far, I haven't found the reporting side of the WatchGuard to be that user-friendly."
"I would like to see the devices made more flexible by adding modules to increase the ports that we can use."
"There are a couple of things I wished that it would do, but I can't think of those off the top of my head."
"The main problem that WatchGuard Threat Detection and Response has is that they use several tools to do the same tasks, and they are sometimes very complicated to use and very slow."
"Its documentation could be improved. Sometimes, you need to search a bit longer to find what you are looking for."
"The data loss protection works well, but it could be easier to configure. The complexity of data loss protection makes it a more difficult feature to fully leverage. Better integration with third-party, two-factor authentication would be advantageous."
"I'd like a few extra features, especially around threat severity assessment."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Licensing for Fortinet FortiGate is on a yearly basis. Pricing for it is a bit high. It could be cheaper."
"Currently, we are paying about $1,500 a month for three sites."
"Pricing for this product is comparatively lower than other products. It's an affordable solution, but when expanding the number of users, they'll ask you to replace the model, so that's an added cost."
"I think the price of Fortinet FortiGate is very reasonable."
"Licensing is usually on a three-year period."
"Its licenses cost the same for different subscription plans."
"Other firewalls are more expensive than Fortinet FortiGate, such as the Azure firewall."
"It is a good product from a price perspective versus functionality."
"The solution is expensive."
"We had a trade-in offer at the end of our first three-year term. As a result, we pretty much got a free device by buying the three-year subscription. It was around $3,000 for the three-years."
"The two larger devices are about $1,000 each and the smaller ones are about $500 or $600 each... It's cheaper and you have more control because it's self-managed."
"It's an affordable tool"
"WatchGuard Data Loss Prevention's pricing is expensive. I rate it a seven out of ten."
"The pricing is competitive."
"It's in the medium range. Its price is pretty good considering the functions and add-ons that are used."
"There is an additional cost for support on top of licensing. When I bought my new unit, I received additional time added to my support."
"The cheapest configuration, for maybe five people, is approximately $500."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Computer Software Company
21%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
University
7%
Computer Software Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Retailer
6%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Which is the better NGFW: Fortinet Fortigate or Cisco Firepower?
When you compare these firewalls you can identify them with different features, advantages, practices and usage a...
What is the biggest difference between Sophos XG and FortiGate?
From my experience regarding both the Sophos and FortiGate firewalls, I personally would rather use FortiGate. I know...
What are the biggest technical differences between Sophos UTM and Fortinet FortiGate?
As a solution, Sophos UTM offers a lot of functionality, it scales well, and the stability and performance are quite ...
What needs improvement with ConnectWise Fortify?
I haven't utilized the advanced threat intelligence capabilities with ConnectWise SIEM. Advanced threat intelligence ...
What is your primary use case for ConnectWise Fortify?
I do not have experience with ConnectWise SIEM for RMM, as I mostly work on Wazuh, and I have a team that handles Con...
What advice do you have for others considering ConnectWise Fortify?
The review can be made anonymous if just my name and not the company name is used. I would assess the real-time visib...
What is your primary use case for WatchGuard Firebox?
We are providing our services to all WatchGuard customers in the region.
What is your primary use case for WatchGuard Firebox?
We just use it as a secondary WiFi device. We're a small office and we needed to set up a WiFi device for a few of ou...
What is your primary use case for WatchGuard Firebox?
We're a hospital and we use it for developing our incoming and outgoing policies, and we also use it for VPN.
 

Also Known As

FortiGate 60b, FortiGate 60c, FortiGate 80c, FortiGate 50b, FortiGate 200b, FortiGate 110c, FortiGate, Fortinet Firewall
ConnectWise Security Management, ConnectWise Fortify, Continuum Fortify, ConnectWise SIEM, ConnectWise SASE
WatchGuard Threat Detection and Response, WatchGuard Application Control, WatchGuard Data Loss Prevention, WatchGuard Gateway AntiVirus, WatchGuard Intrusion Prevention Service
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Dell, HP, Oracle, Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Vodafone, Orange, BT Group, Telstra, Deutsche Telekom, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, CenturyLink, NTT Communications, Tata Communications, SoftBank, China Mobile, Singtel, Telus, Rogers Communications, Bell Canada, Telkom Indonesia, Telkom South Africa, Telmex, Telia Company, Telkom Kenya
Techvera, Syrex, Clark Integrated Technologies
Ellips, Diecutstickers.com, Clarke Energy, NCR, Wrest Park, Homeslice Pizza, Fortessa Tableware Solutions, The Phoenix Residence
Find out what your peers are saying about ConnectWise SIEM vs. WatchGuard Firebox and other solutions. Updated: August 2025.
865,384 professionals have used our research since 2012.