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Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks vs Rapid7 InsightIDR comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 8, 2024

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

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Net...
Ranking in Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
7th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
90
Ranking in other categories
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) (4th), Ransomware Protection (2nd), AI-Powered Cybersecurity Platforms (4th)
Rapid7 InsightIDR
Ranking in Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
14th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
32
Ranking in other categories
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (9th), User Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) (2nd), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (18th), Threat Deception Platforms (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Extended Detection and Response (XDR) category, the mindshare of Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is 5.6%, down from 6.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Rapid7 InsightIDR is 2.7%, up from 2.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
 

Featured Reviews

Mohammad Qaw - PeerSpot reviewer
Perfect correlation and XDR capabilities for network traffic plus endpoint security
The solution should force customers to integrate with network traffic to see the full benefits of XDR. If you are not integrating it or feeding in your network traffic, then you are just buying a normal antivirus which doesn't make any sense. You are paying double the price to use the antivirus feature or to say you have XDR, but in reality you are not using it. The solution should include an on-premises option because some customers want only on-premises. It would be hard, but good to do if possible. Open XDR would be beneficial in the future. Right now, the solution is Closed XDR so cannot communicate with the few new vendors in the Open XDR market.
Asim Naeem - PeerSpot reviewer
Providing comprehensive insight into alerts while working towards AI enhancement
I definitely recommend Rapid7 InsightIDR. It is becoming better, with improvements being continuously made to the product. Right now, I do not have any advice about Rapid7 for other users because every organization or user has different criteria or multiple use cases, so I refrain from commenting on that. I rate the overall solution seven out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The information the dashboard provides is very clear."
"It's a nice product that's stable and scalable."
"Monitoring is most valuable."
"It can automatically correlate events and logs, which is very helpful for an IT administrator. It can correlate different kinds of malware activities over a network, agent, or host system. You do not need to do it manually. It is a good feature. It is also a user-friendly solution. We have deployed it on the cloud because our space does not provide any flexibility for on-premises deployment, but Palo Alto has added some flexibility to install it on-premises. It must be like the same Cortex XDR agent for all the VPN services, web filtering services, and everything else."
"When the pandemic started, Palo Alto came up with many solutions, which helped with the quick shift from on-premises to the cloud."
"The solution is a new generation XDR that has a lot of artificial intelligence modules."
"Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks should be a stable solution."
"Being a cloud solution it is very flexible in serving internal and external connections and a broad range of devices."
"The platform offers unlimited storage and agent-based solutions."
"The log aggregation and storage provided by InsightIDR has shown no issues with scalability; aggregating over one hundred millions events daily."
"During simulations or demonstrations, the tool generates alerts, providing details such as the specific application, its origin, and potential threats. For instance, it can identify if an application belongs to a known ransomware group. The system rates the threat, offering a clear detection ratio, such as 97 out of 100. It not only identifies threats but also illustrates the associated behaviors, helping us understand the potential risk to a particular endpoint."
"Integration with threat modeling from the Metasploit and InsightIDR repositories."
"The solution is very scalable in terms of the licensing model."
"The web interface is great — very useful and user-friendly."
"Rapid7's reporting is more robust than Tenable's."
"​​User behavioral analytics allows us to pinpoint abnormal or suspicious behavior among millions of events every day."
 

Cons

"Every 30 or 40 days, there's a new version and we need to go and make sure our customer's laptops are upgraded."
"Previously, the endpoint would leave the environment, not being on our VPN, essentially unable to interact with the server to upload files. It was unable to retrieve new file verdicts. It was using a thing called "local analysis" to determine if something was a malicious file or not. There was no dynamic analysis."
"The GUI could be improved."
"I think sometimes Cortex XDR agent automatically stops event capturing from the device, and then even the dashboard does not get any notifications from the agent."
"The solution should offer more dashboards and they should be better customized."
"Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks could improve by adding a sandbox feature to better compete with their competitors which have it."
"Managing the product should be easier."
"There's an overall lack of features."
"The searching feature in Rapid7 InsightIDR needs to evolve"
"I feel it would greatly benefit from more supported log sources."
"The interface for doing investigation needs to be enhanced with minor improvements that would make it more useful."
"Sometimes, it is hard to get the right queries to use. Currently, the tool lacks a pre-made set of queries."
"The solution's XDR agents cannot compete with the XDR solutions out there yet."
"The dashboard is an area that could be simplified."
"The reporting is the weakest aspect. There needs to be multi-level grouping for events (for example, group by user and destination). Right now, we can do a group by user and a separate table or group by destination. But I'd be more interested in where a person was logging into instead of who was logging in or where he was logging in."
"Customised alert recipients need to be added to allow better first-line action and quicker response. Configurable honeypots would be a welcome addition."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution has one subscription for endpoint protection and one subscription for detection and response. The two licenses combined give you the BRO version."
"The price is on the higher side, but it's okay."
"The cost depends on your chosen license type, like Pro or other licenses."
"It's way too expensive, but security is expensive. You pay for your licensing, and then you pay for someone to monitor the stuff."
"I don't like that they have different types of licenses."
"Licensing for Palo Alto Networks Cortex XDR can be costly, especially when it comes to a hundred users. A license is required for each user, and the subscription must be renewed on a yearly basis."
"The pricing seems fair, and I do like the licensing model. You use wherever they are, and it is elastic."
"Cortex XDR's pricing is ok."
"Rapid7 InsightIDR is priced very well and is cost-effective."
"Rapid7 InsightIDR charges us based on the endpoints we connect to."
"Licensing is straightforward. If, for some reason, you don’t meet the minimum licensing requirements, there is a third-party managed service that can help."
"The pricing is good, and it is not very expensive."
"Rapid7 InsightIDR is a cheaply priced product. On a scale of one to ten, where one is very expensive, and ten is very cheap, I rate the product's price at seven or eight."
"The pricing of the solution depends on the user. But there is a yearly licensing cost."
"Rapid7 InsightIDR's pricing is reasonable but we have challenges with the Minimum Order Quantity. It is not reasonable for customers who have less than one hundred devices. If they can reduce Minimum Order Quantity, it is good. You have to pay around 5000-6000 dollars per year for the product. The pricing includes maintenance and support costs."
"The pricing and licensing are competitive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto vs. Sentinel One
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto vs. SentinelOne SentinelOne offers very detailed specifics with regard to risks or attacks. The ability to reverse damage caused by ransomware with minimal interruptions to...
Comparing CrowdStrike Falcon to Cortex XDR (Palo Alto)
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto vs. CrowdStrike Falcon Both Cortex XDR and Crowd Strike Falcon offer cloud-based solutions that are very scalable, secure, and user-friendly. Cortex XDR by Palo Alto offers ...
How is Cortex XDR compared with Microsoft Defender?
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is a cloud-delivered endpoint security solution. The tool reduces the attack surface, applies behavioral-based endpoint protection and response, and includes risk-ba...
What SOC product do you recommend?
For tools I’d recommend: -SIEM- LogRhythm -SOAR- Palo Alto XSOAR Doing commercial w/o both (or at least an XDR) is asking to miss details that are critical, and ending up a statistic. Also, rememb...
What do you like most about Rapid7 InsightIDR?
During simulations or demonstrations, the tool generates alerts, providing details such as the specific application, its origin, and potential threats. For instance, it can identify if an applicati...
 

Also Known As

Cyvera, Cortex XDR, Palo Alto Networks Traps
InsightIDR
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

CBI Health Group, University Honda, VakifBank
Liberty Wines, Pioneer Telephone, Visier
Find out what your peers are saying about Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks vs. Rapid7 InsightIDR and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
849,686 professionals have used our research since 2012.