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CYPHER Learning vs Proofpoint’s ZenGuide comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

CYPHER Learning
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
55
Ranking in other categories
Learning Management Systems (LMS) (3rd)
Proofpoint’s ZenGuide
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
2.7
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
Security Awareness Training (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

CYPHER Learning and Proofpoint’s ZenGuide aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. CYPHER Learning is designed for Learning Management Systems (LMS) and holds a mindshare of 3.2%, down 5.0% compared to last year.
Proofpoint’s ZenGuide, on the other hand, focuses on Security Awareness Training, holds 7.3% mindshare, up 2.4% since last year.
Learning Management Systems (LMS) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
CYPHER Learning3.2%
Cornerstone Learn7.1%
Moodle7.0%
Other82.7%
Learning Management Systems (LMS)
Security Awareness Training Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Proofpoint’s ZenGuide7.3%
KnowBe425.8%
Proofpoint Email Protection9.6%
Other57.3%
Security Awareness Training
 

Featured Reviews

Roland Lorenzo M Ruben - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers flexible learning and saves printing costs; it has been excellent for us
There is room for improvement in the CYPHER Learning mobile application because my students have given feedback that they are not using the mobile app as it takes time to open. I also use the app. For me, it is easier to use than using the browser, but some of the students do not use it because it takes a very long time to open. Most of our students are using smartphones. Some students do not have laptops, so if the mobile app is more responsive, it would be a great help for us. The peer feedback feature is not user-friendly. Some of our faculty members were very happy when CYPHER gave the news that there is already a peer feedback feature because we were asking for it, but when they used it, they found it complicated and not user-friendly. They were disappointed with the peer feedback feature. When students submit their outputs, we want their classmates to give feedback as well, but that is not very easy to use. After I tried it, I also did not find it very friendly to use. They have this assessment type where we can group our students. We create groups, and they can work and collaborate with the group. While grading the submissions of the groups, although we can see that the students are separated by groups, we still have to grade them one by one. We would like a way to grade the group as one. For example, if there are five members in a group, currently, we give each member a grade. It would be easier to be able to give the same grade to all the members of the group. The team assessment feature could be improved to allow grading the group as one.
EM
Has helped run awareness campaigns and phishing simulations but needs better multilingual support and user-level tracking
They have made good improvements, but there are still some limitations. For example, we have many entities and want each entity to have their own statistics. Additionally, in the fake phishing part, there is not one type for one language per campaign, as we have many languages. For running fake phishing campaigns, we are obliged to create specific campaigns for specific languages, and consolidation is not easy. It helps us make awareness activities, but it is not easy to evaluate the cybersecurity score for each user. If I take one user and compare their status six months ago to today, I want to know if their maturity score has increased or not. Proofpoint's ZenGuide has some limitations in that aspect. This function would be very important if implemented. It gives global statistics which is good, but sometimes we want to focus on each user, going through the company and groups. I want to know what a user's level was six months or one year ago compared to today across different cybersecurity activities in Proofpoint's ZenGuide. This includes monthly awareness, cybersecurity training, fake phishing campaigns, communication, and reporting malicious or suspicious emails. I want to have one score combining all these activities for each user to determine their global level. Having multi-language fake phishing campaigns would be beneficial. Currently, it is just one campaign per language, making consolidation difficult. In the future, for one campaign, the template should correctly assign the language type depending on the language used by the user.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"What CYPHER Learning has taught me is that parents are also part of the process of student progress. Thanks to the platform, they can participate. They are not outsiders and have become participants. They are aware of what their children are doing."
"CYPHER Learning far outperforms some of the more basic ones."
"I also like the discussion board a lot because students can give their opinions there and interact with each other. For me, as an English teacher, it is also important because they practice writing in a real context."
"The structure and organization of the modules are valuable. Previously, we printed our syllabus and modules and gave them to our students. We also had pen-and-paper quizzes. We do not do that anymore. It is all there in the LMS. It is very easy to access it, so accessibility is a very good feature."
"For as long as I have been working with MATRIX (for a few years now), they have the social aspect with groups. The thing that they did not have for years, until earlier this year, was a reply-all feature. I had been asking for that for years and they finally added it this year. That has been helpful because now our students are less frustrated."
"I really like the fact that it's cloud-based. That means you don't have to look for updates. They happen automatically, which is great. It's also an easy, plug-and-play type of application. It is quite user-friendly and modern."
"The usability makes it easy for our doctors to find whatever they're looking for. The groups help them interact with each other, creating a kind of network and a place of engagement. It's not just a platform to go and learn and get out. It's a place where they can actually interact with other doctors and share experiences."
"It has 100% helped me organize my time. It provides more time for interaction and feedback with my students, both in the classroom or personally. This is why I consider the solution as an achievement. It feels more collaborative in the sense that planning not only depends on me, but also on my students."
"I would definitely recommend Proofpoint's ZenGuide to others, as I think the branding and the ability to add your own branding on all different avenues, through the email communications, training, simulations, and everything, is probably the biggest advantage I've seen so far."
"Most valuable is the SSO integration with our AD, so the users can employ our federation service to log in."
"Proofpoint's ZenGuide analytics provides many useful reports that we can access on the dashboard."
 

Cons

"The search function needs to be improved; it isn't currently working correctly and has no value to us at this point, but it should be of great value. To my knowledge, CYPHER Learning is presently working on this issue."
"When they bring on new partners, like Udemy, we do find that there are quite a few bugs in the system. They brought them on more than a year ago and there are still a few bugs, just pulling things through to CYPHER Learning. Integration bugs are a bit of an issue."
"In terms of face-to-face education, a suggestion for CYPHER LEARNING is that it give more presence to CYPHER Learning as an entity in the school by teaching more about how to exploit the tools: how to create games, and more about the use of SCORM."
"The user interface looks dated compared to more modern learning management systems, which are really clean."
"There are some tools that facilitate dialogue but not many that help produce continuous interaction. There is room for improvement in the area of interaction. I'd like to see more ways for the student to communicate with their classmates."
"They are not the cheapest solution, but they are not the most expensive."
"CYPHER Learning should definitely offer live video conferencing integration."
"eCommerce integration is crucial for us. They have two separate reporting styles. You can view information within the courses themselves, and you can view information on the eCommerce orders. The reporting within the courses and the eCommerce orders are separate, causing difficulty."
"For running fake phishing campaigns, we are obliged to create specific campaigns for specific languages, and consolidation is not easy."
"We would like to create reports for local IT leaders in a different way, more suitable for upper management."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"CYPHER Learning's price is slightly higher than other solutions."
"CYPHER Learning is more cost-efficient for us compared to others."
"The pricing is somewhere in the middle. It's not too expensive and, for what it is, it's very reasonable."
"The pricing is good. It's scalable, meaning you can start off at a cost level that is easy for a startup and then build on it from there."
"It has helped us save from 90% to 100% of our costs. The most valuable thing that we have earned in the last three years is time, e.g., my personal time versus my work time. There is more harmony."
"The system is not cheap but it's affordable. The pricing is fair... The cherry on top was that we received all the functionality with the simplest plan, the one with the minimal number of users. It couldn't be any better."
"I did not negotiate the pricing, but from what I gathered, it was a significant purchase for us at West Music. We recognize its value and potential for growth, making it worthwhile."
"For our for-profit entities, CYPHER Learning is the perfect solution in terms of cost. It is not too expensive and is about the same as what other service providers charge."
"received very good pricing, as we are also working with the Proofpoint spam appliances."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
22%
Computer Software Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
20%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
11%
Performing Arts
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business30
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise5
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NEO LMS?
The pricing for CYPHER Learning is on par with other solutions. I've been a single user of the system for a while and priced out several other options, and it's probably standard pricing if not may...
What needs improvement with NEO LMS?
One of the areas that I believe CYPHER Learning could improve on is having a saving function as you type in, much as some Google products. That would really help in my classroom because we do a lot...
What advice do you have for others considering NEO LMS?
I absolutely recommend CYPHER Learning to other users. My students really connect with it because it doesn’t resemble anything else available. The ease of use, the autonomy it provides my students,...
What needs improvement with Wombat Security Education Platform?
I do not have many recommendations for improvements for Proofpoint's ZenGuide right now. I am still fairly new to it, so I might find some recommendations as I use it more, but at the moment, I don...
What is your primary use case for Wombat Security Education Platform?
Our use cases for Proofpoint's ZenGuide involve training company-wide on security awareness, phishing, and running phishing simulations every quarter or so.
What advice do you have for others considering Wombat Security Education Platform?
I am not actually sure about the compliance enforcement capabilities of Proofpoint's ZenGuide, so I cannot comment on whether that has an impact. Based on my experience, I would rate Proofpoint's Z...
 

Also Known As

MATRIX LMS, NEO LMS
Proofpoint Security Awareness Training, Wombat Security Education Platform
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Millions of users across business, academia, and entrepreneurs - worldwide.
Carnegie Mellon University, Royal Bank of Scotland, City of Garland, Texas
Find out what your peers are saying about Moodle, SAP, CYPHER LEARNING and others in Learning Management Systems (LMS). Updated: October 2025.
871,829 professionals have used our research since 2012.