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Deep Instinct Prevention Platform vs Symantec Protection Engine 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

Deep Instinct Prevention Pl...
Ranking in Anti-Malware Tools
16th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) (31st)
Symantec Protection Engine
Ranking in Anti-Malware Tools
34th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Anti-Malware Tools category, the mindshare of Deep Instinct Prevention Platform is 0.9%, down from 1.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Protection Engine is 0.4%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Anti-Malware Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Deep Instinct Prevention Platform0.9%
Symantec Protection Engine0.4%
Other98.7%
Anti-Malware Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Tom Foal - PeerSpot reviewer
CTO at Klaatu IT Security Ltd
Stops ransomware before it executes and reduces response time for the team
A potential area of improvement for Deep Instinct Prevention Platform is their focus on file uploads and large data storage, backups, and other related areas. It is difficult to think of what they could improve, but low information provided by the system when it detects something is one area, particularly in scripting. Deep Instinct Prevention Platform detects malicious scripts but it needs better measures, perhaps signing scripts, so we can be sure that a script is created by a client, not by some malware. It is really about helping us triage incidents effectively, so a bit more help with the analysis of incidents, particularly what the Deep Instinct Prevention Platform agent has discovered, would be beneficial. We need to know what it has spotted that makes it suspect malware.
Abhimanyu Das - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Associate at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Real-time file security has reduced incident tickets and improves threat detection accuracy
The best features of Symantec Protection Engine include machine learning, file reputation, and real-time scanning. It efficiently handles heavy loads through ICAP and cloud-based processing, reducing the burden on endpoints compared to Trend Micro and other endpoint security solutions. Its centralized control is also noteworthy. Through machine learning, it detects both known and unknown malware and malicious URLs, in addition to performing signature-based scans that assist SOC teams in analysis. The solution is highly effective in leveraging both machine learning and file reputation. Regarding centralized control, it offers a unified management console for policy deployment and provides real-time visibility through dashboards, helping save significant administrative time. Symantec Protection Engine has had a positive impact on our organization by enhancing our overall security posture. It effectively blocks a high volume of file-based threats across more than 200 servers, saves SOC analysts time in endpoint remediation, and streamlines compliance processes. It further strengthens security through real-time scanning and machine learning-based quarantine, blocking phishing payloads in SharePoint uploads before they reach endpoints, thereby reducing incidents by 30–40% compared to signature-only tools.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The support is very good, they reply and respond very quickly."
"The detection rate is very high. In all the testing with around 20 partners in different environments, quite a lot of them had installed with other anti-malware applications, like Sophos. This software can co-exist with those applications in the same machine. This is impressive."
"The user interface is a good feature; it shows which process has been accessed and the flow, and the detections for PowerShell are also pretty good, as is the active scripts detection feature."
"Deep Instinct’s prevention-first approach to stopping unknown ransomware and malware is the reason why we purchased the product."
"Its false positives are very low, because the behavior analysis engine double checks them."
"Deep Instinct is very light; it doesn't take too much CPU attention or memory, it doesn't slow down the performance, and you don't really realize any change in the performance, which makes it very different from other solutions that are usually heavy for the users."
"No valuable quote available from the provided review sections."
"It has given us a more structured approach for detecting and preventing threats, with machine learning-based detection and prevention whose engines, even in older versions, are able to pick viruses and malware, supported by many online use cases for detecting different viruses and malware that have been out for many years."
"Symantec Protection Engine's been a game-changer for us at Kantar—blocks like 80-85% of file-based threats right at the gateway before they hit our 200 servers, cutting down endpoint incidents big time."
"What I appreciate in Symantec Protection Engine is the Virtual Policy Manager (VPM) and the Application Name feature, which are really effective."
 

Cons

"I would like to see improvement in the user interface so that the user has more control. For example, it would be good if a user could change their grouping if they want to be part of another group. Or if I want to right-click and scan a specific file that I just imported, that would be helpful. Sometimes you just want to do an extra scan to make sure you're safe."
"Deep Instinct Prevention Platform detects malicious scripts but it needs better measures, perhaps signing scripts, so we can be sure that a script is created by a client, not by some malware."
"If the tool was able to provide fine-tuning capabilities from the product's end depending on the environment of its user, then it would be a good improvement in the solution."
"Due to the nature of deep learning, it’s sometimes difficult to determine why the AI model has blocked a specific file, although this has improved over time."
"I would like a little more training for the admins."
"The main area for improvement in Deep Instinct Prevention Platform is Arm support, which is not implemented yet."
"Pricing is also an issue. Its pricing is not as aggressive as it could be, and its price makes it difficult to sell."
"Reporting on incidents needs improvement. It doesn't give very much information compared to Sophos."
"Price is a significant area for improvement. The pricing is quite expensive, and it is particularly high for regular customers."
"To improve Symantec Protection Engine, I suggest simplifying its integration with other tools, as it is more complex compared to Trend Micro and CrowdStrike."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Its pricing is too high, but that is not because of the product. It is expensive because of the cost of the console. You need a console to control the whole thing, but the console is expensive. You have to split this cost among all possible users. Normally, to be able to make it economically attractive, you need at least 1,000 agents, PCs, or users. If you have a customer with 300 to 500 agents, PCs, or users, it becomes too pricey."
"Pricing and licensing are very straightforward. It's two SKUs, one is for the console and the other is for the client."
"The pricing is a little bit expensive but we are satisfied with DI's performance."
"If I include the false positive rate and the detection rate in the comparison, Deep Instinct is worth its price."
"There are no additional costs on the price, and our company has a support contract, which bundles in those services anyway."
"In comparison to the other products out there, it's exceptionally competitively priced. When you consider the lower administrative overhead that it facilitates, it's an absolute value."
"One thing about their licensing program that I like is that just one covers the server as well as on the endpoint as well as mobile devices. There is no complexity in calculating how many SKUs I need for mobile, for laptop, for desktop, and for servers. It's very simple and that makes it much easier to budget."
"Their pricing is very competitive. It is good, fair, and a lot cheaper than what we were doing with Cylance."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Construction Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise5
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Deep Instinct?
The price for Deep Instinct Prevention Platform is reasonable. It is about the same price as any other antivirus.
What needs improvement with Deep Instinct?
A potential area of improvement for Deep Instinct Prevention Platform is their focus on file uploads and large data storage, backups, and other related areas. It is difficult to think of what they ...
What is your primary use case for Deep Instinct?
Deep Instinct Prevention Platform is basically a stopper that prevents any malware, including zero-days. The main benefit Deep Instinct Prevention Platform provides is that it stops ransomware, whi...
What needs improvement with Symantec Protection Engine?
Symantec Protection Engine has fewer issues during installations. However, some customers find it confusing to distinguish between the normal proxy and the web proxy because Symantec Protection Eng...
What is your primary use case for Symantec Protection Engine?
I tried using Symantec Protection Engine on AWS cloud and have constructed some implementations. It was purchased through AWS marketplace.
 

Overview

Find out what your peers are saying about Deep Instinct Prevention Platform vs. Symantec Protection Engine and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
885,311 professionals have used our research since 2012.