We performed a comparison between Fortinet FortiGate-VM and OPNsense based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Features: Fortinet FortiGate-VM is highly regarded for its robust security features, including geofencing, firewalling, IPS, and antivirus. Users also appreciate its user-friendly interface. OPNsense is notable for its scalability and ability to accommodate guest access. Its dashboards, IDS and IPS capabilities, and availability of a free version are also highlighted as valuable features.
Fortinet FortiGate-VM could benefit from enhancements in key activation, log management, IPsec failover, monitoring tools, hardening, availability, VPN connectivity, operating system stability, data center clustering, throughput, web application firewall integration, pricing model, troubleshooting forum, and guidance. OPNsense requires improvements in interface simplification, integration, DNS blocking, peer-blocking, installation, deployment, reporting, SSL inspection, and learning curve.
Service and Support: Fortinet FortiGate-VM's customer service has received both positive and negative feedback. Some customers appreciate the support team's quick response times and expertise. However, others have faced challenges in obtaining prompt assistance and finding information easily. OPNsense has been commended for its exceptional support, rapid response times, and helpful guidance. Nonetheless, a few users have noted the lack of easy accessibility to the support service and have recommended the addition of an associated support service.
Ease of Deployment: The setup process for Fortinet FortiGate-VM is typically simple. OPNsense is not overly complicated or difficult. FortiGate-VM may take more time for larger deployments, however, it provides a user-friendly installation and configuration experience. Clients can perform the OPNsense setup themselves, and it can be completed within a few hours.
Pricing: Fortinet FortiGate-VM requires licensing fees with no extra expenses. OPNsense, being open-source, doesn't require a license, however, hardware costs are involved.
ROI: Fortinet FortiGate-VM offers enhanced security and stability. Users consider its ROI to be highly satisfactory. OPNsense delivers a quick return on investment, typically within three months, and eliminates the need for ongoing fees.
Comparison Results: The analysis of user feedback indicates that Fortinet FortiGate-VM outperforms OPNsense in various aspects. Users highly value Fortinet FortiGate-VM for its robust security capabilities, user-friendly interface, effortless deployment, scalability, and extensive filtering options. Moreover, users appreciate the availability of support from Fortinet.
"We purchased Fortinet because of the pricing, its functionality, because it met our requirements, and the total cost of ownership over five years was quite reasonable. In the market, Fortinet is rated quite well."
"The UTM feature is quite good. FortiAP is easy to deploy because both Fortigate and FortiAP are under the same brand. Otherwise, you need to do more work on the configuration."
"The Fortinet FortiGate local partners were good. I did not have direct contact with Fortinet support."
"The flexibility and ease of configuration are the most valuable features."
"It is user friendly, and has all the features you need."
"This solution has solid UTM features combined with a nice GUI."
"The most valuable features of Fortinet FortiGate are remote access, web filtering, and IPS."
"The product is easy to use and is stable. The SV1 functionality is a benefit."
"FortiGate integrates well."
"The solution is very easy to set up. It doesn't take a lot of time and offers a quick deployment, so you can start using it almost right away."
"We use it to ensure that our network is properly protected from viruses and malware."
"It's very easy to set up, even for more junior developers."
"The interface is decent."
"Its technical support is excellent."
"It's a very simple solution to manage."
"This product is affordable and it's a good, high-performance appliance."
"It's more secure and more reliable."
"The solution is good for a basic firewall for a small business or for home use."
"The graphic user interface is very good and it is user-friendly which makes the product easy-to-use."
"What I like best about OPNsense is that, as a firewall, it's pretty good. I'm quite impressed with it. I had an excellent experience with OPNsense, which helped me achieve the targets I wanted."
"The most valuable features in OPNsense are reporting and visibility."
"The system in general is quite flexible."
"The interface and the dashboard are the most valuable features of this solution."
"The solution has high availability."
"MTBF: Hardware failure is more common when compared to SonicWall or Cisco ASA."
"Technical support needs to be improved."
"The UI could be improved."
"I would like some automated custom reporting."
"I could not configure sFlow from the FortiGate graphical user interface. I realized that the sFlow configuration is available only from the CLI, and discovered that sFlow is not supported on virtual interfaces, such as VDOM links, IPsec, or GRE."
"Maybe they could make some features more accessible, such as a way to translate directions between two networks that share the same subnets."
"They need to improve their technical support."
"My only complaint about FortiGate is a lack of QinQ VLAN tunneling. I haven't found this feature in any Fortinet product. You can do this on all Cisco routers, including the smaller models. However, QinQ isn't available on the biggest, most expensive Fortinet units. They still don't have that. I think now we're on software version 6.0, and they still haven't found a solution for QinQ. It isn't a dealbreaker, but that's my main complaint."
"Technical support could be better."
"In the next releases, it would be nice to see central cloud management."
"Fortinet could improve the availability and delivery of its products. It takes four to six weeks for every purchase to arrive."
"The tool is expensive."
"Improvements are needed for the responsive UI and JIT traffic reporting."
"Not a ten because I think that Cisco is better."
"Customization needs improvement."
"It is difficult to size the VM in terms of machine resources, and for this reason, clients prefer the appliance."
"You will need additional training before you can actually start to use it."
"The only thing that I would like to see improved is the Insight or the NetFlow analysis part. It would be good to have the possibility to dig down on the Insight platform. Right now, we can easily do only a few analyses. If this page becomes more powerful, it surely will be a well-adopted platform."
"Its interface should be a little bit better."
"There are a few weaknesses. For example, there is a lack of some features that I have in certain commercial products."
"The ability to set the VPN IP address would be a welcome addition."
"While they do have paid options that actually gives better features, for most of the clients, if they tend to take a paid option will instead opt for Fortinet."
"The interface of the solution is an area with shortcomings."
"I would like better documentation concerning the provided packages and their integration."
Fortinet FortiGate-VM is ranked 9th in Firewalls with 113 reviews while OPNsense is ranked 3rd in Firewalls with 36 reviews. Fortinet FortiGate-VM is rated 8.4, while OPNsense is rated 8.4. The top reviewer of Fortinet FortiGate-VM writes "An easy-to-manage and configure tool that provides ample documentation to help with the setup phase". On the other hand, the top reviewer of OPNsense writes "Good interface and firewall capabilities and overall easy to use". Fortinet FortiGate-VM is most compared with Azure Firewall, Palo Alto Networks VM-Series, Fortinet FortiOS, Netgate pfSense and Cisco Secure Firewall, whereas OPNsense is most compared with Netgate pfSense, Sophos XG, Untangle NG Firewall, Sophos UTM and IPFire. See our Fortinet FortiGate-VM vs. OPNsense report.
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