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Fortinet FortiMail Cloud vs Symantec Messaging Gateway comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 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

Fortinet FortiMail Cloud
Ranking in Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
7th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Email (6th)
Symantec Messaging Gateway
Ranking in Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
6th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Secure Email Gateway (SEG) category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiMail Cloud is 4.7%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Messaging Gateway is 2.5%, up from 1.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
 

Featured Reviews

Pravin Mandlik - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides enhanced email security with potential agent compatibility issues
There are definitely features that Fortinet should work on. I'm not the right person to implement those features. For a portable cloud solution, a customer has more affinity towards a solution where endpoint security is already in place. In endpoint security, they are not at the latest quadrant. That is why a customer with existing endpoint security solutions like Trend Micro might prefer a main security solution from that vendor. If we go for FortiMail Cloud and have a separate endpoint security solution, there are two agents that have to sit on a customer endpoint. From that perspective, Fortinet policies add an extra load to the endpoint. Maybe other solutions have an advantage when it comes to Fortinet.
Girish Vijay - PeerSpot reviewer
A stable and reasonably priced solution that performs well and has a very good malware database
Since Symantec merged with Broadcom, they might have lost some good technical engineers. Maybe that’s the reason why the product is performing poorly. When we have a good marketing and sales team, even though our product cannot perform, we will sell it at a high price because of the buzzwords. However, at the end of the day, the product should perform. Most of the products might not perform. Symantec is a very good product, but the services are basic. I rate the technical features of the product a nine out of ten. However, I would rate the services provided by the solution a six out of ten. Overall, I rate the tool an eight 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

"One of the most beautiful benefits is its integration, as it can seamlessly integrate with any third-party email servers."
"Fortinet's support is really good."
"The return on investment for us was achieved since we did not have similar incidents again in our environment."
"The most valuable features are filtering and sandboxing."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the ability to check to see if the email is real."
"It has the best feature for processed mail analysis."
"The most valuable feature is the advanced threat protection."
"The most valuable features are email ATB and Malware Analysis."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is the content filtering policies because the solution offers huge options for configuration, such as hardware manipulation, et cetera, and the dictionaries make the work easier."
"The cloud-based interface is very user-friendly."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway has a huge knowledge base about phishing, spamming, spoofing, etc."
"The solution is excellent at blocking spam."
"The solution is stable and the performance is good."
"Symantec is a secure product."
"It has very good capabilities for managing malware."
"The solution is "set and forget". You pay for it and everything is done for you."
 

Cons

"In endpoint security, they are not at the latest quadrant. That is why a customer with existing endpoint security solutions like Trend Micro might prefer a main security solution from that vendor."
"The product could be improved by extending reporting tools and adding options for notification."
"I've not been able to use more than two domains in the back end. I like to view logs for the different domains. If I add any other domain I'm not able to get a proper cPanel for that domain. I am talking about the login factors. I'm not able to see logs for different domains in a different Window. Basically, it's an issue in the login process."
"Fortinet FortiMail Cloud doesn't have AI features, making it an outdated tool for me."
"There are no specific new features I would suggest at this moment."
"The tool's UI can be simple since it's cluttered now and you can't understand where you are going. It's not obvious to find out the menus or things that you are looking to find."
"This solution is slow and it should be made faster."
"I would like to see more advanced sandbox features, where you can actually download to a machine where you can test."
"The product must improve the user dashboards."
"It could be more scalable."
"The false positive submissions must be improved."
"It is a nice product but is not user friendly in terms of the graphical interface. It is poor and is not rich in terms of the human interface."
"In a later release, it would be nice if the messaging gateway supported the cluster feature."
"They really need to create a good package that competes with Microsoft."
"Sometimes the solution picks up false positive for viruses during scans."
"The documentation could have more detailed examples of how to use the product in various situations. As more companies shift to the cloud, they could better integrate the on-prem and cloud versions through an on-prem client."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"You only have to purchase one license for multiple participants."
"When we're talking about pricing, other products have about the same price. That is normal."
"I rate the price of Fortinet FortiMail Cloud a five on a one to ten scale, where one is the low price, and ten is the high price. It is an averagely priced product."
"The licensing is for three years. In the beginning, we did not pay monthly, it was paid once for three years."
"I see how manageable and flexible the licenses are."
"It should cost around $60,000. We bought it as a bundle, so everything comes together in the license. That is standard."
"A license for our company using FortiMail and FortiCare (filtering and support) was $4000."
"The pricing depends on various factors, including the type of licenses and subscriptions you have procured"
"A subscription for technical support costs extra."
"It's a bit expensive compared to its competitor Barracuda Email Security Gateway but cheaper than Sophos Email."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway’s pricing is very cheap."
"The cost of Symantec Messaging Gateway is too expensive in general. However, the appliance also includes the price of the license in the same bundle."
"They're a little costly compared to Microsoft."
"For 150 users, we pay INR 1,60,000."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Hospitality Company
6%
Non Profit
5%
Financial Services Firm
22%
Computer Software Company
18%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Fortinet FortiMail Cloud?
Content disarming and analysis are essential features in our email security setup
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiMail Cloud?
The pricing for Fortinet FortiMail Cloud seems a bit high, although it is considered acceptable for the product's value. The solution provides cost-saving and scalable options, especially in a clou...
What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiMail Cloud?
The flexibility of the product is an area that could be improved. It would be beneficial to enhance flexibility for better adaptation to various customer environments.
What needs improvement with Symantec Messaging Gateway?
The solution takes up a lot of memory. The system becomes slow. The performance must be improved.
What is your primary use case for Symantec Messaging Gateway?
We use the solution to secure our data and emails.
 

Also Known As

No data available
Symantec.cloud, Symantec Email Security.cloud
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data
Doric, Joblink Plus, Our Lady of Mercy College, Parramatta, PPB Advisory, Slater & Gordon Lawyers, Sydney Adventist Hospital Ltd.
Find out what your peers are saying about Fortinet FortiMail Cloud vs. Symantec Messaging Gateway and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
856,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.