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Fortinet FortiMail vs Symantec Messaging Gateway comparison

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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

Fortinet FortiMail
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
68
Ranking in other categories
Email Security (8th)
Symantec Messaging Gateway
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
Secure Email Gateway (SEG) (13th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Messaging and Collaboration solutions, they serve different purposes. Fortinet FortiMail is designed for Email Security and holds a mindshare of 2.7%, down 3.7% compared to last year.
Symantec Messaging Gateway, on the other hand, focuses on Secure Email Gateway (SEG), holds 3.1% mindshare, up 2.4% since last year.
Email Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Fortinet FortiMail2.7%
Proofpoint Email Protection5.9%
Microsoft Defender for Office 3655.0%
Other86.4%
Email Security
Secure Email Gateway (SEG) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Symantec Messaging Gateway3.1%
Proofpoint Email Protection16.7%
Mimecast Advanced Email Security14.5%
Other65.7%
Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
 

Featured Reviews

Abhimanyu Das - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Cybersecurity Engineer at Kyndryl
Targeted email filtering has reduced spam and phishing and now saves significant investigation time
The best features of Fortinet FortiMail include its techniques and tactics, which are highly effective compared to other solutions such as Microsoft 365. Although Fortinet FortiMail may not be as advanced in some aspects, it is well recognized for its strong performance in handling spam and phishing. It performs thorough mail scanning and also offers a sandboxing feature that enhances protection. Fortinet FortiMail has had a positive impact on my organization by significantly reducing unwanted email activities such as spam and phishing. It provides accurate detection and generates results that often exceed what can be achieved through manual analysis. Since deploying Fortinet FortiMail, I have observed a reduction in investigation time by at least 20 to 30 percent.
Dennis O'Reilly - PeerSpot reviewer
Cyber SecOps Principal at Dotcom Security
The product provides good content filtering options, but the false positive submissions must be improved
The tool is very stable. I rate the stability a seven out of ten. It's an on-premise application that runs on a virtual machine. It has dependencies on the hypervisor host that we're running it on. If it's not configured, the application can be influenced by it. Sometimes, there is a service stop error while the service is still running. Sometimes, the service just stops. Some policies do not act the way that we intend them to respond.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Its performance is very good and it is stable."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is the tool's ability to prevent phishing attacks."
"Fortinet FortiMail has been beneficial to my company; in the past, there were a lot of spam and phishing attempts, but after Fortinet FortiMail was implemented, it provided better protection against spam, phishing attempts, and ransomware."
"The number of false positives is minimal."
"I highly recommend the product; the product is easy and there's no complexity, it's easy to use, easy to learn, easy to upgrade, easy to apply any changes, and it offers a good price versus quality balance."
"We do have, as of late, spam outbreaks, and this solution has been pretty reliable in dealing with them."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the spam filter."
"The GUI isn't hard to use. When we do a demo and explain the features of Fortinet products to our customers, they understand very quickly. They can easily manage their systems without us."
"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 anti-malware and spam features are valuable."
"The cloud-based interface is very user-friendly."
"The stability is good; it's not buggy or glitchy, it works well, the performance is good, and they kept up with security patches."
"My advice to others who plan to use Symantec Messaging Gateway is that it's a very good product, it's very stable, and it's user-friendly, but the only problem is that it doesn't have good partner support here in Bolivia, where I'm located."
"The solution is highly customizable. You can make rules for domains and configure policies for spam or malware. Messaging Gateway is an on-prem solution, so it's useful for companies without a cloud presence."
"The main thing that I appreciate about this product is that the database of spam, malware, and ransomware is very large."
"I've been using Messaging Gateway for ten years."
 

Cons

"The main area for improvement is the pricing."
"The product's price is an area with shortcomings, making it an area where improvements are required."
"Maybe FortiMail's integration could be better."
"In my opinion, points for improvement for Fortinet FortiMail include sometimes the speed and fine-tuning the false positive problems, especially with the signed PDF attachments and the whitelist and blacklist."
"My company pays around 28.000 Egyptian Pounds per year for this program. It is rather expensive in my opinion."
"I have faced issues from one of the customers that they received spam emails. I think they need to look into it and improve their signatures."
"Fortinet FortiMail should allow more flexibility with the content rules."
"I believe there is room for enhancement in content and web security features."
"It will provide Excel reports and PDF reports, but it would be great if they supported the concept of Crystal Reports."
"Sometimes the solution picks up false positive for viruses during scans."
"The biggest problem is it's an on-prem product and we're trying to get out of having equipment in data centers."
"They really need to create a good package that competes with Microsoft."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway should include better exclusions and exceptions for better administration."
"Support could be better. What's also lacking when you compare it with Proofpoint and other threat protection solutions is that it does the basic stuff, but we need more advanced threat handling."
"Messaging Gateway's advanced malware detection could be improved."
"What needs to be improved in Symantec Messaging Gateway is its local partner support, as it's not as technical."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is quite pricey compared to other competitors in the market."
"This is a good solution and value for the money."
"Fortinet Fortimail has reasonable pricing."
"Price-wise, the solution is not far from Microsoft ATP. So, it is affordable."
"Pricing is straight-forward and renewable without complicated pricing structures."
"I have no information on pricing for the competition because right now, my company is working only with Fortinet, but I can say that in general, the price for Fortinet FortiMail was accepted by the customers easily. The POC is also important when a customer is buying a solution. The customer wants to see how the product runs, and as Fortinet FortiMail is a stable product that runs without big issues, it has a bigger chance of getting chosen by customers over its competitors, even if its price may be a little higher. Pricing for the solution is competitive. Sometimes it's less, sometimes it's a little bit higher, but it isn't far from what other solutions charge."
"Compared to its competitors, Fortinet's products are available at a higher price range."
"It is an expensive product."
"They're a little costly compared to Microsoft."
"A subscription for technical support costs extra."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway’s pricing is very cheap."
"For 150 users, we pay INR 1,60,000."
"It's a bit expensive compared to its competitor Barracuda Email Security Gateway but cheaper than Sophos Email."
"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."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
10%
Construction Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Outsourcing Company
19%
Construction Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business33
Midsize Enterprise23
Large Enterprise14
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise9
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiMail?
I think they should improve Fortinet FortiMail on-premises by enhancing its user interface. Additional features they could have in the future would include advanced analytics capabilities. I do thi...
What is your primary use case for Fortinet FortiMail?
I do have a partnership with Fortinet. I have been both a partner and reseller.
Ask a question
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Also Known As

FortiMail
Symantec.cloud, Symantec Email Security.cloud
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Magromer Cueros y Pieles S.A.
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 Proofpoint, Microsoft, Check Point Software Technologies and others in Email Security. Updated: October 2026.
920,939 professionals have used our research since 2012.