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Fortra's Alert Logic MDR vs Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 2, 2025

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

Fortra's Alert Logic MDR
Ranking in SOC as a Service
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (28th), Managed Detection and Response (MDR) (19th)
Palo Alto Networks Cortex X...
Ranking in SOC as a Service
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
47
Ranking in other categories
Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the SOC as a Service category, the mindshare of Fortra's Alert Logic MDR is 6.8%, down from 9.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR is 19.6%, up from 12.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
SOC as a Service
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2191746 - PeerSpot reviewer
It's a highly mature, competitively priced solution that provides total visibility into your ecosystem. FORTRA's Alert Logic has the only Cybersecurity Platform that integrates XDR+WAF+VM+DLP in one.
Alert Logic offers total visibility into the client's IT ecosystem. The solution's intrusion detection system inspects 100 percent of the network packets and installs universal agents on all physical and virtual servers for log collection. Alert Logic also aggregates logs of the client's various 3rd Party security tools into a single pane of glass. All of the analytics from those data feeds got to a 24/7 SOC with sophisticated resources. Alert Logic has massive threat intelligence resources to provide additional context to the incident response declarations. They do all the heavy lifting for clients who lack the technology and resources to operate their own SOC. The client is solely responsible for the incident response component. The macro analytics resides on Alert Logic's cloud. You have the ECM response and business application team on the client side. Everything works in tandem, which is the only way you can deal with the advanced threats we face today, especially the ransomware families. If you don't respond in minutes, you're in trouble.
NikhilSharma2 - PeerSpot reviewer
Ability to multiple playbooks to fetch data from multiple firewalls and utomated several tasks, including vulnerability scans and SOCL (Security Orchestration, Automation
Recently, they started implementing microservices in XSOAR, which has improved quality and addressed previous issues. However, they should focus more on licensing costs. The user licensing fees are quite high. For example, I received a quote for XSOAR, and it was $12,000 per user per year. If you have a SOC team of 30 members/analysts, you're looking at a substantial expense. They should consider reducing these costs since this high pricing seems to be more about profit. So, there is room for improvement in the pricing. Moreover, the reporting and dashboard features are decent but could be improved. The user interface (UI) is quite heavy and takes time to load, which is a major drawback.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We receive infrastructure security warnings from it. So, we know what is going on and what needs to be addressed."
"The installation and configuration were slick."
"The initial setup is pretty straightforward."
"Notifications and the detail of notifications are most valuable. It is a user-friendly solution."
"The solution was consistently available, and I cannot recall any instances where it was down."
"It improves our security. Before, we didn't have anything scanning our containers. We had software scanning all the physical servers, but we had nothing to scan our containers. With Alert Logic, we can do that."
"Everything is in one dashboard; I'm notified when there's an incident and advised on what steps to take."
"It has the ability to install agents. It is pretty straightforward. You can automate the process pretty easily."
"The product can automate security tasks."
"It is quite scalable. I would rate it a ten out of ten."
"What I appreciate most about Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR is that it is very open, even more so than Anomali."
"Many different playbooks are available and can be customized."
"Its agility and scalability are valuable."
"The most valuable features are simplicity and ease of integration."
"From the security team's standpoint, the solution has improved our organization's overall cybersecurity."
"Cortex XSOAR's playbook for incident management and automation is highly valuable."
 

Cons

"Alert Logic needs to expand its SOCs to serve more markets, such as the Middle East and Asia. There should be infrastructure that covers more time zones. The company should also develop an EDR that is natively integrated into their solution. Currently, a client must buy another EDR solution like CrowdStrike or Sophos. I think Alert Logic is developing this. Built-in email security could also be developed and integrated."
"We'd like to have triggered alerts sent to us so we see errors quicker."
"The product needs to mature. We don't want to be bombarded with unnecessary issues and have the real ones slip through."
"They have ideas and email you whatever they find, but they don't have a dedicated security team who will work on an attack or a specific security instance."
"I would like to see it do initial scans and start capturing data, which it will truly analyze, not just be a reporting system saying, "Here is an email. Here is an email. Here is an email.""
"I would like more data on the alert payload. It would be good to have the ability to customize the alert payload to add whatever data that we want on there. Right now, it is a bit limited."
"The documentation, especially with the initial setup, needs improvement."
"As a user involved with the user interface, I believe there is a need to continue improving it based on feedback from our customers."
"The solution's correlation rules and playbooks should be improved."
"Palo Alto needs to develop more AI-centric products."
"The configuration of the solution could improve it is difficult."
"The product can be tailored for each deployment to respond to specific customer needs, and this complexity may be seen as a downside."
"The platform’s setup procedures could be streamlined compared to one of its competitors."
"The dashboard performance could be improved."
"The solution’s price and technical support could be improved."
"The tool’s multi-tenancy feature must be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Alert Logic has better competitive pricing than some of its competitors."
"Price of the solution was very reasonable considering the size of our organization at the time, and so it worked out perfectly."
"Our ROI would probably be zero. We don't even use it. It sits in there. We get emails and just delete them. Around the world, we don't even use it."
"Almost any product that is on the AWS Marketplace is super easy to subscribe to."
"Its pricing is very reasonable considering what you get for what you pay. There is quite a good value there. Its licensing is also very logical. They've got the licensing price points at a reasonable level. It is on a monthly license but a yearly contract. There are no additional costs to the standard licensing fees."
"When I first looked at Demisto, it had a price tag of $250,000 but when we finally purchased it, it was $345,000."
"The price of Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR could be reduced. We are always looking for a discount. There is an annual license needed to use this solution."
"The solution is a bit on the expensive side."
"There is a perception that it is priced very high compared to other solutions."
"The price of Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR is comparable to other solutions in the market."
"My company did not make any payments towards the licensing costs attached to the product since we were only using its pilot version."
"Palo Alto offers significant discounts to customers who purchase the products repeatedly."
"The pricing is fair. The pricing reflects the value and feature set it offers."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
20%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Healthcare Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR?
Even though customers often comment on the price, the potential savings come from managing a large number of security events with a limited number of analysts. This leads to economic advantages des...
What needs improvement with Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR?
For Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR, there is always room for improvement. One of the significant issues we encounter is system slowdown when we receive an influx of alerts, which inhibits how quic...
 

Also Known As

Alert Logic MDR, Alert Logic Managed Detection and ResponseAlert Logic Threat Manager, Alert Logic Cloud Defender, Critical Watch FusionVM
Demisto Enterprise, Cortex XSOAR, Demisto
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Cellcom Israel, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas City, esri, Cylance, Flatiron Health, Veeva, ADT Cybersecurity
Find out what your peers are saying about Fortra's Alert Logic MDR vs. Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
859,129 professionals have used our research since 2012.