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Hillstone E-Series vs SonicWall NSa comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 16, 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

Hillstone E-Series
Ranking in Firewalls
41st
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
SSL VPN (10th), Enterprise Infrastructure VPN (24th)
SonicWall NSa
Ranking in Firewalls
26th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
89
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Hillstone E-Series is 0.9%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SonicWall NSa is 1.4%, down from 1.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Firewalls Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
SonicWall NSa1.4%
Hillstone E-Series0.9%
Other97.7%
Firewalls
 

Featured Reviews

TahirMahmood - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Manager at Zubair Feeds
Offers good features like URL filtering, IPS, and IDS to users
We received an update for the tool in July. The update was provided for the tool as there was a problem with the firewall, where too much memory was consumed, and the firewall was hanging a lot. When we updated the tool's features, everything became okay. The tool only had some memory-related problems. It took the tool a month to fix the issues.
Mahendra Basera - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr. Engineer at InterGlobe Technology Quotient
Automated breach prevention has protected critical workloads and keeps external attacks blocked
I am familiar with SonicWall TZ. I have done a POC of TZ but I have not worked extensively with it. I have worked with the 2600 firewall and then the 3600. These are the models which we have worked with.SonicWall NSa was an on-premises solution. The two firewalls which were in production, in the data center and on the LAN side, were both on-premises solutions. We had a pre-decided budget under which we would purchase the firewall. All parameters including security, high availability, and budget concerns were covered with SonicWall NSa being implemented at that time. SonicWall NSa is a user-friendly product that is easy to configure, and it is easy for network personnel and firewall administrators to work with. Even the L1 team captured and learned this firewall effectively, helping us resolve all parameters related to high availability firewalls within budget-friendly costs. I rate this review a nine 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

"I am impressed with the application filtering feature."
"This solution has two main features that we find very valuable; a threat-intelligence option, and a web/application filtering option. The technical support team are very good and very quick."
"If an organization is not looking for a web proxy, it's a very, very good product."
"Working with the Hillstone E-Series has, from a remote perspective, allowed me to give my clients secure connectivity from a remote location to their offices or their servers."
"Very reliable solution with good scalability and straightforward implementation."
"Five out of five ROI."
"The most valuable features of the Hillstone E-Series are its hardware capacity, innovation, and the throughput that the hardware can take."
"With Hillstone, TCO and ROI are very good, it's an easy sale."
"It has good reporting, the reporting is marvelous, but reporting is always after the fact and you want to be proactive if you're a firewall."
"The features that I have found most valuable are the firewalling, which is very good and the GUI which is very intuitive. It is easy to use, and provides great security."
"Our primary use case for SonicWall NSa is as a public firewall, as an interface between our private network and the public network."
"SonicWall provides endpoint security with advanced protection. Moreover, SonicWall includes access points and additional features."
"As a company product, SonicWall firewalls and their support has been excellent."
"What I like best about SonicWall NSa is the security it offers compared to other solutions in the market. Its reduction rate is also better than others."
"It has a very good user interface."
"The security is great, it has great performance, the prices are similar to other vendors and the support is good."
 

Cons

"The tool provides just a general report. It does not provide a granular report. Hence, the tool should work on its reporting feature."
"The room for improvement would be the SSL VPN license cost."
"SSL VPN license cost is not cheap."
"Having frequent live webinars on a monthly basis would really help."
"The tool needs to improve its price."
"Support from Hillstone E-Series has a shortcoming that needs improvement."
"I am not sure if this solution offers active directory integration. Adding that feature will definitely be an advantage."
"The solution doesn't have a web proxy built into the system like Sophos. This is something they should work to change."
"We have used other solutions such as pfSense and Linux native firewalls. I prefer SonicWall NSa but if you are going to use something for an enterprise you need another solution."
"Certain features like SD-WAN are sometimes confusing to configure."
"The logging, reporting, and storage capacity size could improve in a future release."
"SonicWall NSa needs to make their product more user-friendly."
"Needs a more detailed reporting feature."
"The product could expand its throughput capacity."
"The support is not up to the mark because the quality is lacking; however, SonicWall has been in the market for a while, so people are aware of its qualities, and being a cost-effective product, it is very good."
"We still get phishing emails that manage to come through from time to time."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost per year for licensing, and hardware, is approximately $850 for the basic plan."
"The licensing model is very complex with many subcategories of licenses you can purchase. They could make it more simplified for customers to understand."
"The tool's pricing is reasonable. It depends on the model. The product's pricing is around 600 USD. You need to buy a software license to activate the features. You need to pay around 150 USD for that."
"Hillstone's pricing is economical and neither very high nor very low."
"While I don't know the exact amount off the top of my head, I would estimate the licensing package was about $15,000 to $20,000 a year."
"SonicWall NSa has reasonable pricing. My company pays for it yearly, but I forgot how much the company pays. From what I remember, you only pay for the license fees."
"Licensed features provide application control, content filtering, antivirus, and anti-malware all in a single appliance."
"The solution is cheaper than others."
"The return on investment is very good."
"You need their analyzer to properly generate reports. This is an expensive, licensed feature, with a complex application or appliance back-end."
"Normally, when we buy any product, we buy it with a five-year service built into it. Later on, depending on the growth of the organization, we go for a new one or an upgrade."
"The price is high. I would rate it four to five out of ten."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
16%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Construction Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise1
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business56
Midsize Enterprise21
Large Enterprise24
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SonicWall NSa?
I am overall satisfied with everything, including the price.
What needs improvement with SonicWall NSa?
The CPU configuration for SonicWall NSa, based on my experience, is average. It should be increased somewhat because we are not always aware of the load under varying organizational working standar...
What is your primary use case for SonicWall NSa?
We have SonicWall NSa models including NSA 2600, NSA 3600, and 6600 firewalls in our environment.We have used the Deep Packet Inspection feature of SonicWall NSa. We adopted a security package that...
 

Also Known As

No data available
NSA 250M, NSA 2600, NSA 3600, NSA 4600, NSA 5600, Dell SonicWALL NSA
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Bank of China Macao, Instituto Tecnológico Bolivariano, Ministry of Labor in San Salvador, FEDCO
Orange County Rescue Mission, First Source, Michaels & Taylor, Green Clinic Health System, Aspire Chiltern Skills and Enterprise Centre, UnitedStack, Faith Lutheran College Redlands, Celtic Manor Resort, Star Kay White, Air Works, Unimat Life, NHS Yorkshire and Humber Commissioning Support (YHCS), Hutt City Council, Mato Grosso do Sul, Nspyre
Find out what your peers are saying about Hillstone E-Series vs. SonicWall NSa and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
915,341 professionals have used our research since 2012.