Hillstone E-Series vs SonicWall TZ comparison

Hillstone Networks and SonicWall are both solutions in the Firewalls category. Hillstone Networks is ranked #39 with an average rating of 8.0, while SonicWall is ranked #19 with an average rating of 9.0. Hillstone Networks holds a 0.4% mindshare in Firewalls, compared to SonicWall’s 2.2% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Hillstone Networks users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 88% of SonicWall users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 25, 2026

SonicWall TZ and Hillstone E-Series compete within the firewall and network security category. SonicWall TZ seems to have the upper hand due to its affordability, ease of use, and comprehensive security features.

Features: The SonicWall TZ series is known for its ease of use, straightforward firewall policy configuration, and high level of security and throughput. Features like advanced intrusion prevention and deep packet inspection stand out. The Hillstone E-Series is praised for its innovation, hardware capacity, and virtual switching capabilities, providing an integrated solution without the need for additional hardware.

Room for Improvement: SonicWall TZ users suggest improvements in mail security, application detection, and reporting tools. Challenges include complex interfaces and technical support inefficiencies. Recommendations for Hillstone E-Series include a simplified licensing model, better support responsiveness, and improvements in memory management and ticketing processes.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: SonicWall TZ is primarily deployed on-premises with some cloud options, known for its easy setup but mixed technical support experiences. Hillstone E-Series, also primarily deployed on-premises, offers knowledgeable support yet experiences delays in ticketing processes.

Pricing and ROI: SonicWall TZ offers competitive pricing but its subscription models can increase costs. It provides significant ROI through security enhancements. Hillstone E-Series is noted for economical pricing with a complex licensing model, offering cost-effectiveness with stability and security features.

To learn more, read our detailed Hillstone E-Series vs. SonicWall TZ Report (Updated: February 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Hillstone E-Series vs. SonicWall TZ

February 2026

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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 FortiGate

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 18.7%, down from 20.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Hillstone E-Series is 0.4%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SonicWall TZ is 2.2%, down from 2.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Firewalls Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Fortinet FortiGate	18.7%
SonicWall TZ	2.2%
Hillstone E-Series	0.4%
Other	78.7%

Firewalls

Featured Reviews

Vasu Gala

Manager, Information Technology Operation/Presales at TechMonarch

A stable solution with an intuitive interface and quick customer service

I have been working with Fortinet FortiGate, WatchGuard, Sophos, and SonicWall. I'm not as comfortable with SonicWall because of their UI and limitations. I prefer Fortinet above all other options. When it comes to configuration, I am confident in my ability to handle various tasks, including creating policies such as firewall rules, web policies, and application policies. Additionally, I can configure VPNs and implement load balancing, among other tasks. Overall, I feel much more comfortable working with Fortinet. Fortinet has made significant improvements by integrating AI with firewalls for threat analysis and prevention. In the past 2-3 years, they have launched FortiSASE and SIEM, and they also provide SOC services. Both Palo Alto and Fortinet FortiGate are excellent. While Fortinet FortiGate comes at higher prices, the functionality and support justify the cost. They promptly resolve firmware issues and inform all support providers about configuration changes.

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TahirMahmood

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.

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Fernando Kavindra Fernando

Senior Pre-sales and Solutions Engineer - Cyber Security at Enterprise Technology (Pvt) Ltd

Web filtering and traffic balancing have improved security for SMBs but threat insight still needs work

I assess the machine learning capabilities of SonicWall TZ in proactive threat detection to not be at the level of other vendors such as Palo Alto Networks, Fortinet, and Check Point. It is somewhere in between, so I would not recommend it for a large enterprise-level organization to rely on because it is not at that level. SonicWall TZ's content filtering service is reliable. We have used it, but it is not very reliable compared to brands such as Fortinet, Palo Alto Networks, or Check Point. What could be improved about SonicWall TZ is the threat intelligence, which by far is not at the level of vendors such as Fortinet, Palo Alto Networks, and Check Point. Their threat intelligence needs to be improved, as does the GUI, which is not as user-friendly compared to devices such as Fortinet. They could learn from their competitors by making the product more user-friendly. The product interface is not that user-friendly. By adopting a more user-friendly GUI, improving threat intelligence, and enhancing the available guides would be beneficial. In my understanding, in some cases, the KB articles and knowledge articles were not that efficient. They were useful, but they could have been more precise with the knowledge base articles. They need to provide more information about SonicWall TZ, specifically more documentation and more troubleshooting articles. Other than the threat intelligence and the user-friendly GUI, there are no other additional features that I can think of for SonicWall TZ in the future or at least in the next release to make it more competitive.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The key features include SD-WAN, firewall use, intrusion prevention, intrusion detection, and application control."

"Web filtering is the most useful feature."

"Secure, user-friendly, stable, and scalable network security solution. Installation is straightforward."

"It offers web filtering capabilities at a more affordable price compared to other solutions like PSMs or NETGEAR."

"The IPS is good. It protect my network from attackers."

"FortiGate is more feature-rich and has a broader range of hardware. T"

"Fortinet FortiGate brings numerous benefits to my company."

"The SD-WAN feature is the most valuable. This feature evolved from link load balancing. It has helped us in terms of our uptime and privatizing applications whenever we experience an outage. The SD-WAN feature has been a plus for us. Two-factor authentication has allowed us to add more users in terms of remote working. We have two-factor authentication for remote workers to authenticate them before they get on the network."

More Fortinet FortiGate pros

"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."

"The most valuable feature of the Hillstone E-Series is its user-friendliness."

"The initial setup was straightforward. It only took a few hours to deploy."

"The most valuable feature of the solution is the ransomware protection that the tool offers."

"The installation is easy, we have not had any complaints from our customers."

"The most valuable features of the Hillstone E-Series are its hardware capacity, innovation, and the throughput that the hardware can take."

"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."

More Hillstone E-Series pros

"The product is easy to deploy."

"I have found this solution to be easier to use when compared to other products, such as those offered by Cisco."

"I've found the technical support to be helpful."

"The most valuable features are security and technical support."

"The advanced gateway security features such as web filter, application control filter, IPS, ideas, gateway antivirus, anti-spyware, and botnet filter are valuable."

"The general feature is the antivirus policy, followed by the ransomware protection, and these are the features I was looking at."

"From our point of view, the most valuable feature was the ease of deployment."

"Access restriction and IP whitelisting are the most valuable features."

More SonicWall TZ pros

Cons

"I wish that they could integrate zero-trust technology into Fortinet FortiGate. I am not sure whether it has been done already, but if they could implement that, it would help significantly."

"I would rate the technical support of Fortinet a six or seven out of ten. It is not very helpful. I would like to see improvements in their support."

"There's a limitation wherein you can only have about 30 virtual or secondary IPs on a particular interface."

"The stability of Fortinet FortiGate could improve."

"I don't really have anything negative to say as far as Fortinet firewalls are concerned. If anything, they can support a user a little bit better. They can stop being so time-sensitive about how much time the support call has taken, and they can help you do it yourself."

"The management consoles can be improved."

"The documentation available for Fortinet FortiGate should be improved"

"In the next release, maybe the documentation on how to use this solution could be improved."

More Fortinet FortiGate cons

"SSL VPN license cost is not cheap."

"The solution doesn't have a web proxy built into the system like Sophos. This is something they should work to change."

"The tool needs to improve its price."

"The current usage reporting is very basic."

"The tool only had some memory-related problems."

"The tool provides just a general report. It does not provide a granular report. Hence, the tool should work on its reporting feature."

"I am not sure if this solution offers active directory integration. Adding that feature will definitely be an advantage."

"Having frequent live webinars on a monthly basis would really help."

More Hillstone E-Series cons

"The stability could be a lot better."

"There is a point I don't like about SonicWall in the past and now. Most of the destinations we look at when we're detecting some user using too much bandwidth or something like that, SonicWall just gave us destination IP address, instead of the full qualified domain name. I think that's the most important part that is still missing. I think that's the most important for us."

"We have been facing issues with reporting."

"It could be made more user friendly."

"Sometimes there is a glitch between the network connection. Last time, something happened on our IP phone, the SonicWall team did some updates to fix the issue. However, glitches happen very rarely. I did not experience any other types of problems."

"The market seems to be going to a cloud-supported, new generation of firewall products. I think that's probably going to be important to us, the next time around."

"The cost of the solution has room for improvement."

"The VPN that is available in the new version is a bit bulky and slower in speed."

More SonicWall TZ cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's an expensive solution."

"The price of Fortinet FortiGate when compared to other solutions is high. However, my knowledge of the price is from third parties and I am not sure how accurate it is. I typically work in the technical area of my organization."

"The platform offers a reasonable price point compared to its competitors."

"It is too expensive for us. My organization is very small, and we have a total of ten users. We have three internal users and seven external users. The FortiGate 100D series is too expensive for renewing the licenses."

"It's a very full-featured and it's priced well solution."

"We just pay a flat monthly fee to the vendor for the support."

"This is not a cheap solution but it isn't expensive, either. It's a good solution for the right price."

"It has been two years. I don't remember the actual price, but it was affordable. We buy the boxes and then use the license for three years."

More Fortinet FortiGate pricing and cost advice

"Hillstone's pricing is economical and neither very high nor very low."

"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."

"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 cost per year for licensing, and hardware, is approximately $850 for the basic plan."

"It has a yearly subscription."

"The product is not expensive, but it is not cheap."

"You need to purchase multiple licenses to manage multiple devices which is cost-prohibitive for the value you would receive."

"The prices are expensive."

"It comes to a range between five hundred to seven hundred dollars."

"Its pricing is okay as compared to other solutions."

"The price is high compared to some other solutions."

"Licensing costs have been around $2,000. There are no other costs above the standard licensing fees."

More SonicWall TZ pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

12%

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Comms Service Provider

15%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

Educational Organization

Computer Software Company

13%

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

Healthcare Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	357
Midsize Enterprise	133
Large Enterprise	189

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	1

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	63
Midsize Enterprise	16
Large Enterprise	14

Questions from the Community

Which is the better NGFW: Fortinet Fortigate or Cisco Firepower?

When you compare these firewalls you can identify them with different features, advantages, practices and usage a...

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What is the biggest difference between Sophos XG and FortiGate?

From my experience regarding both the Sophos and FortiGate firewalls, I personally would rather use FortiGate. I know...

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What are the biggest technical differences between Sophos UTM and Fortinet FortiGate?

As a solution, Sophos UTM offers a lot of functionality, it scales well, and the stability and performance are quite ...

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What needs improvement with Hillstone E-Series?

We received an update for the tool in July. The update was provided for the tool as there was a problem with the fire...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Hillstone E-Series?

I use the solution in my company for site-to-site VPN, SSL VPNs, URL filtering, IPS, IDS and all the other features w...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Hillstone E-Series?

Our company did not use the tool's micro-segmentation features. There were no issues while integrating the tool. I ha...

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Would you choose Fortinet Fortigate or Sonicwall TZ?

I’ll say it depends on your needs. Fortinet FortiGate and SonicWall TZ are both next-gen firewalls (NGFW) with simila...

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What do you like most about SonicWall TZ?

The most valuable feature of SonicWall TZ is the double authentication, where it asks for one password and again asks...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SonicWall TZ?

The price is normal. It is a nominal cost for an SMB TZ used for SMB businesses. However, more licenses are required ...

See all answers

Comparisons

Sophos Firewall vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 20% of the time

Cisco Secure Firewall vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 14% of the time

Netgate pfSense vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 5% of the time

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 4% of the time

Cisco Meraki MX vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 3% of the time

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OpenVPN Access Server vs Hillstone E-Series

Compared 18% of the time

Sangfor SSL VPN vs Hillstone E-Series

Compared 9% of the time

Hillstone A-Series vs Hillstone E-Series

Compared 9% of the time

Sophos Firewall vs Hillstone E-Series

Compared 7% of the time

Cisco IOS SSL VPN vs Hillstone E-Series

Compared 6% of the time

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Sophos Firewall vs SonicWall TZ

Compared 15% of the time

Cisco Meraki MX vs SonicWall TZ

Compared 8% of the time

Netgate pfSense vs SonicWall TZ

Compared 7% of the time

WatchGuard Firebox vs SonicWall TZ

Compared 7% of the time

SonicWall NSa vs SonicWall TZ

Compared 5% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Fortinet FortiGate

February 2026

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Buyer's Guide

Firewalls

February 2026

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Buyer's Guide

SonicWall TZ

January 2026

Download SonicWall TZ product report

Also Known As

Fortinet FortiGate Next-Generation Firewall

No data available

Dell SonicWALL TZ

Overview

Fortinet FortiGate is a versatile network security tool offering features like VPN, firewall, web filtering, intrusion prevention, and scalability. It is known for its performance and integration with other Fortinet products, making it a preferred choice for robust cybersecurity.

Fortinet FortiGate stands out as a comprehensive cybersecurity solution with strong performance and ease of configuration. It delivers unified threat management, integrating features such as dynamic routing, SD-WAN support, and centralized management. Despite its strengths, improvements in the web interface's stability, pricing structures, and reporting capabilities are needed. Users seek better integration with third-party tools and automation advancements to enhance the experience further. These enhancements, alongside improvements in bandwidth management and the reduction of licensing costs, are points of interest for users looking to capitalize on FortiGate's extensive capabilities.

What are Fortinet FortiGate's key features?

VPN: Ensures secure remote connections.
Firewall: Protects against unauthorized access.
Web Filtering: Blocks malicious sites and content.
Application Control: Manages and controls applications.
Intrusion Prevention: Detects and prevents vulnerabilities.
SSL Inspection: Enhances security by inspecting encrypted traffic.

What benefits should be considered when evaluating Fortinet FortiGate?

Affordability: Offers cost-effective security solutions.
Reliability: Known for consistent and stable performance.
Integration: Seamlessly integrates with other Fortinet products.
Comprehensive Protection: Provides broad threat protection capabilities.

Fortinet FortiGate is widely implemented across industries as a primary firewall system for securing internet gateways and safeguarding data centers. It supports businesses in achieving SD-WAN integration and enhances cybersecurity by providing essential features like antivirus, web filtering, and application control. Enterprises utilize FortiGate for securing remote connections and ensuring compliance with security standards, making it adaptable for different network sizes and industries.

Fortinet

Hillstone E-Series is a comprehensive network security solution designed to protect organizations from advanced threats. It offers a range of features including a firewall, intrusion prevention system (IPS), virtual private network (VPN), and application control.

With its advanced threat intelligence capabilities, E-Series can detect and prevent sophisticated attacks, ensuring the security of critical data and systems. It also provides granular control over applications, allowing organizations to enforce policies and optimize network performance.

E-Series is easy to deploy and manage, with a user-friendly interface and centralized management console. It offers high-performance throughput and scalability, making it suitable for small businesses to large enterprises. With its robust security features and ease of use, Hillstone E-Series is an ideal choice for organizations looking to enhance their network security posture.

Hillstone Networks

The secure, sophisticated SonicWALL TZ is widely deployed at small businesses, retail, government, remote sites and branch offices. It combines high-performance intrusion prevention, malware blocking, content/URL filtering and application control.

SonicWall

Sample Customers

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Dell, HP, Oracle, Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Vodafone, Orange, BT Group, Telstra, Deutsche Telekom, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, CenturyLink, NTT Communications, Tata Communications, SoftBank, China Mobile, Singtel, Telus, Rogers Communications, Bell Canada, Telkom Indonesia, Telkom South Africa, Telmex, Telia Company, Telkom Kenya

Bank of China Macao, Instituto Tecnológico Bolivariano, Ministry of Labor in San Salvador, FEDCO

AeroM_xico Delta TechOps, Unimat

Buyer's Guide

Hillstone E-Series vs. SonicWall TZ

February 2026

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