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Hillstone T-Series vs KerioControl 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

Fortinet FortiGate
Sponsored
Ranking in Firewalls
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
580
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (2nd), Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) (1st), Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (1st), WAN Edge (1st), ZTNA (1st), Unified Threat Management (UTM) (1st)
Hillstone T-Series
Ranking in Firewalls
42nd
Average Rating
7.4
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
KerioControl
Ranking in Firewalls
26th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
58
Ranking in other categories
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) (16th), Unified Threat Management (UTM) (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 18.8%, down from 20.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Hillstone T-Series is 0.2%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of KerioControl is 1.1%, down from 1.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Firewalls Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Fortinet FortiGate18.8%
KerioControl1.1%
Hillstone T-Series0.2%
Other79.9%
Firewalls
 

Featured Reviews

Vasu Gala - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
TahirMahmood - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Manager at Zubair Feeds
Is stable and has a user-friendly dashboard and a good interface
We installed Hillstone T-Series after a ransomware attack. The dashboard and user interface are very good We cannot secure a specific IP class with this firewall. Another loophole with Hillstone T-Series is that when we connect through WiFi and turn our hot spot on, all who connect through the…
MM
Senior Systems Tech/Admin at Samco Software Inc.
Comprehensive Security Features and High Ease of Setup Elevate User Experience
The best features for KerioControl are its proprietary VPN protocol, which does not connect easily with other firewalls unless you enable IPsec. It will only connect to KerioControl. KerioControl is very valuable for business. Key points where KerioControl is valuable include its own anti-spam, intrusion prevention, and antivirus, which is included in the yearly subscription renewals. The VPN capabilities are helpful in managing my remote or distributed workforce, as we create documents and set up a location for clients to download. Clients can download KerioControl's VPN client online, and they just have to log in from the VPN client, which connects easily. I assess the firewall function in filtering both incoming and outgoing network traffic with KerioControl as excellent. Everything is logged, and any intrusion, antivirus, virus, or anything foreign to the system trying to hack in gets logged, and we can easily block those IPs.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Fortinet FortiGate brings numerous benefits to my company."
"Good load balancing feature."
"FortiGate Next Generation Firewall's design is good...I am very impressed with the product's stability."
"The most valuable feature of Fortinet FortiGate IPS is its efficiency."
"We are using the FortiGate 100D series. VPN, firewall, anti-malware, OTM, and intrusion prevention are useful features."
"The product is scalable."
"The CLI and GUI do a good job of putting a lot at your fingertips."
"The solution has helped our organization secure our network and connect remote sites."
"It has been stable so far."
"The only firewall able to monitor traffic from a CCTV network. Can detect unauthorized devices plugged into the network, which standard firewalls can't do."
"We installed Hillstone T-Series after a ransomware attack. The dashboard and user interface are very good."
"The user interface and the ease of use are pretty good. Everything fits together so nicely."
"The firewall and intrusion detection features are very useful these days because hackers have a lot of tricks that they use to get into a system. With Kerio Control you can see something that's happening. Otherwise, you have to use other tools to see what's happening on the firewalls. Having IPS in it is quite useful for us."
"All of the features of Kerio Control are equally good. Most valuable to us are the firewall rules, the intrusion detection system, and IP address features."
"The product is easy to use."
"When one of the employees of my customers is using the VPN Client, I have created for them that they will always get a message. When the VPN Client connects to Kerio Control from the outside, they will get an email so they know when they are connected and when they are disconnected what is happening to their network."
"The solution has an app manager and a portal where you can maintain all your Keri products. It is a firewall that includes antivirus and anti-malware, which adds security. The VPNs, both site-to-site and client VPNs, are pretty easy to set up."
"The routing of the multiple internet physical routers I have is the most valuable feature of this solution. Instead of me physically unplugging a cable from one router to the server, if one connection goes down, it automatically switches for me. So I can have all three of them plugged in. If one goes down, it just picks up the other one automatically. There's no physical cable swapping."
"I have found the most valuable features of Kerio Control to be the IPS and firewall."
 

Cons

"For Fortinet FortiGate, their code development would definitely be something they need to improve on to reduce vulnerabilities that need to be patched."
"The price could be improved."
"In most cases, the IPS engine uses too many resources, which makes Fortinet FortiGate devices unstable."
"There's always something new that can be added or fixed."
"It would be nice if backups could more easily migrate between different models."
"Their support's response time can be better. In the past six months, they took quite a long time to respond to the support tickets."
"The solution could improve the integration."
"One of the problems I was having was with user mapping, and it is an issue for which I have escalated tickets with Fortinet support."
"Another loophole with Hillstone T-Series is that when we connect through WiFi and turn our hot spot on, all who connect through the hotspot get all the functions, and the security does not work."
"Licensing is not cheap."
"They have a very good technical support team, but I think there are some communication issues due to language differences."
"I find it a bit costly to pay for the products that I am not using. They need to change their model in such a way that you don't have to pay for the products that you are not using. Its local support and scalability are also not good. I am looking forward to a more scalable product that will be able to grow with time and technology."
"Support responses need improvement."
"Filtering of pages and greater personalization in services need improvement."
"Kerio Control has just improved on their biggest problem, which was to introduce better support for high-availability requirements in production."
"When it comes to dealing with updates, there are often bugs on the solution. They should do a lot more testing before they release new versions."
"There were certain things I didn't know about it, but I've always been able to just contact our IT company. They've been able to walk me through certain things. It was quite a monumental task to set up a public site. Support really had to help me with setting up the VLANs and walk me through it. It was not possible for me to figure that out on my own, but that's what they're here for. That could have been a little bit easier laid out."
"Improvements are needed to the Next Generation Firewall Protection, specifically with user-level protection."
"The one thing that did put me off of the solution was that, after they were taken over by GFI, the licensing and a few other items have gotten very complicated."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is quite affordable for our customers. There is a separate cost for IPS, antivirus, web filtering, and other features. They have a great choice of licenses. You can go for the license that you want, which is quite useful."
"The license is yearly. We pay for the top end. It's called 360."
"If you purchase a one-year subscription with the hardware and then you want to renew for the second year, it is very costly."
"I rate FortiGate Next Generation Firewall a five out of ten for pricing."
"If you are looking for a quality product, it will come at a higher price. Expecting them to be significantly cheaper is unrealistic. In terms of pricing, it is a bit costly. However, the functionality and support offered are worth it."
"The pricing for the product is alright."
"Currently, we are paying about $1,500 a month for three sites."
"Its licenses cost the same for different subscription plans."
"We got a much cheaper price than that provided by Fortinet right now."
"On a scale from one to ten, with one being low and ten being high price, I would rate the price of Hillstone T-Series at three. There are no additional costs other than renewal costs."
"Search and compare."
"The yearly maintenance fee is a bit high for the Kerio Control Boxes. The end of life for the devices is kind of short. It seems like they're making you upgrade within a short period of time. They should at least allow five years, but it seems like they are changing their end of life to be shorter to generate revenue."
"Its licensing is yearly. You renew every year. Its price is all-inclusive."
"Licensing is easier with Kerio Control. With FortiGate, we realized the licensing is really hectic, because if you skip one year, you have to back pay that year. If you skip two years, you have to back pay two years. With Kerio Control, if a license expires, one year later you can just reactivate and go on."
"The pricing is in-line with our expectations in terms of the quality that we get for it."
"I think it is a bit on the pricey side, but it's okay. I've got 50 licenses which I think is $250 a year or something like that."
"Its initial cost is less as compared to other products. It becomes a bit costly when you pay for the products that you don't use. We paid for almost all the products through subscription, but we are using only a few products. We use EndPointSecurity, Kerio Connect, WebMonitor, and LanGuard. We don't use the rest of the products."
"On the low-end device that I use, it has unlimited IP addresses. So, they have a subscription model where, on the higher models, you pay X dollars for 10 IP addresses. Then, if you want any more, you have to pay more on the model. On the low-end model, it has unlimited IP addresses, because if you have too many users, the thing will just slow you down and stop working. At some point, you need to say, "Okay, I've grown to a point where performance is impacted. I need to get some bigger hardware." If I get to that stage, I will possibly look at using one of the virtual appliances and putting it on some bigger hardware."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
6%
No data available
Computer Software Company
18%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business357
Midsize Enterprise133
Large Enterprise188
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business44
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise3
 

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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 is your experience regarding pricing and costs for KerioControl?
KerioControl offers good pricing as one license covers all features needed without extra payment. The price for the p...
What needs improvement with KerioControl?
Regarding KerioControl's application awareness and control feature, I have not used it much.
What is your primary use case for KerioControl?
With KerioControl, we usually use them for site-to-site VPNs for most of our clients. With multiple offices, we use K...
 

Also Known As

Fortinet FortiGate Next-Generation Firewall
Hillstone T-Series Intelligent Next-Generation Firewalls, Hillstone iNGFW
No data available
 

Overview

 

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
University of Córdoba
Triton Technical, McDonald's
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