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Hillstone T-Series vs Palo Alto Networks VM-Series 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
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
373
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (1st), WAN Edge (1st)
Hillstone T-Series
Ranking in Firewalls
40th
Average Rating
7.4
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Palo Alto Networks VM-Series
Ranking in Firewalls
13th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
64
Ranking in other categories
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 21.2%, up from 17.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Hillstone T-Series is 0.1%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Palo Alto Networks VM-Series is 0.9%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Firewalls
 

Featured Reviews

Vasu Gala - PeerSpot reviewer
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
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…
RonnieYazdani - PeerSpot reviewer
User-friendly CLI and efficient dashboard streamline operations with robust security features
I find Palo Alto Networks VM-Series easy to deploy, and none of my customers have had significant complaints. My customers have high certifications provided by Palo Alto Networks. The friendly dashboard and the ability to easily command and use the CLI make Palo Alto Networks VM-Series a better product. It offers robust solutions, making it valuable to my customers.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable features of Fortinet FortiGate are the different types of profiling. It has been the most effective for me. The WAF and the antivirus profile are the most effective in network protection."
"This product is definitely scalable."
"There is an easy process for configuring it, and it is straightforward to implement the device from scratch."
"​Easy to implement, and it is also reliable.​"
"The most important features of Fortinet FortiGate are the Intrusion Prevention System (IPS) and firewall control applications."
"The best features of Fortinet FortiGate are that it does the job effectively and protects our environment."
"Security, SD-WAN, and Streetscape are valuable features."
"The most valuable feature is the ease of configuration."
"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."
"With the improved visibility we now have, the traffic is being properly monitored, which means that we are better able to manage it. These are improvements that we saw very quickly."
"The solution strengthens our IT posture."
"The most valuable features are security and support."
"Palo Alto's robust threat intelligence supports new updates, and I can open cases directly with their Threat Intelligence team."
"The feature that I have found the most useful is that it meets all our requirements technically."
"You already can scale it if you put it in Auto Scaling groups. If you put it in a load balancer, it should already be able to scale."
"The solution enables organizations to enforce policies."
"The threat prevention and WildFire features are the most valuable features. DNS is another good feature of the product."
 

Cons

"Fortinet needs to overhaul its documentation."
"Fortinet currently has many products bundled with FortiGate including the basic firewall and load balancer, and I think that that they need to have separate product portfolios for each of these specialized services."
"Technical support for this solution can be improved."
"At the moment, the main concern is the pricing and the type of licensing. Fortinet offers different types of licensing, and my idea is that the best approach is to have only one, two, or a maximum of three types of licensing."
"It's my understanding that more of the current generation features could be brought in. There could be more integration with EDRs, for example."
"The updates Fortinet provides are sometimes unstable."
"They could simplify their deployment process, especially when customers have existing devices."
"We would like to have the ability to disable some of the security functionalities."
"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 difficult to reach technical support at Palo Alto Networks."
"The only minor issue we've faced is with the app's ID configuration, which requires specific matching for application filtering."
"It would be good if the common features work consistently in physical and virtual environments. There was an integration issue in the virtual deployment where it didn't report the interface counters, and we had to upgrade to the latest version, whereas the same thing has been working in the physical deployment for ages now. It seems that it was because of Azure. We were using VMware before, and we didn't have any such issues. We do see such small issues where we expect things to work, but they don't because of some incompatibilities. There also seems to be a limitation on how to do high availability in a virtualized environment. All features should be consistently available in physical and virtual environments. It is not always easy to integrate Palo Alto in the network management system. We would like to be able to compare two network management systems. They can maybe allow monitoring an interface through the GUI to create a reference or do a baseline check about whether your network monitoring system is actually giving you the correct traffic figures. You need traffic figures to be able to recognize the trends and plan the capacity."
"We don't know how it will scale once we start putting more load on it."
"Just sometimes it can be a bit sluggish navigating through pages. That is just purely because of Java.​"
"There is a need for two-factor authentication, particularly for VPN and CloudProtect."
"The performance of VM instances has some limitations in terms of threshold and throughput compared to appliances."
"The scalability could be improved further."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of FortiGate is average and I would say that based on the top five products available on the market, it is in the affordable range."
"While Fortinet FortiGate has a higher price point compared to Sophos XG, its user-friendly interface justifies the cost."
"By default, they give SD-WAN along with the firewall. They don't have separate licensing for the SD-WAN functionality. However, they have security licenses that are sold separately on a subscription basis. Customers can consume these security features to protect their users from internet traffic."
"Work through partners for the best pricing."
"The price of Fortinet FortiGate could improve, it is expensive."
"The price of FortiGate is good."
"We find the most valuable aspect of this solution is the price. It is affordable, and cheaper than other firewalls."
"Its price is good."
"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."
"We got a much cheaper price than that provided by Fortinet right now."
"Palo Alto can be as much as two times the price of competing products that have twice the capabilities."
"Do not buy larges box if you do not need them. Rightsizing is a great task to do before​hand."
"The license fee is slightly high."
"We found purchasing process the product on the AWS Marketplace to be very good."
"Because the solution was getting deployed on AWS, it was the best place to go and it was available there."
"We used BYOL, because of the cost to own."
"It is not the cheapest on the market. The total cost for two firewall instances is $75,000. This includes licenses, deployment fees, and support for two years."
"The product is cheaper than the on-premise version."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Educational Organization
12%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
20%
Computer Software Company
17%
Real Estate/Law Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

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...
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...
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 ...
Ask a question
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Features comparison between Palo Alto and Fortinet firewalls
In the best tradition of these questions, Feature-wise both are quite similar, but each has things it's better at, it...
How does Azure Firewall compare with Palo Alto Networks VM Series?
Both products are very stable and easily scalable. The setup of Azure Firewall is easy and very user-friendly and the...
 

Also Known As

FortiGate 60b, FortiGate 60c, FortiGate 80c, FortiGate 50b, FortiGate 200b, FortiGate 110c, FortiGate, Fortinet 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
Warren Rogers Associates
Find out what your peers are saying about Hillstone T-Series vs. Palo Alto Networks VM-Series and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
859,957 professionals have used our research since 2012.