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IRONSCALES vs Microsoft Defender for Office 365 comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 1, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
5.6
IRONSCALES improves email security, saves time, reduces risks, and offers cost-effective protection against phishing and ransomware attacks.
Sentiment score
7.3
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is praised for enhancing security, reducing costs, and improving productivity with integrated threat protection.
It has also decreased our time to detection and response by about 15 to 20 percent.
Overall, cost of owning and operating our system goes down.
It's hard to quantify the return on investment we've seen from Microsoft Defender for Office 365.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.4
IRONSCALES support is highly rated for responsiveness and efficiency, with improvements and high satisfaction despite minor delays.
Sentiment score
6.0
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 support is mixed, praised for responsiveness but criticized for delays and outdated documentation.
Customer support for IRONSCALES is outstanding.
I would rate their technical support as very good, as they respond promptly when my team opens a ticket.
Over the past two years, there have been no critical problems.
we opened tickets, and they typically resolve them quickly.
Customer service and support have been fantastic.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.6
IRONSCALES efficiently scales with organizational growth, offering seamless integration with Office 365 and minimal maintenance while maintaining performance.
Sentiment score
8.0
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 seamlessly scales for global users, enabling effective cybersecurity with adaptable cloud-based capabilities and careful planning.
We have never faced scalability problems, and Microsoft manages it effectively.
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 scales transparently for us, as we grew from 1,000 users to 3,000 users, and we didn't notice much difference.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.4
IRONSCALES is highly stable and reliable in the cloud, with minimal disruptions and promising future system integrations.
Sentiment score
7.5
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is praised for its stability, reliability, operational effectiveness, and high user satisfaction despite minor issues.
The solution is stable, as we have been using it for the past two years.
I would assess the stability and reliability of Microsoft Defender for Office 365 as very stable, with barely any issues.
Overall, the stability and reliability of Microsoft Defender for Office 365 are good.
 

Room For Improvement

IRONSCALES needs feature bundling, UI improvements, more language support, Google Suite integration, better pricing, and enhanced security features.
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 needs better virus blocking, integration, threat detection, user-friendly configuration, and competitive pricing improvements.
If there were clickable drill downs on specific users or specific correspondence to relate them to certain types of mails, that would be beneficial.
Having a more user-friendly UI would make it easier to identify features and options when using the tool.
Though this isn't problematic for our users, the content could be updated more frequently.
The main area for improvement is simplifying the implementation and rollout process.
Microsoft could improve by offering recommendations for domain spoofing attacks, especially scenarios where DNS records like SPF, DKIM, and DMARC are not properly published.
There is a different console for different things; I just want one consolidated console.
 

Setup Cost

IRONSCALES offers a cost-effective, worthwhile solution for enterprises, saving time and money on phishing management despite some expense concerns.
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 offers comprehensive security, valued for integration with E3/E5 licenses, despite varied perceptions on cost.
While I don't specifically oversee the pricing details, I understand that IRONSCALES is in the range of similar solutions while offering better results.
We've likely saved 30% of costs.
Money-wise, it is a part of the Office 365 suite, making it slightly more expensive compared to Trend Micro.
Microsoft is quite affordable with a lot of features available for any size organization.
 

Valuable Features

IRONSCALES offers AI-driven phishing protection, easy integration, mobile management, and enhanced security awareness with Microsoft 365 scalability.
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 provides comprehensive security features, enhancing protection and efficiency across platforms with real-time threat detection.
IRONSCALES has positively impacted my organization by making email security simple in terms of controlling mails, understanding where the threats are, and protecting the organization itself.
The best features of IRONSCALES are that most alerts are validated through AI, which reduces the fatigue of alerts that need to be worked on by the team handling the alerts investigation part.
IRONSCALES excels at analyzing the intention, not just the content itself, but the sender's attempt to gain user attention.
It ranks the threats and allows us to prioritize those hitting us the hardest, such as email threats.
It provides end-to-end visibility on email threats such as phishing, extending beyond Exchange Online Protection.
The value of the DLP feature is significant to us because we have internal data, sometimes sensitive, and the users may not always be aware of security and privacy, which might lead them to send out information mistakenly to external parties.
 

Categories and Ranking

IRONSCALES
Ranking in Email Security
17th
Ranking in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
18th
Ranking in Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
7th
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
16
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Microsoft Defender for Offi...
Ranking in Email Security
1st
Ranking in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
2nd
Ranking in Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
53
Ranking in other categories
Email Archiving (1st), Microsoft Security Suite (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Email Security category, the mindshare of IRONSCALES is 1.7%, down from 2.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is 11.4%, down from 14.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Email Security Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Defender for Office 36511.4%
IRONSCALES1.7%
Other86.9%
Email Security
 

Featured Reviews

Hemeshen Govender - PeerSpot reviewer
Applies AI automation to clearly identify and stop a lot of phishing emails
The solution captures a bit more of the unknown, quantifies it, and applies intelligence to it to pick out and stop a lot of phishing emails that come through. The solution improved our response to phishing attempts. IRONSCALES has a virtual assistant and some AI intelligence that's applied to it. That was the main differentiator between IRONSCALES and Microsoft. The solution's AI automation clearly identifies phishing emails and gives you an overall indication of why it found the mail to be malicious. It does the whole analysis for you to see why the email was deemed a phishing email. The solution's response time is better than that of our previous tool. The solution's user interface is pretty straightforward and user-friendly.
Vikas Ingle - PeerSpot reviewer
Centralized tenant enables group control but setup process complicates implementation
Actually earlier, I used to have full controls with Trend Micro. Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is now part of a centralized tenant for my entire group. I don't have control on that, as another team is maintaining it. Since I don't have full visibility of the features, I cannot make significant comments.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
18%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Healthcare Company
5%
University
5%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise4
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business23
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise27
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IRONSCALES?
The solution captures a bit more of the unknown, quantifies it, and applies intelligence to it to pick out and stop a lot of phishing emails that come through.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IRONSCALES?
While I don't specifically oversee the pricing details, I understand that IRONSCALES is in the range of similar solutions while offering better results.
What needs improvement with IRONSCALES?
There are areas that could be improved with this product. Regarding the Spanish language awareness training, while they are producing good content, it appears to be initially produced in English an...
What do you like most about Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
Threat Explorer is an invaluable tool for me, and it plays a crucial role in helping me discern the origins of various email campaigns, pinpointing where they emanate from, and identifying the indi...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
Microsoft is quite affordable with a lot of features available for any size organization.
What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
I think that Microsoft Defender for Office 365 could be improved if it could use VirusTotal to compare the programs or anything that I download. VirusTotal helps to identify viruses, malware, troja...
 

Also Known As

No data available
MS Defender for Office 365
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Allegheny Millwork, Ayrshire College, Nium, Orris, Paramount School District, Pres Les, PRT Staffing, Recovery Unplugged, Telit, WebHelp
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is trusted by companies such as Ithaca College.
Find out what your peers are saying about IRONSCALES vs. Microsoft Defender for Office 365 and other solutions. Updated: October 2025.
872,706 professionals have used our research since 2012.