Menlo Secure vs Symantec Secure Web Gateway comparison

Why PeerSpot?

Menlo Security and Broadcom are both solutions in the Secure Web Gateways (SWG) category. Menlo Security is ranked #25, while Broadcom is ranked #27. Menlo Security holds a 2.3% mindshare in WSG, compared to Broadcom’s 1.5% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Menlo Security users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 57% of Broadcom users who would recommend it.

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 4, 2024

Menlo Secure and Symantec Secure Web Gateway compete in the secure browsing solutions category. Symantec Secure Web Gateway may have the upper hand with comprehensive threat protection over Menlo's innovative isolation-based approach.

Features: Menlo Secure's key features include its cloud-based isolation technology, offering a zero-trust browsing model by executing all content in an isolated environment and rewriting email links for secure access. Symantec Secure Web Gateway provides advanced threat protection, robust content filtering, and strong threat intelligence capabilities, highlighting its extensive security suite.

Room for Improvement: Menlo Secure could enhance its logging capabilities, address bypass sites' authentication issues, and improve user count tracking. Symantec Secure Web Gateway needs improvements in online user interfaces, license management, and consistency since Broadcom's acquisition.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Menlo Secure benefits from its cloud-first deployment, simplifying integration with minimal hardware needs. Symantec Secure Web Gateway, while offering a comprehensive feature set, requires more complex configurations but provides extensive customer service resources.

Pricing and ROI: Menlo Secure offers competitive pricing with ROI through reduced malware incidents and lower support costs, thanks to its simple architecture. Symantec Secure Web Gateway, though potentially higher in setup costs, justifies expenditure with broad security coverage and threat mitigation capabilities.

To learn more, read our detailed Menlo Secure vs. Symantec Secure Web Gateway Report (Updated: September 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Menlo Secure vs. Symantec Secure Web Gateway

September 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

iboss

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Secure Web Gateways (SWG) category, the mindshare of iboss is 3.2%, up from 2.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Menlo Secure is 2.3%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Secure Web Gateway is 1.5%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Secure Web Gateways (SWG) Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
iboss	3.2%
Menlo Secure	2.3%
Symantec Secure Web Gateway	1.5%
Other	93.0%

Secure Web Gateways (SWG)

Featured Reviews

Ashok Ananthula

Senior Consultant Proxy Engineering at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees

Cloud gateway has strengthened remote web security and now needs better Mac and ISP support

The problem our organization had is that iboss failed for the Mac devices. It is not able to give a successful agent for the Mac agents. That is where in 2025, we had to migrate to the Palo Alto-based platform. If your use case is for just Windows laptops,you can consider this platform as an option One issue is the data center resiliency part. In India especially, they are not tied up with the Tier 1 ISPs like Tata or Airtel; they were having Tier 2 ISPs and encountered many issues reaching few major sites that my organization depends on, and they were having problems that they could not fix quickly. They also lack a mechanism to route that traffic within their data center; rather, they ask customers to make a pac file change to route it to Singapore explicitly. It would be better if they route from their backend , i mean even if I send it to India DC, they should be able to route it internally to make that work; however, they fail to do that and ask the customer to route it in the pac file. Another suggestion is that in China, they do not have the proper setup; they used to have numerous problems with slowness and lack of premium circuits in China as well. That leads to multiple sites working slowly with latency-related issues. So the main issue is the ISP-related problems that need to be solved.

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reviewer2701794

Head Of Bluechip Enterprise at a manufacturing company with 51-200 employees

Provides strong protection and multiple use cases but struggles with market recognition

There aren't specific areas for improvement; however, they're not as well known as the big vendors such as Palo Alto. Menlo Secure is a smaller company with limited resources and funding, which makes it challenging to compete with larger companies such as Palo and Cisco. What can be improved is market awareness and adoption of the technology. When selling it in the channel, regardless of how good the technology might be, success depends more on market adoption and awareness.

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Kedar-Kulkarni

Principal Consultant at CSaaS

Monitors traffic effectively but struggles with integration challenges

I find that the technical support is mediocre, at least for the Middle East. I frequently face challenges when contacting OpenStack through the distribution channel. It should be more straightforward. I notice that customers work with partners, not directly with Symantec, relying on local company integrators for support. Symantec becomes the level two or level three support, which requires navigating through a supply chain that is quite extensive.

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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

"I would definitely recommend iboss for web filtering purposes to other organizations or individuals."

"I would rate the technical support of iboss a solid 10 without a shadow of a doubt."

"The console is cloud-based, which is something I really appreciate."

"iboss is among the few products providing inline filtering where no application is needed on the device. It operates on the network side and is not device-based. This feature was one of the main reasons why we stayed with them for so long."

"iboss is pretty scalable. They provide good support. The case managers you work with to coordinate what you need are pretty good."

"Technical support is pretty sharp and very responsive."

"The students were always protected, and the content filtering worked very well, seeming to work better than other products we had tried previously."

"Content filtering is the most useful feature of iboss."

More iboss pros

"Accessing the internet with a proxy from anywhere is the most valuable feature. It ensures that users are only able to browse legitimate websites. If they happen to go to a legitimate website with a malicious payload, the isolation feature will take care of that."

"Either you have access to something or don't have access to it, and if you do, we can ensure, 100 percent of the time, that there is nothing malicious that is going to impact our system in any way."

"The solution is invisible to our end users, so it doesn't have any impact on their work or performance."

"We have definitely seen ROI, as we save a ton of money and time because the numerous hits that we were receiving from our security tools prior to implementing them had to all be chased down, dispositioned, and endpoints had to be reimaged."

"We are not aware of a single compromise from the web since implementing the solution."

"For us, the primary goal is protection on the web, and that's extremely important. We're not using any of the other services at this time. The web part is key to the success of the organization. It gives us the ability to protect. It can isolate. It opens the session in an isolated format so that the code isn't running locally. It is running over in the Menlo environment, not in ours. It is not running on the local computer, whereas if you were to go to a normal website, it would run Java or something else on the local machine and potentially execute the malicious code locally. So, it does give us that level of protection."

"It has reduced security events to follow up on. While it is not 100%, there has been probably a 90% or more reduction. We were getting hit left, right, and center constantly from people browsing the Internet and hitting bad websites. It was not just bad websites that were stood up to be malicious, but good sites that were compromised."

"This security technology addresses risk and enables people to conduct business without that risk, which is where the ROI is realized."

More Menlo Secure pros

"Typically, Symantec is more or less like any other platform that performs proxy functions."

"In terms of most valuable features, I like the ICAP capability and URL filtering the most."

"I find the product to be very straightforward."

"The most valuable features are the website blocking capability and SSL interception."

"The most valuable feature is the endpoint security."

"We've tried other endpoint security solutions but this tool seems to be the best when specifically comparing the endpoint security features."

"Scalability is not really any major issue, it is quite scalable and if we need to do more deployments, we just add them."

"It has a faster implementation process compared to other products."

More Symantec Secure Web Gateway pros

Cons

"The solution could be stronger on the integration side and offer more cloud applications like G Suite or Oracle."

"For zero trust implementation, we encountered complexity issues, especially with a large infrastructure company ExxonMobil."

"The reporting feature needs improvement. It doesn't give you the expected results. It is quite difficult to get the specific reports needed, and it is not as intuitive as the rest of the platform."

"Iboss is growing so fast that it is often hard for them to keep up with the challenges."

"I have heard they are doing DDoS filtering, but I am not certain if they are implementing it correctly."

"The easiest device I have set up was the Barracuda line of products."

"I am currently doing a PoC of the zero trust aspect of it. Compared to other similar solutions, it is hard to get around each feature. It takes a while to get used to it."

"SSL decryption: We had issues with learners using apps instead of using web browsers. This type of encryption is tough for any appliance in a BYOD environment."

More iboss cons

"Currently, I don't have a good way to see which of my rules are being used in the access control lists."

"Currently, I don't have a good way to see which of my rules are being used in the access control lists. I have numerous entries, but are they all still needed? A report that would show me my list of who is allowed and whether we're actually using it would be useful because I can then go clean up my list. It would be easier to manage. We would eliminate the vulnerability of unused services."

"The user monitoring could still be improved."

"Menlo Secure is a smaller company with limited resources and funding, which makes it challenging to compete with larger companies such as Palo and Cisco."

"In the best of all worlds, we wouldn't have to make any exceptions. However, that is a big ask because a lot of that depends on how websites are constructed. For example, there are some very complex, application-oriented sites that we end up making exceptions for. It is really not that big an issue for us to make the exceptions. We feel like we are doing that without a huge impact on our security posture, but we do have to make some exceptions for complex sites, e.g., mostly SaaS-type sites and applications."

"We are now transitioning to another solution. The main reason for that is that managing all of the exceptions and troubleshooting all of the issues our users have had connecting to the internet has become too significant in terms of workload, compared to what we hope we will have with another solution."

"The interface could be made more user-friendly."

"I think the worst thing that we're experiencing is very poor and inadequate technical support."

"The platform’s data center is not capable of managing most of the traffic."

"It's not user-friendly, and we end up making too many phone calls to get things fixed."

"I find that the technical support is mediocre, at least for the Middle East. I frequently face challenges when contacting OpenStack through the distribution channel."

"The Credential ID part where you need to register it: Sometimes, it does not register a device, for some reason."

"One of the problems with using Symantec is that it's widely known and the people who are making malware have designed to circumvent it."

"AI-driven security could be helpful, yet how effective it will be remains unclear."

More Symantec Secure Web Gateway cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is expensive compared to one of its competitors."

"The overall pricing for iboss is very competitive and transparent."

"It is probably in line with other solutions, but I do not deal with the financial side."

"We had the cost of purchasing a new appliance along with the implementation and licensing costs. However, the following year, the cost of just licensing was similar to what was paid the previous year for a new appliance along with the implementation and licensing costs."

"We have not priced the solution recently, but they were competitive with other vendors in the past."

"It is not expensive, and it is also not cheap. iboss is priced right in the sweet spot for the number of features it offers."

"It is appropriately priced for what they're doing for us. Considering the protection provided, I feel their pricing is spot-on."

"The solution is expensive. It's more expensive than the solution I previously used. Compared with the other cloud-based solutions, it's very competitive."

"We save a ton of money and time. Previously, the numerous hits that we were receiving from our security tools, prior to implementing them, had to all be chased down, dispositioned, and endpoints had to be reimaged. It was just a ton of effort to do all that. That is where the savings from time and money come in."

"There is an additional charge for advanced security features."

"Symantec Secure Web Gateway is less expensive than one of its competitors."

"Pricing and licensing is stunted and licensing is expensive. We have many customers who are now thinking about other solutions due to the cost."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Comms Service Provider

Construction Company

Manufacturing Company

14%

Construction Company

11%

Outsourcing Company

Comms Service Provider

Construction Company

21%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Manufacturing Company

Transportation Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	13
Midsize Enterprise	7
Large Enterprise	11

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	5
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	4

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with iboss?

I think iboss could be improved by making reporting and dashboard customization more flexible, and simplifying troubl...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for iboss?

I use iboss as a cloud-based secure web gateway to provide secure internet access, web filtering, and protect remote ...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for iboss?

My experience with iboss's pricing structure, setup cost, and licensing model has been positive, straightforward, and...

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What needs improvement with Menlo Security Secure Web Gateway?

There aren't specific areas for improvement; however, they're not as well known as the big vendors such as Palo Alto....

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Menlo Security Secure Web Gateway?

People are mainly using it for zero trust web access. Menlo Secure is built from the ground up to provide zero basic ...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Menlo Security Secure Web Gateway?

Secure file sharing and data protection is not exactly what Menlo Secure is designed to do. While it can handle some ...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Symantec Secure Web Gateway?

I believe that pricing is on par with peers. Symantec and other vendors offer discounts when cutting a deal with a cu...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Symantec Secure Web Gateway?

AI-driven security could be helpful, yet how effective it will be remains unclear. I plan to evaluate whatever new fe...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Symantec Secure Web Gateway?

I find the product to be very straightforward. I just install it and forget it as it continuously monitors traffic. I...

See all answers

Comparisons

Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks vs iboss

Compared 10% of the time

Netskope vs iboss

Compared 8% of the time

Fortinet FortiGate vs iboss

Compared 8% of the time

Cisco Umbrella vs iboss

Compared 6% of the time

FortiSASE vs iboss

Compared 6% of the time

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Prisma Access Browser vs Menlo Secure

Compared 12% of the time

Check Point Harmony SASE (formerly Perimeter 81) vs Menlo Secure

Compared 12% of the time

Netskope Next Gen Secure Web Gateway vs Menlo Secure

Compared 10% of the time

Cloudflare One vs Menlo Secure

Compared 9% of the time

Cisco Web Security Appliance vs Menlo Secure

Compared 2% of the time

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Zscaler Internet Access vs Symantec Secure Web Gateway

Compared 19% of the time

Cisco Umbrella vs Symantec Secure Web Gateway

Compared 13% of the time

Akamai Secure Internet Access Enterprise vs Symantec Secure Web Gateway

Compared 12% of the time

Fortra's Clearswift Secure Web Gateway vs Symantec Secure Web Gateway

Compared 9% of the time

Skyhigh Security vs Symantec Secure Web Gateway

Compared 3% of the time

More Symantec Secure Web Gateway Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

iboss

September 2026

Download iboss product report

Buyer's Guide

Menlo Secure

September 2026

Download Menlo Secure product report

Buyer's Guide

Symantec Secure Web Gateway

September 2026

Download Symantec Secure Web Gateway product report

Also Known As

iBoss Cloud Platform

Menlo Security Web Security, Menlo Web Security

Symantec Complete Website Security

Overview

iboss is the Zero Trust SASE platform that gives organizations complete visibility and governance over their AI, data, and applications through one unified platform, one console, one policy engine, and one data lake.

Your endpoints may already stop malware. Your data and application activity can still be invisible. iboss decrypts and understands every connection, then turns that signal into answers security leaders can act on.

The platform leads with three capabilities in this order: AI Security and Visibility, Data Security and Visibility, and App Visibility and Control. Zero Trust Network Access, VPN replacement, and SD-WAN sit underneath as the access fabric that carries those three. Trusted by global enterprises and government agencies.

What are the most important features of Iboss?

- AI Security and Visibility: conversation capture, shadow-AI discovery, AI DLP, and agent governance across Claude, Co-Work, ChatGPT, Gemini, and Grok, and emerging services.

- Data Security and Visibility: full SSL/TLS decryption, deep content inspection, MIP label compliance, and one-click compliance reporting.

- App Visibility and Control: signatureless CASB, dual risk scoring, in-app controls, and SSPM for major SaaS.

- Containerized Zero Trust SASE: dedicated containers, isolated SSL keys, one console, one policy engine, one data lake.

- Access fabric: ZTNA, VPN replacement, and SD-WAN under the same platform.

What benefits should users consider in reviews?

- Complete visibility over AI, data, and applications from one platform instead of separate point tools.

- Encrypted traffic is inspected by default so data decisions use content and context together.

- Shadow SaaS and new web tools appear as they are used, with enforceable controls in one console.

- Native data sovereignty through dedicated containers, in-region inspection, and per-customer SSL key custody.

- Scale proven in published materials: 10M+ users, 100+ countries, 150B+ transactions, 2.5B+ threats blocked.

Economic buyers are CISOs, CIOs, and VPs of Security. Champions include security architects, network and infrastructure leaders, SecOps, and GRC. Primary segments: enterprise and business, financial services, government (including FedRAMP Gov Cloud), healthcare, manufacturing, legal and professional services, retail and hospitality, and MSP/MSSP partners. Education, including K-12, is one vertical among these.

iboss

Menlo Security Secure Application Access

Menlo Security Secure Application Access makes zero trust access easy, giving users secure connectivity to private applications, including web and legacy applications. At the core of Secure Application Access is the Menlo Secure Cloud Browser, which fetches, secures and delivers the content for users.

In addition to providing simple-to-deploy, clientless ZTA, Secure Application Access and the Menlo Secure Cloud Browser protect applications from attacks such as session hijacking, cookie manipulation, and other tactics that employ protocol manipulation.

Secure Application Access protects applications from Internet threats and provides granular controls for added protection of the application and associated data. These security controls include Read-only/Read-write, Upload/download, Copy/paste, AV scanning, Sandboxing, and Data Loss Prevention.

Last Mile Data Protection

Menlo Last-Mile Data Protection identifies and prevents sensitive data from leaving your company by meticulously inspecting all file uploads and user input across browsing sessions. Leveraging the Secure Cloud Browser, users are protected from the internet and you can protect your organization from data loss with comprehensive traffic monitoring and controls. This approach addresses the growing concerns surrounding data leakage in the age of AI tools like ChatGPT.

By identifying sensitive data through file types, regular expressions, or predefined libraries, Menlo Last-Mile Data Protection empowers security teams to regulate data input into AI platforms and prevent unauthorized uploads. This capability provides crucial protection for intellectual property, PII, and other confidential information.

The solution leverages the Menlo Cloud Security Platform's visibility and control over traffic to reliably detect and prevent data leaks originating from both browser submission forms and non-browser traffic. With the ability to inspect encrypted web traffic, Menlo Last-Mile Data Protection enforces DLP policies consistently across all users and devices, ensuring comprehensive data protection.

Menlo Security

Symantec Secure Web Gateway provides robust endpoint security, offering seamless management, website blocking, and advanced threat protection, with cloud hosting and SSL interception.

Symantec Secure Web Gateway is designed to enhance web security through its endpoint security integration, effective website blocking, and SSL interception capabilities. Supporting numerous platforms, it allows swift deployment and comprehensive reporting, making it a preferred choice for companies seeking reliable antivirus protection and controlled internet access. Despite facing challenges with technical assistance and firewall functionalities, it stands out with its efficient threat-handling processes and user-friendly management features. Administrators benefit from straightforward URL filtering and a consistently active web-based cloud proxy, ideal for reducing infrastructure management issues.

What are the key features of Symantec Secure Web Gateway?

User-friendly interfaces and easy management allow for intuitive operation and administration.
Strong endpoint security integrates seamlessly with antivirus features and content filtering.
Website blocking offers controlled access to ensure safe browsing environments.
SSL interception ensures data protection and secure communication channels.
ICAP capability supports enhanced integration with other security appliances.
URL filtering applies customizable policies for secure, role-based internet access.

What benefits or ROI can be expected from Symantec Secure Web Gateway?

Streamlined deployment and management reduce time and resource investments.
Cloud hosting decreases infrastructure costs and maintenance requirements.
Caching boosts performance with faster load times and reduced bandwidth usage.
Easy initial setup minimizes configuration efforts and operational disruptions.

In industries where web security integration is vital, Symantec Secure Web Gateway manages client traffic, ensures seamless access control, and filters URLs with ease. Its capabilities, similar to Blue Coat's proxy services, offer less infrastructure management, making it ideal for sectors needing constant data protection.

Broadcom

Sample Customers

Trusted by global enterprises and government agencies.

Information Not Available

Buyer's Guide

Menlo Secure vs. Symantec Secure Web Gateway

September 2026

Free Report: Menlo Secure vs. Symantec Secure Web Gateway

Find out what your peers are saying about Menlo Secure vs. Symantec Secure Web Gateway and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.

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