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Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 13, 2025

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

Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Ranking in Container Management
8th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
78
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (7th), Container Security (7th), Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (1st), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (4th), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (4th), Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (5th), Microsoft Security Suite (7th), Compliance Management (5th)
Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE
Ranking in Container Management
10th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
Container Monitoring (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Container Management category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is 1.1%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE is 8.2%, up from 7.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Container Management
 

Featured Reviews

Vibhor Goel - PeerSpot reviewer
A single tool for complete visibility and addressing security gaps
Currently, issues are structured in Microsoft Defender for Cloud at severity levels of high, critical, or warning, but these severity levels are not always right. For example, Microsoft might consider a port being open as critical, but that might not be the case for our company. Similarly, it might suggest closing some management ports, but you might need them to be able to log in, so the severity levels for certain things can be improved. Even though Microsoft Defender for Cloud provides a way to temporarily disable certain alerts or notifications without affecting our security score, it would be better to have more granularized control over these recommendations. Currently, we cannot even disable certain alerts or notifications. There should be an automated mechanism to design Azure policies based on the recommendations, possibly with AI integration. Instead of an engineer having to write a policy to fix security gaps, which is very time-consuming, there should be an inbuilt capability to auto-remediate everything and have proper control in place. Additionally, enabling Defender for Cloud at the resource group level, rather than only at the subscription level, would be beneficial.
Prasanthraj PN - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers efficient deployment and management with easy resource allocation, yet faces challenges in integration and compatibility
Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE offers easy and fast deployment, management, stability, reliability, and cost-effectiveness. The resource allocation is very simple. If we need to expand the memory, storage space, or processor core, it is very easy to manage through our central control. These features are what stand out the most.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is quite good and addresses many security gaps."
"One important security feature is the incident alerts. Now, with all these cyberattacks, there are a lot of incident alerts that get triggered. It is very difficult to keep monitoring everything automatically, instead our organization is utilizing the automated use case that we get from Microsoft. That has helped bring down the manual work for a lot of things."
"DSPM is the most valuable feature."
"My favorite part of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is the compliance features. Defender covers a wide range of workloads, on par with competing products on the market."
"Microsoft Defender has a lot of features including regulatory compliance and attaching workbooks but the most valuable is the recommendations it provides for each and every resource when we open Microsoft Defender."
"The most valuable feature is that it's intuitive. It's very intuitive."
"Defender is a robust platform for dealing with many kinds of threats. We're protected from various threats, like viruses. Attacks can be easily minimized with this solution defending our infrastructure."
"The most valuable features are the monitoring of users, endpoint detection and response, and the adaptability of the AI threat intelligence engine, which quickly adapts to customizations."
"My experience with Nutanix's technical support is excellent."
"We can add some add-ons and plugins to the product if we need to."
"Nutanix is very stable and reliable, based on my experience with many customers, including large banks and telcos."
"The solution is embedded in the hypervisor and there are no deployment costs."
"The solution provides no downtime features. If we face issues, we create a new port, deploy it there, and then drop the existing one. This way, we avoid NKE downtime on our website."
"The platform is valuable due to its ease of use and quick deployment capabilities."
"The technical support is excellent."
"The most valuable features of the Nutanix Kubernetes Engine (NKE) are its simplicity and efficiency during the initial cluster creation phase."
 

Cons

"There should be an automated mechanism to design Azure policies based on the recommendations, possibly with AI integration. Instead of an engineer having to write a policy to fix security gaps, which is very time-consuming, there should be an inbuilt capability to auto-remediate everything and have proper control in place."
"Defender could improve how data is represented. It can be unstructured or slow to load. The recent update allowing policy grouping into control groups is beneficial, but further enhancements for speed and clarity are needed."
"After getting a recommendation, it takes time for the solution to refresh properly to show that the problem has been eliminated."
"Most of the time, when we log into the support, we don't get a chance to interact with Microsoft employees directly, except having it go to outsource employees of Microsoft. The initial interaction has not been that great because outsourced companies cannot provide the kind of quality or technical expertise that we look for. We have a technical manager from Microsoft, but they are kind of average unless we make noise and ask them to escalate. We then can get the right people and the right solution, but it definitely takes time."
"They could always work to make the pricing a bit lower."
"Microsoft Defender could be more centralized. For example, I still need to go to another console to do policy management."
"The cost is always a concern, but overall, it's not too bad because it is easy to use and pretty friendly."
"I felt that there was disconnection in terms of understanding the UI. The communication for moving from the old UI to the new UI could be improved. It was a bit awkward."
"I have issues with the product's interoperability."
"GUI lacks sufficient information to help with understanding the installation and process."
"NKE could benefit from additional features that support more advanced Kubernetes functionalities and configurations."
"There have been challenges related to software bugs, especially regarding long-term licensing options and issues within our customer network."
"Nutanix has limitations compared to VMware, particularly in testing and industry tie-ups with different OEMs. Deploying virtual machines, especially for industrial automation, can be challenging due to compatibility issues."
"The product lacks some virtualization capabilities, making it an area for improvement where the solution can focus on providing users with more virtualization capabilities related to disk systems."
"One major issue we faced was that appliances couldn't migrate from VMware to the tool. However, this seems to be a common problem across platforms. We've seen the same issue when migrating from VMware to RHV or other solutions. It's not specifically a Nutanix problem but rather an issue migrating appliances from one VM infrastructure to another. Some kernel-level and storage-level issues impact this process."
"There is no auto-scaling feature in Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE; however, NKP offers it. In NKE, we created additional worker nodes and increased CPU and RAM capacity, but it required manual intervention."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Defender for Cloud is pretty costly for a single line. It's incredibly high to pay monthly for security per server. The cost is considerable for an enterprise with 500-plus virtual machines, and the monthly bill can spike."
"Pricing depends on your workload size, but it is very cheap. If you're talking about virtual machines, it is $5 or something for each machine, which is minimal. If you go for some agent-based solution for every virtual machine, then you need to pay the same thing or more than that. For an on-premises solution like this, we were paying around $30 to $50 based on size. With Defender, Microsoft doesn't bother about the size. You pay based on the number of machines. So, if you have 10 virtual machines, and 10 virtual machines are being monitored, you are paying based on that rather than the size of the virtual machine. Thus, you are paying for the number of units rather than paying for the size of your units."
"This is a worldwide service and depending on the country, there will be different prices."
"I rate Microsoft Defender a three out of ten for affordability. The price could be a little lower."
"The solution is expensive, and I rate it a five to six out of ten."
"The licensing is straightforward but can become expensive if you cover everything. You must balance the cost against the importance of what needs covering."
"Pricing is difficult because each license has its own metrics and cost."
"Azure Defender is definitely pricey, but their competitors cost about the same. For example, a Palo Alto solution is the same price per endpoint, but the ground strikes cost a bit more than Azure Defender. Still, it's pricey for a company like ours. Maybe well-established organizations can afford it, but it might be too costly for a startup."
"I rate NKE's pricing a six out of ten."
"The platform is averagely priced. I rate the pricing as four out of ten."
"I rate the product price a five on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive."
"While deploying Kubernetes clusters on Nutanix is cost-effective, there may be additional costs for remote branch offices where Kubernetes is less common."
"The product's licenses are included in the software version deployed in our data center."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
16%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How is Prisma Cloud vs Azure Security Center for security?
Azure Security Center is very easy to use, integrates well, and gives very good visibility on what is happening across your ecosystem. It also has great remote workforce capabilities and supports a...
What do you like most about Microsoft Defender for Cloud?
The entire Defender Suite is tightly coupled, integrated, and collaborative.
What do you like most about Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE?
The most valuable features of the Nutanix Kubernetes Engine (NKE) are its simplicity and efficiency during the initial cluster creation phase.
What needs improvement with Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE?
I have heard there are many features added in NKP that are not available in Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE, such as load balancer features. The unified control plane feature is not being used in Nut...
What is your primary use case for Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE?
I have been working with the Nutanix Kubernetes platform for the past five years. Currently, I am supporting JetBlue Airlines in America, which uses a Nutanix environment and Nutanix Kubernetes Eng...
 

Also Known As

Microsoft Azure Security Center, Azure Security Center, Microsoft ASC, Azure Defender
Nutanix Karbon
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Defender for Cloud is trusted by companies such as ASOS, Vatenfall, SWC Technology Partners, and more.
JetBlue, International Speedway Corporation, SAIC Volkswagen
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs. Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,384 professionals have used our research since 2012.