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Microsoft Defender for Endpoint vs Trellix Active Response comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 9, 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
6.9
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint offers significant ROI with cost savings, seamless integration, and real-time protection against ransomware attacks.
Sentiment score
3.8
Trellix Active Response improved threat detection, reduced incident response times, increased efficiency, and enhanced productivity with an intuitive interface.
Without detection and protection measures, organizations would face substantial payments and reputational damage, including the necessity to inform customers about data breaches, potentially leading to loss of business.
Consultant at ACT4SERVICES
We have seen a return on investment when using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, as it saves labor by reducing the need for staff to focus on it.
IT CONSULTANT at a tech company with 10,001+ employees
The biggest return on investment for me when using Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is the time saving.
Lead security engineer at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
While we haven't yet quantified the financial benefits, we recognize that there has been a return on investment, particularly with operational efficiencies provided by the alerts.
Senior Manager Operational Technology and Cyber Security at Eskom Ltd
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.4
Many users find Microsoft Defender for Endpoint reliable, but support experiences vary, with premium support offering quicker assistance.
Sentiment score
7.8
Trellix Active Response's customer support is generally positive, but availability and contact speed could improve, rated seven out of ten.
The Microsoft agent, who did not actually work for Microsoft, is one of the vendors that Microsoft uses for support, said, 'Just to set expectations, my lunch break is in an hour and I am going to go away then.'
Security Analyst III at a healthcare company with 10,001+ employees
The level-one support seems disconnected from subject matter experts.
Office 365 Subject Expert at a government with 10,001+ employees
I rate Microsoft support 10 out of 10.
Team manager of it department at a financial services firm with 501-1,000 employees
I would rate technical support from Trellix Active Response as a seven because sometimes we face difficulties finding engineers quickly, leading to customer frustration.
Information Security Engineer at Nhq Distribution Ltd
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.4
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is scalable and integrates well with Microsoft’s ecosystem, despite needing improvements for handling massive data.
Sentiment score
4.1
Trellix Active Response is scalable, integrates easily, handles large data seamlessly, and maintains performance and security with minimal latency.
We managed to scale it out in a short amount of time, with two months of planning and three months of implementation on 10,000 computers.
Team manager of it department at a financial services firm with 501-1,000 employees
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is scalable enough to handle various devices across environments, whether they are laptops, Android devices, or operating in hybrid environments.
Snr. Infrastructure Architect (Data Centre) at LogicEra
Compatibility is its main feature.
IT CONSULTANT at a tech company with 10,001+ employees
The scalability of Active Response is satisfactory.
Senior Manager Operational Technology and Cyber Security at Eskom Ltd
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.9
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is praised for its reliability and stability, with minor concerns about resource intensity and performance.
Sentiment score
4.6
Trellix Active Response is praised for reliability, efficient data handling, quick threat detection, adaptability, and stability with minimal downtime.
I haven't seen any outages with Microsoft.
IT Security Engineer at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
I rate Defender 10 out of 10 for stability.
Team manager of it department at a financial services firm with 501-1,000 employees
Defender for Endpoint is extremely stable.
Systems engineers at Delta Dental of Colorado
 

Room For Improvement

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint faces interface complexity, slow detection, high CPU usage, integration issues, and seeks improvements in multiple areas.
Trellix Active Response needs better resource management, advanced analytics, and improved integrations for efficient monitoring and AI features.
Repeated interactions are necessary due to Level One's lack of tools and knowledge, hindering efficient problem-solving and negatively impacting our experience with Microsoft support.
Office 365 Subject Expert at a government with 10,001+ employees
In contrast, competing products offer reduced pricing for long-term commitments, which makes it difficult for us in that environment.
Solution Consultant at BIM Group of Companies
We use Microsoft partners to help govern the platform, and as part of an alliance, we want to gather data from each tenant and combine them for a complete view.
Team manager of it department at a financial services firm with 501-1,000 employees
We would like Trellix to optimize the technology for these systems similarly to how it is deployed for normal endpoints.
Senior Manager Operational Technology and Cyber Security at Eskom Ltd
There is room for improvement in the platform area and security area to make the dashboard visibility clearer and easier for customers to monitor malicious activities occurring in their environment.
Information Security Engineer at Nhq Distribution Ltd
 

Setup Cost

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint offers flexible pricing, making it competitive and cost-effective compared to standalone security products.
That has been the trend we have seen with Microsoft lately—it is just getting more and more expensive.
Assistant Director, Hybrid Infrastructure & Operations at a insurance company with 501-1,000 employees
Given our extensive Microsoft licensing, transitioning to Defender for Endpoint did not affect licensing costs.
Team manager of it department at a financial services firm with 501-1,000 employees
It costs $15 per VM for the P2 plan, which is seen as affordable for customers.
Snr. Infrastructure Architect (Data Centre) at LogicEra
Based on our evaluations, Trellix Active Response's pricing was the most feasible from a cost perspective.
Senior Manager Operational Technology and Cyber Security at Eskom Ltd
 

Valuable Features

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint excels with seamless integration, advanced threat intelligence, AI-driven protection, and continuous cloud-based security management.
Trellix Active Response enhances analytics, user insights, and incident handling, excelling in detection and response with holistic EDR benefits.
Defender for Endpoint's coverage across different platforms in our environment is pretty good. We have devices running Linux, Mac OS, Windows, iOS, and Android. It covers all of them.
Team manager of it department at a financial services firm with 501-1,000 employees
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint provides a unified management interface allowing customers to manage their on-premises and hybrid infrastructures from a single pane.
Snr. Infrastructure Architect (Data Centre) at LogicEra
One of the best features of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is its database for identifying zero-day attacks or malware attacks.
Consultant at ACT4SERVICES
They notify us immediately of any vulnerabilities on the endpoints, allowing us to deploy a response quickly.
Senior Manager Operational Technology and Cyber Security at Eskom Ltd
The most valuable feature of Trellix Active Response is that whenever any incident occurs, it allows us to disconnect from that particular network or area and shut down the system using commands.
Information Security Engineer at Nhq Distribution Ltd
 

Categories and Ranking

Microsoft Defender for Endp...
Ranking in Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
210
Ranking in other categories
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) (2nd), Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (3rd), Anti-Malware Tools (1st), Microsoft Security Suite (3rd)
Trellix Active Response
Ranking in Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)
45th
Average Rating
7.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.1
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2025, in the Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is 8.7%, down from 11.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Trellix Active Response is 0.4%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint8.7%
Trellix Active Response0.4%
Other90.9%
Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR)
 

Featured Reviews

Robert Arbuckle - PeerSpot reviewer
Security Analyst III at a healthcare company with 10,001+ employees
Automatically isolates threats and integrates with logging to reduce response time
Overall, I would evaluate the Microsoft support level that I receive at probably about a seven, but that depends on the day. It has been spotty. We have had issues where the urgency level of the Microsoft support is not as high as ours, especially during a data breach or potential data breach situation. We have had issues with some of the offshore support being lackluster. One specific thing that comes to mind is we were on a support call with our CISO on the call, and the Microsoft agent, who did not actually work for Microsoft, is one of the vendors that Microsoft uses for support, said, "Just to set expectations, my lunch break is in an hour and I am going to go away then." For us, it was already ten o'clock at night and we had been working on this for a couple of hours, trying to get a security engineer on with us. For him to tell us that he was going to go away and have lunch, it was, "Okay, but go find somebody else if you need to." It was just the lackluster approach, and it seemed like he did not really care. We seem to get a lot of this when we get non-Microsoft support. I can identify areas for improvement with Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, as it is kind of a convoluted mess to try to take care of false positives. Especially when they have been identified as false positives but they keep going off over and over again. It is great for my pocketbook because it generates a lot of on-call action, but I would really prefer more sleep at two o'clock in the morning than dealing with false positives. I would say that the unified portal for managing Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is suitable for both teams as they are all in there. It would be great if they would stop moving things around and renaming things, which makes sense. The new XDR portal is pretty nice. Being able to have it central again inside of the regular Security Center without having to open up two windows is helpful. Overall, I think it is pretty good. There is always going to be something that could be improved, such as alerting and the ability to modify alerts would be a little bit helpful to have. Being able to add more data into the alerts and turn off alerts that are not as useful would be beneficial. It is hard to say what the quantitative impact the security exposure management feature has had on our company's security, because a lot of it is kind of subjective. I think we are sitting at around a fifty percent score still, and a lot of it is just kind of unusual circumstances that we cannot really implement without breaking the organization.
ED
Senior Manager Operational Technology and Cyber Security at Eskom Ltd
Operational efficiencies increase with immediate threat alerts for endpoints
We use Trellix Active Response primarily for our endpoints, including desktop computers. It monitors all the tools that our users use for their day-to-day work The alerts provided by Trellix Active Response are its most valuable feature. They notify us immediately of any vulnerabilities on the…
report
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Government
8%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business80
Midsize Enterprise40
Large Enterprise92
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

How is Cortex XDR compared with Microsoft Defender?
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is a cloud-delivered endpoint security solution. The tool reduces the attack surface, applies behavioral-based endpoint protection and response, and includes risk-ba...
Which offers better endpoint security - Symantec or Microsoft Defender?
We use Symantec because we do not use MS Enterprise products, but in my opinion, Microsoft Defender is a superior solution. Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is a cloud-delivered endpoint security s...
How does Microsoft Defender for Endpoint compare with Crowdstrike Falcon?
The CrowdStrike solution delivers a lot of information about incidents. It has a very light sensor that will never push your machine hardware to "test", you don't have the usual "scan now" feature ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for McAfee Active Response?
Based on our evaluations, Trellix Active Response's pricing was the most feasible from a cost perspective. I rate the pricing between a six and an eight. It is justified.
What needs improvement with McAfee Active Response?
For Trellix Active Response, there is room for improvement in the platform area and security area to make the dashboard visibility clearer and easier for customers to monitor malicious activities o...
What is your primary use case for McAfee Active Response?
The typical use case for Trellix Active Response is to provide quick incident response, as the product collects and correlates logs with the ePO dashboard, allowing customers to get visibility of t...
 

Also Known As

Microsoft Defender ATP, Microsoft Defender Advanced Threat Protection, MS Defender for Endpoint, Microsoft Defender Antivirus
McAfee Active Response
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Petrofrac, Metro CSG, Christus Health
Liquor Control Board of Ontario
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Endpoint vs. Trellix Active Response and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,310 professionals have used our research since 2012.