Microsoft Defender vs Proofpoint Email Protection comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 3, 2024
 

Categories and Ranking

Microsoft Defender for Offi...
Average Rating
8.4
Number of Reviews
43
Ranking in other categories
Email Security (1st), Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (1st), Microsoft Security Suite (9th)
Proofpoint Email Protection
Average Rating
8.4
Number of Reviews
46
Ranking in other categories
Security Awareness Training (2nd), Office 365 Protection (2nd), Secure Email Gateway (SEG) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2024, in the Email Security category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is 13.8%, down from 20.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Proofpoint Email Protection is 10.5%, down from 21.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Email Security
Unique Categories:
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
13.5%
Microsoft Security Suite
1.9%
Security Awareness Training
3.0%
Office 365 Protection
11.1%
 

Q&A Highlights

Aishwarya Rm - PeerSpot reviewer
Mar 03, 2023
 

Featured Reviews

Luis-Brown - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 8, 2023
Allows for easy reporting of problems, valuable anti-phishing, and anti-malware support
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 lacks proactivity in assisting us with preparing for potential threats before they occur. While they employ a substantial amount of threat intelligence to preemptively prevent incidents, their effectiveness diminishes when it comes to delivering proactive threat intelligence alerts from Microsoft. Their focus primarily revolves around managing the internal environment. On the other hand, my other vendor, Check Point, along with my membership in MS-ISAC, supplements me with this type of information. The phishing and spam filters could use some improvement. It is adequate, but it doesn't match the quality of Proofpoint or Mimecast. However, it comes close in effectiveness. Plus, if we're obtaining it for free, investing in the other products seems impractical.
Suhel Khan - PeerSpot reviewer
Mar 17, 2023
Good at identifying threats, helpful sandboxing capabilities, and useful support
The solution is primarily used for email protection. However, it is not as good as EDR. It is good at handling privacy It's helped us when one of our senior managers got a fake email about getting a payment. The solution automatically flagged and notified us.  It's great for email protection.…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Microsoft Defender for Office 365's most valuable features are safe attachments and safe links."
"Defender is a SaaS platform, so it offers more flexibility. Managing the permissions is easier. The solution's automated detection and response features are scalable."
"Does a thorough job of examining email and URLs for malicious content."
"The email protection is excellent, especially in terms of anti-phishing policies."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365's most valuable feature is its performance."
"The most valuable feature is the integration. It's a single console, so we don't have to switch around between multiple products. Another valuable feature is the ease of operations and maintenance."
"Defender enables us to secure all 365-related activity from a single place. It gives us visibility into everything happening in Outlook, protecting us against phishing and other email-based threats. Defender helps us detect any suspicious behaviors."
"Defender helps us prioritize threats across our organization."
"The solution scales well."
"The most valuable feature of Proofpoint Email Protection is the dashboards and their visibility, easy configuration, and artificial intelligence. Additionally, the reports are very important and helpful."
"Proofpoint Email Protection's initial installation is straightforward. It took us less than a day to complete the implementation."
"Provides better control over emails, especially those sent via Office 365 on the cloud."
"As a cloud-based product, it can scale well."
"It's detection of true positives are great, as it's cloud based it's very scalable and stable."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to remove bad messages that were delivered, prior to being classified as unwanted."
"The setup was easy."
 

Cons

"There is room for improvement with the UI."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 could improve by giving customers information on techniques to prevent threats. For example, information about best practices on how to protect their own devices against hackers and scammers, such as educational information or training. This would help others have a better understanding of cyber security. Additionally, there can be more security features added."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365's Mac functionality requires improvement to deliver the same level of protection found on Windows devices."
"The pre-sales cost calculations could be more transparent."
"It would be better if it were more scalable. It depends on the architecture, but we would like to make it more scalable for both data centers."
"We noticed that from time to time, Microsoft's stability does have problems. Sometimes the service goes up and down. Sometimes they change without prior notice."
"The only thing they should improve is the licensing model. They should stop changing it. A year ago, the five features I mentioned were included in one product. Now, three of them are bundled into one product, and you have to pay extra for the other two. I don't mind paying extra, but I don't want them to change it every year or every six months. I need to know what I'm looking at and not worry about it next year."
"The company should focus on adding threats that the solution is currently unable to detect."
"I want Security Awareness Training in there as a package deal. A lot of companies are starting to value email security a little bit more and take it a little bit more seriously, and the great product that we link together with a lot of these sales is a training product called Security Awareness Training. It is an upsell that we do with Proofpoint, and it is definitely something that I recommend everybody with email security to look into. It would be great if Security Awareness Training is included with the email security."
"The solution's server console and cluster dashboard have been the same for four years so need to be upgraded."
"The product's deployment is complex and requires technical knowledge."
"Proofpoint Email Protection could improve on the training. Every organization is different and to fine-tune it to block everything properly there needs to be better training. Sometimes it can block some of the information it shouldn't."
"The scalability can be improved, and the solution can be optimized."
"Proofpoint Email Protection could improve the Mail Trace feature and make navigation easier."
"They do not have an on-demand scan for the internal viruses and internal users, and they don't have a scan for the exchange server against viruses and spam as Symantec does."
"Integration and filtering out who you want and don't want to have integrated ID could be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is much more expensive than using another solution because we have had to include some options and upgrade our license."
"I know that the product is incredibly expensive."
"For licensing, it's usually a yearly package for customers who are subscribed to Office 365, but they can also pay on a monthly basis."
"The pricing is normal. Considering its popularity, it's not overpriced."
"Defender for 365 comes in various plans and licenses, along with other Microsoft security solutions. Purchasing this kind of package or security bundle gives good value for money, and that's what I recommend."
"The solution could be better by simplifying the business model of their licensing. It was hard to figure out how to get the licensing done for the environment, initially."
"Compared to other brands, Microsoft Defender for Office 365's pricing is competitive."
"The solution saves money so we have seen a return on investment."
"Annually, it costs us about $92,000. This is pretty much what it costs us. There is no additional cost."
"The licensing is basically $8/user."
"The solution is expensive."
"The solution uses a licensing model that is reasonable compared to other products."
"The end customer is buying our solution, which can be for monthly or annual usage depending on our payment and business model."
"It is multiple times more expensive, which made it very much less attractive."
"The price is reasonable."
"Proofpoint Email Protection is a reasonably priced product, which means that it is neither too low nor too high in terms of price."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Email Security solutions are best for your needs.
793,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Answers from the Community

Aishwarya Rm - PeerSpot reviewer
Mar 3, 2023
Mar 3, 2023
In my opinion, there is little comparison. Proofpoint is an industry leader in email protection and has a very tightly integrated ecosystem for email defense, incident response, and awareness training. They have dedicated teams monitoring the threat landscape and continually tweak their algorithms to match current threats. Proofpoint goes far beyond email protection with tools to help your t...
See 2 answers
JB
Mar 2, 2023
In my opinion, there is little comparison. Proofpoint is an industry leader in email protection and has a very tightly integrated ecosystem for email defense, incident response, and awareness training. They have dedicated teams monitoring the threat landscape and continually tweak their algorithms to match current threats. Proofpoint goes far beyond email protection with tools to help your team investigate email-related threats, monitor user interactions and risks, act on users who continually handle email improperly with training, simulated phishes for user awareness, and even tools to reach full DMARC and DKIM protection (which can be extremely time and labor intensive). Defender has very little footprint, but also offers far less features. Proofpoint can be a more costly solution, but when compared feature for feature it far outweighs Defender. We do use both at my organization and I rarely interact with Defender as part of email investigations. Both will offer great protection, but beyond that Proofpoint is very feature rich and gives my team more tools to combat email threats when something is not caught by the gateway rules. Quite often emails do not contain threats prior to delivery and are weaponized afterward to get past the email defenses. Proofpoint has TAP and TRAP to isolate and remove those threats once they do become weaponized; along with the intelligence to know it has occurred. Proofpoint also has stellar reporting features so you have a very good understanding of your email environment at a glance.
Remy Ma - PeerSpot reviewer
Mar 3, 2023
If you're looking for Managed Email Security, it can be hard to decide between Microsoft Defender for Office 365 and Proofpoint Email Protection. It's like choosing between two delicious flavors of ice cream — both are good, but what flavor do you prefer? Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is managed by Microsoft’s Security & Compliance Center and provides managed email security for Office 365 customers. It offers comprehensive protection against malicious emails, phishing attacks, and other advanced threats. On the other hand, Proofpoint Email Protection is managed by a third-party provider and provides managed email security for businesses of all sizes. While it doesn't have as many features as Defender, Proofpoint still offers robust protection against malicious emails, phishing attacks, and other advanced threats. In the end, it comes down to personal preference. Do you prefer managed email security managed by Microsoft or a third party? It all depends on your individual needs. Whichever solution you choose, make sure that managed email security meets all of your requirements!
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
7%
Educational Organization
27%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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?
While Microsoft Defender for Office 365 necessitates pricier E3 or E5 subscriptions, the extensive functionality offered by these licenses across various Microsoft products justifies the investment.
What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps is a very good solution that allows you to use a single port or tool to control everything happening with your organization's different cloud applications. Configu...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Proofpoint Email Protection?
The product is costly. I rate the product price a seven on a scale of one to ten, where one is low price and ten is high price. When you want to change what capabilities you want in the product, yo...
What needs improvement with Proofpoint Email Protection?
The solution needs to integrate with the owner's labeling solution. Without this integration, the solution is not feasible.
 

Also Known As

MS Defender for Office 365
Proofpoint Enterprise Protection, Cofense PhishMe
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is trusted by companies such as Ithaca College.
Blocket, University of Waterloo, Lincoln Memorial University, WellSpan Health, U-Haul, Carestream Health, Westinghouse
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs. Proofpoint Email Protection and other solutions. Updated: January 2024.
793,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.