No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs Sophos Email comparison

Sponsored
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 3, 2024

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

Cloudflare One
Sponsored
Ranking in Email Security
21st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (15th), Data Loss Prevention (DLP) (20th), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (11th), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (7th), Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (13th), Access Management (13th), Bot Management (3rd), ZTNA as a Service (9th), ZTNA (4th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (10th), Remote Browser Isolation (RBI) (3rd)
Microsoft Defender for Offi...
Ranking in Email Security
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
62
Ranking in other categories
Email Archiving (1st), Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (2nd), Microsoft Security Suite (9th), Secure Email Gateway (SEG) (1st)
Sophos Email
Ranking in Email Security
14th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
34
Ranking in other categories
Office 365 Protection (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the Email Security category, the mindshare of Cloudflare One is 1.5%, down from 1.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is 7.3%, down from 13.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Sophos Email is 1.8%, down from 2.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Email Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Defender for Office 3657.3%
Sophos Email1.8%
Cloudflare One1.5%
Other89.4%
Email Security
 

Featured Reviews

CV
Network Architect at IP Dimension
Cloud security has improved remote access and has reduced costs for smaller client sites
I have used Cloudflare One's Identity-Aware Proxy, and it is quite straightforward from what I have seen so far. The app registration on the Azure side integrates fully into Cloudflare, and I am very satisfied with that part because it is easy to set up. The integration of Cloudflare One's Secure Web Gateway and Zero Trust Network Access works without any issues. That part is pretty automatic, and if you complete the rest of the setup, it comes together by itself with no issues from my side. What makes it nice is that we can actually start replacing on-site firewalls at this stage for the smaller clients because it does not matter if they go to a coffee shop or work from home; they are still secured by the same connection. The hops get shorter and you get better latency. We have done testing to see if it is better. One thing that we did notice with our proof of concept with our current client is that they have people connecting from the UK. When they used their previous VPN solution, uploading CAD drawings and other files to the server took a long time. They mentioned that it is much quicker on Cloudflare One's solution. I definitely believe that is part of the improved performance, and I am satisfied with that as well. What is nice about Cloudflare One is that it makes the setup easier and also easier to train technicians to maintain it. Compared to legacy systems, we do not need to get fancy firewalls in place that are costly. That is definitely also a cost-saver with Cloudflare One.
Emeka Ndulu - PeerSpot reviewer
Cloud Solutions Architect at a tech services company with 201-500 employees
Improves threat visibility and response while reducing manual tasks and training users against phishing
I appreciate the attack simulation feature whereby I get to train users and educate them on how to identify phishing emails and spam emails, as well as the anti-spam protection. It gives me visibility into my threat environment and threat landscape to ensure that I am one step ahead of any likelihood of threats within my environment. I get to detect it and respond, so the threat intelligence is very effective. Microsoft security solutions save my time. It saves money because once I protect my environment, I don't lose money. It has decreased my detection time and my time to respond.
Kalyan  Chowdhury - PeerSpot reviewer
Founder at Computech infosysetm
Stronger email and mobile security has protected users from ransomware and simplified management
Price is obviously a challenging part, and I think it is the biggest problem we have suffered from over the last two or three years due to a 7 to 8% hike per year, twice a year, which is why we have some renewals on Sophos Email, Sophos XDR, EDR, and the firewall, but due to price hike, they are unable to renew it. The price is going to be very high. It would be better if Sophos can provide a more flexible pricing model for different types of businesses. Price could be lower. The main competitor for Sophos in the market is Palo Alto, which has reduced their price by more than 35 to 40%, making it a very challenging part to sell this product. Palo Alto provides the same functionality for email security, which adds to the challenge because the price is going very high.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's the endpoint exposition. We don't need to expose our VPN server to the internet and need a zero-test solution. I can apply some conditional access to the endpoint that's connecting to our network to check their security policies or the security condition of their workstation. Once the workstation is trying to connect to my internal network, then I would like to check the discrete condition of these endpoints that are trying to access my internal network. We created some conditional access. We have CrowdStrike, to check if the CrowdStrike is installed, to check if it's updated, and to check for Windows updates. We created some conditional policies to check it."
"For Cloudflare Access, I am using the free plan...The most valuable feature is their protection."
"Cloudflare DDoS mitigates DDoS attacks."
"We mostly use Cloudflare WAF, and gets basic Cloudflaire DDoS, caching as extra bonus . We like the factor these features are all integrated into 1 console, simple to manage."
"It is a stable solution."
"This solution is easy to understand and easy to configure."
"Clover is the best product globally."
"Cloudflare, in my opinion, was easy to implement."
"Microsoft so far has been good; we haven't faced any kind of disruption or anything else, it's a good product and good platform, I must say, and overall it's a good product and good service and we haven't dealt with bugs or glitches."
"The insights provided with Microsoft Defender for Office 365 are helpful because it comes with the E5 license, and by default, we can use a lot of capabilities."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is a stable solution."
"The most valuable feature is the integration; it's a single console, so we don't have to switch around between multiple products, and another valuable feature is the ease of operations and maintenance."
"One of our clients didn't have the budget to invest in a SOC team, but we deployed the solution for them, and they now run a SOC with only one analyst."
"Some of the valuable features on the email side are anti-phishing, anti-malware, and Safe Links."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 saves me time; it does save a lot of time, especially with the automation."
"It has significantly decreased my time to detection and response."
"Sophos Email is a stable solution."
"The most valuable feature is its email security."
"Sophos Email is in the cloud and integrated with its firewall."
"The deployment is very easy. It's quite straightforward."
"Sophos Email provides both inbound and outbound filtering."
"The main use case for Sophos Email is its robust security features; we are effectively blocking spam and phishing attempts, and we have strong control over these aspects."
"I cannot guarantee any email by its name. It can be spam. Sophos Email helps to double-check whether an email is spam or not. It has a dashboard which gives an overview of the alerts."
"The platform is scalable when installed on server-based systems."
 

Cons

"Cloudflare One is not very powerful, but for what we require, it is basic and sufficient."
"For the topic of improvement, providing some training material is one of my suggestions."
"The software has automated alerts, but the automated alerts are not available in the mobile app."
"Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform needs to improve its documentation. It took time to do the implementation."
"When there are any dynamic changes in complex applications, the tool takes a lot of time, making its analytics-related area a major matter of concern where improvements are needed."
"Our subscription plan for the solution has a limitation of bot signatures."
"Lacks a VPN feature to provide a secure connection to the data center."
"There are premium tier live service and lower tier live service, so we opted for the lower tier. But there is no medium tier where we pay a little extra and get a bit more service. So if that can be improved."
"Sometimes I have to recategorize things when it takes the wrong step and I do not want it to classify something as suspicious."
"The inbuilt analysis of false positives can be faster. It's not slow, but it can be faster."
"I was looking for some advanced features, like if I would receive an email that contains a legitimate file type, but the content is malicious, how I can protect against that?"
"One area for improvement is support, in terms of being able to reach them and, especially, technical support for configuration."
"Microsoft sometimes has downtime, and we'll get several incidents coming in back to back. We have a huge backlog of notifications, many of which may be false positives. However, there might be serious alerts, so we can't risk dismissing all of them at once."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 must improve the overall management style, including the GUI. It also needs to change the filters so that it is easy to whitelist and blacklist data."
"If you look at other products, such as Wiz or Palo Alto's cloud, because they also have similar components in terms of how they protect cloud infrastructure or enable cloud security, Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is not up to that extent."
"From a development point of view, if I wanted to do development on my actual machine where Defender is, the organization can set certain policies or Defender makes that prohibitive."
"The tool has some performance issues and bugs, making it an area where improvements are required."
"Sophos Email can improve mail security."
"Sophos Email can improve mail security."
"Lacks visibility into spam emails."
"The solution should be able to support the cloud environment."
"Sophos Email does not work with split delivery. If I have a domain with 100 mailboxes and want to protect only 50, it is not recommended by Sophos or not possible to configure."
"The product could include all the essential features and capabilities, similar to the on-premise, server-based version."
"It was sometimes hard to find the settings in the solution's interface."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price tag is no longer $200,000, but rather $300,000 to $400,000. It's twice."
"The solution's pricing lacks transparency."
"The pricing of the solution is cheap. The licensing cost is also very low. I rate the cost and pricing a three out of ten."
"My company has to make yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to the solution. There are no hidden charges apart from the licensing costs of the solution."
"The pricing is somewhere in the middle. I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten."
"Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform's pricing is good."
"The prices are slightly expensive."
"The solution is not that expensive."
"For large enterprise organizations, they can definitely afford it, but for small and medium organizations, they might struggle to cover the expenses."
"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 pricing has become expensive."
"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."
"From the pricing point of view, like any other product in the market, there is scope for negotiation."
"The product is very expensive."
"Compared to other brands, Microsoft Defender for Office 365's pricing is competitive."
"The product is expensive."
"Licensing is paid on a yearly basis."
"The solution is expensive."
"I rate the price of Sophos Email a four out of five."
"It falls somewhere in the middle—it's not excessively expensive nor very cheap."
"The pricing could improve by having additional discounts. For example, when customers buy have more than 50 or more users, there should be additional discounts."
"Sophos Email is priced lower than its competitors."
"Sophos Email is a little expensive for us, but it's necessary. We have a subscription and renew it every three years."
"I would rate the pricing of Sophos Email as a six. It is considered affordable as a standalone product, and there are no additional costs besides licensing. The pricing is fixed."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Email Security solutions are best for your needs.
886,932 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
22%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise11
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business25
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise31
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise5
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access has strong integration with Microsoft, among other platforms. However, when it comes to Kaspersky, ...
What is your primary use case for Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access provides secure access to internal applications for employees, external members of the organization...
What advice do you have for others considering Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access is one of the best integrations available. While about two hundred vendors offer similar services, ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
My experience with pricing, setup, and licensing is that it's actually quite reasonable even on the licensing side as...
What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
I think Microsoft Defender for Office 365 can be improved by creating more educational pieces about not just looking ...
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Defender for Office 365?
My main use cases for Microsoft Defender for Office 365 include email hygiene.
What do you like most about Sophos Email?
The solution's identity proxy feature is very good and reliable.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Sophos Email?
Regarding Sophos Email pricing, I would rate it between six or seven out of ten.
What needs improvement with Sophos Email?
Price is obviously a challenging part, and I think it is the biggest problem we have suffered from over the last two ...
 

Also Known As

Cloudflare Area 1 Email Security, Cloudflare Bot Management, Cloudflare Gateway, Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform, Cloudflare DDoS, Cloudflare SASE & SSE Platform
MS Defender for Office 365
Sophos Email Security
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

23andMe
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is trusted by companies such as Ithaca College.
Del Monte Foods, Terra Verde, spicerhaart, RIVERLITE, Dataprise, SureBridge, Reed's School, Sayfol International School
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs. Sophos Email and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
886,932 professionals have used our research since 2012.