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Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs Symantec Advanced Threat Protection comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 1, 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

Microsoft Defender for Offi...
Ranking in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
3rd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
61
Ranking in other categories
Email Archiving (2nd), Email Security (2nd), Microsoft Security Suite (8th), Secure Email Gateway (SEG) (2nd)
Symantec Advanced Threat Pr...
Ranking in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
24th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
16
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is 5.8%, down from 12.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Advanced Threat Protection is 2.2%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Defender for Office 3655.8%
Symantec Advanced Threat Protection2.2%
Other92.0%
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
 

Featured Reviews

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.
Dennis O'Reilly - PeerSpot reviewer
Cyber SecOps Principal at Dotcom Security
Provides end-to-end antivirus protection and has good stability
Symantec Endpoint Protection provides end-to-end protection. Along with antivirus protection, it has a lot of key areas, including intrusive prevention, firewall features, and application and device control. It can integrate with other Broadcom solutions, such as Symantec Messaging Gateway and Symantec DLP. If you want to send an email, it gets scanned through endpoint protection and DLP. We get all Symantec functionality in a single pane.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"One of the best features of the tool is its capability to aggregate insights from different workloads, basically from the Office 365 and endpoints part."
"It also gives the vulnerability status according to the versions you have selected. Let's say you have Google Chrome. It mentions the versions it has, and it updates. Within two hours of an update, it is reflected in the dashboard. That's really nice to have."
"Overall, I would rate Microsoft Defender for Office 365 at a ten."
"Some of the valuable features on the email side are anti-phishing, anti-malware, and Safe Links."
"The benefit that stands out to me is the ability for multiple individuals to collaborate simultaneously within the same document. Additionally, there is the option to save the document directly in the integrated OneDrive or SharePoint."
"The solution is very easy to use. All you have to do is to assign the license to the end-user and it's done. The customer will only have the feature activated, and the solution will monitor the emails to determine if they are a threat or not."
"Scalability-wise, I do not think there are any issues so far."
"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."
"Overall, the product supports everything already feature-wise, because it has email protection, monitoring detection, network intrusion detection, and advanced threat protection."
"Endpoint to network is a good feature, it can protect the line."
"Real-time threat analysis is quick and takes action on threats immediately."
"Technical support is very responsive. You just have to open a ticket. They respond in a timely manner. Their response is good. I'm satisfied."
"The incident management on the solution is very good. You get a lot of detailed information about an incident. You also get a lot of documentation in connection with the CVI or integration."
"The product integrates well with our systems, and we have not encountered any problems."
"The most valuable feature is NetFlow threat protection."
"Technical support has been helpful and responsive."
 

Cons

"The visibility for the weaknesses in the system and unauthorized access can be improved."
"In one of the reports I can get the exact place where a vulnerable file resides. But for that, I need to explicitly go into the device and check. If they could include that file part in the report, without my having to go to the device itself, that would help."
"There is room for improvement in terms of reporting."
"Its price should be improved. Its cost is a major concern for us."
"Configuring the default strategies and policies in Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps generates a lot of noise and false positives."
"The phishing and spam filters could use some improvement."
"Sometimes, phishing emails manage to pass through the filter, so the system needs to enhance its phishing email detection capabilities."
"I assess the stability and reliability of the solution as seven out of ten."
"The support team that Symantec offers didn't know how to solve issues even though they referred to themselves as "engineers"."
"The product's support services need improvement."
"It should be able to collect information if the agent is disabled."
"An improvement could be made on the reporting because then it would be easier to collect information and submit it for compliance."
"Not ideal for advanced threat protection."
"The cloud platform needs to have improvement in terms of the user interface and the different capabilities it has available. It needs to match the other leading next-gen EDR products that are available in the market. That's the reason why we are stepping away from Symantec. Their cloud environment is just generally lacking in comparison to others."
"Symantec appliances need improvement. The whole appliance environment is a robust system and it needs a massive amount of storage space. If you have to increase or speed up the background storage it's a pretty complicated process. The scalability and sizing is critical, and if you do it wrong you run into issues pretty quickly."
"Scalability could be better."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"For large enterprise organizations, they can definitely afford it, but for small and medium organizations, they might struggle to cover the expenses."
"The product is expensive."
"Microsoft Defender is expensive. I typically recommend it only if clients have the budget. Otherwise, I would suggest an alternative."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 comes with Microsoft Windows. It is free with the operating system."
"The pricing has become expensive."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is an add-on to the Office license. Many customers are purchasing this solution."
"I know that the product is incredibly expensive."
"It is much more expensive than using another solution because we have had to include some options and upgrade our license."
"Pricing is good. It is nice to have a great product at a fair price."
"Symantec Endpoint Protection has an average price."
"Symantec Advanced Threat Protection's pricing is comparable."
"The pricing of this solution is inexpensive and affordable."
"The price is quite expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Outsourcing Company
19%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Marketing Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business24
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise32
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise13
 

Questions from the Community

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 a standalone product. It's very competitive compared to what competitor...
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 for malware. We are seeing a lot more malware-less emails that Defender for Offi...
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.
Ask a question
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Also Known As

MS Defender for Office 365
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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is trusted by companies such as Ithaca College.
ECI
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs. Symantec Advanced Threat Protection and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
921,665 professionals have used our research since 2012.