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Microsoft Defender for Office 365 vs Symantec Advanced Threat Protection comparison

 

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)
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
62
Ranking in other categories
Email Archiving (1st), Email Security (2nd), Microsoft Security Suite (9th), Secure Email Gateway (SEG) (1st)
Symantec Advanced Threat Pr...
Ranking in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
21st
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 April 2026, in the Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is 6.9%, down from 15.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Advanced Threat Protection is 2.2%, up from 1.5% 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 3656.9%
Symantec Advanced Threat Protection2.2%
Other90.9%
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.
TapabrataSamanta - PeerSpot reviewer
Lead Architect at Zones
Reliable platform with effective integration capabilities
Our primary use case for the product is to provide advanced threat protection to our clients, primarily in the banking and financial sectors Symantec ATP has been beneficial in ensuring robust security for our clients. Its effectiveness in detecting and mitigating threats has improved customer…

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 saves me time; it does save a lot of time, especially with the automation."
"Scalability-wise, I do not think there are any issues so far."
"I would say that 90% of the spam and phishing attack emails get blocked right off the bat."
"At the moment we are satisfied with this product. It's a stable, scalable, and resilient solution for us."
"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."
"The feature of Microsoft Defender for Office 365 that I like the most is probably the email features specifically, because those are the ones that a typical end user will accidentally click on a link not knowing what it is, and it'll catch it, and then it'll feed it over to Defender and stop the attack from happening before it actually can."
"Safe attachments, safe links, policies, and the ability to protect from zero-day threats are the most valuable features."
"It has helped us in improving our security posture; it detects any kind of attack or abnormal behavior in accessing the system and sends an alert to the administrator who can check, understand, and review on time to ensure that all activities are legit."
"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."
"You don't have to buy a separate email security platform. You can enable that using their endpoint, and I like that. You don't have to have two agents running on the same box."
"The Application Control code and the easy integration are valuable features."
"The most valuable feature is Click-time URL protection."
"The technical support services are excellent."
"They manage to solve detection quite nicely, with rather elaborate detection compared to other providers, and Symantec also provides a useful set of information linked to each of the attacked computers."
"This is a good solution, and whatever our requirement is, all of the features are there."
"Currently we have 800-plus nodes connected with this solution, without any issues."
 

Cons

"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 should be more proactive."
"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."
"In the areas of improvement for Microsoft Defender for Office 365, the console is the biggest challenge for me."
"We need a separate license and we don't know how to get the license that is required."
"Microsoft needs to broaden its global support presence by establishing teams of subject-matter experts in all regions."
"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."
"They have moved features from one console to another. Things have been moved around in the interface and it takes me time to find where certain features are."
"I think Microsoft Defender for Office 365 can be improved by creating more educational pieces about not just looking for malware."
"An improvement could be made on the reporting because then it would be easier to collect information and submit it for compliance."
"The administration interface needs a lot of improvement. It should be UI-based and simple."
"The support team that Symantec offers didn't know how to solve issues even though they referred to themselves as "engineers"."
"There are some features that would add value to this product. One of them would be a graphical presentation of threats that the system has encountered."
"The product's support services need improvement."
"Entire threat protection is not available for the advanced features."
"It's a strange situation where the infrastructure of the consumer or customer is behind some kind of firewall and they have always used some kind of customized proxy. In this situation, the ATP has a very tough time to pass the information to the cloud and back. To fix, it requires a more elaborate and complex configuration for that particular case."
"The support has dropped down to a five out of ten."
 

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."
"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."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 comes with Microsoft Windows. It is free with the operating system."
"From the pricing point of view, like any other product in the market, there is scope for negotiation."
"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."
"Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is an add-on to the Office license. Many customers are purchasing this solution."
"I was working in the government and it was too expensive for us to use our Microsoft products."
"The product is expensive."
"Pricing is good. It is nice to have a great product at a fair price."
"Symantec Advanced Threat Protection's pricing is comparable."
"The pricing of this solution is inexpensive and affordable."
"The price is quite expensive."
"Symantec Endpoint Protection has an average price."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Marketing Services Firm
11%
Financial Services Firm
11%
University
9%
Construction Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business25
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise31
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 competitors are ch...
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.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Symantec Advanced Threat Protection?
The price is quite expensive because a different entity has taken over the company.
What needs improvement with Symantec Advanced Threat Protection?
One area for improvement could be the pricing model. Future releases could further enhance integration capabilities with other platforms and simplify the licensing model to compete more with Micros...
What is your primary use case for Symantec Advanced Threat Protection?
Our primary use case for the product is to provide advanced threat protection to our clients, primarily in the banking and financial sectors.
 

Also Known As

MS Defender for Office 365
No data available
 

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: April 2026.
886,858 professionals have used our research since 2012.