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Microsoft Defender XDR vs Symantec XDR comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Net...
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Ranking in Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
110
Ranking in other categories
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) (4th), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (6th), Ransomware Protection (2nd), AI-Powered Cybersecurity Platforms (1st)
Microsoft Defender XDR
Ranking in Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
4th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
109
Ranking in other categories
Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (8th), Microsoft Security Suite (4th)
Symantec XDR
Ranking in Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
47th
Average Rating
8.0
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Extended Detection and Response (XDR) category, the mindshare of Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks is 4.7%, down from 5.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender XDR is 4.5%, down from 6.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec XDR is 0.5%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Extended Detection and Response (XDR) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Defender XDR4.5%
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks4.7%
Symantec XDR0.5%
Other90.3%
Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
 

Featured Reviews

ABHISHEK_SINGH - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Process Expert at A.P. Moller - Maersk
Gained full visibility and streamlined threat detection through behavior-based insights and AI integration
Initially, we got to have a lot of false positives when we onboarded, but nowadays it's quite smooth. We have fine-tuned our security policies and allowed different levels of policies to get rid of those false positives. Currently, we are getting a fairly good amount of incidents that are not false positives or benign, but actionable items. The process is streamlined. In the initial days, the operations used to get involved in a lot of benign and other activities, but now the process is streamlined. We are leveraging the auto-detection and remediation plans. The operations teams are now more involved in other business roles as well, not just looking into the logs and fetching out what's happening there. They have fixed a lot of things. Initially, they didn't have IAC code drift detection, cloud posture management, or security posture management, but they have those now. They purchased different vendors and did a merger with that. They have now Prisma Cloud that gets integrated and now they are working with Cortex Cloud. Everything that was negative has now been addressed, and the product altogether looks to be in a very better and mature shape now. Currently, it's more or less detecting the workloads with AI-based best practices. Since most organizations are consuming AI agents and other things, we are looking forward to seeing what other feature enhancements Palo Alto can support in that.
Shivam Dhang - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Infrastructure & Cloud Manager at Softcell Technologies Limited
Unified security view has reduced incident response time and improves cross-domain threat hunting
From a customer perspective, given that we are using Microsoft Defender XDR at a company with multiple cloud environments, I would like to see more intelligent alert tuning. Sometimes we still get noise, so better prioritization would help. I also wish the advanced hunting interface was more streamlined, especially for large-scale queries. Finally, deeper integrations with third-party tools would help us get a more complete picture across our stack. Onboarding can be complex if Microsoft 365 identity and endpoints are not properly aligned. Initial setup requires good planning. Overall, the platform is strong, but onboarding should be planned according to your specific needs.
BR
Cyber Security Consultant at I(TS)² Saudi Arabia
A scalable and stable solution with straightforward deployment
We can generate maps from the environment. For example, suppose there is a virus that has a zero-day attack and is publicly unknown. We can block that and keep it away from the network so it is not further replicated. It also has custom white and black lists. We can add a good reputation on both lists and use the sonar technology for Symantec and the online network for advanced reports.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Cortex XDR lets us manage several clients from the same console, and its endpoint defense is more advanced than traditional antivirus."
"Provides behavior-based detection which offers many benefits over signature-based detection."
"One thing that I like about Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks, it is detecting all the suspicious or malicious binaries, and it has integration with Palo Alto Firewall."
"One of the things that I enjoy the most is using policy extensions. It's like having host firewalls to control USB connections. I think it's a wonderful tool to restrict use when connecting to our computers. Another important tool is Home Insights. That is an add-on to the Cortex solution. I like that because we can see all the vulnerabilities in the environment and control what assets are connected to our network."
"The most valuable features of this product are the management capabilities, which allow an IT organization to get quite a good picture of attempted cyber attacks, and its out-of-the-box investigation capabilities."
"The positive impacts I see from Cortex XDR by Palo Alto Networks include a complete 360-degree view of our security posture altogether, being a uniform platform where we are ingesting logs from multiple resources."
"Stability is one of the features we like the most."
"It is easy to use."
"The feature I like the most in Microsoft Defender XDR is XDR because it has taken us a while, but we are a global company with people in a few countries, and now we can have centralized alerts that we send out to Teams messages and clean up infected computers or help people in a very short amount of time."
"For me, the advanced hunting capabilities have been really great. It allowed querying the dataset with their own language, which is KQL or Kusto Query Language. That has allowed me to get much more insight into the events that have occurred. The whole power of 365 Defender is that you can get the whole story. It allows you to query an email-based activity and then correlate it with an endpoint-based activity."
"The most valuable features are machine learning, AI, and auto-remediation of none malicious alerts."
"Overall, the solution has decreased our time to detect and respond."
"The most valuable features of Microsoft 365 Defender are the combination of all the capabilities and centralized management."
"We have saved time with fifty to sixty percent faster incident response, and the overall efficiency has improved with a reduction of thirty to forty percent in manual SOC effort due to a single console and fewer tool switches."
"What I appreciate most about Microsoft Defender XDR is the ability to drill down to the process level, the visibility of processes, and the file-level details of what processes are accessing, including the IP addresses for outbound connections."
"Microsoft Defender XDR provides strong identity protection with comprehensive insights into risky user behavior and potential indicators of compromise."
"We can block a virus that has a zero-day attack and is publicly unknown and keep it away from the network so it is not further replicated."
"You can advise the solution and protect your environment."
 

Cons

"It is not easy to sell Cortex XDR, not because it isn't a good tool."
"The solution needs better reports. I think they should let the customer go in and customize the reports."
"Although I would say this product is highly-rated, it could probably do more because nothing does everything that you want."
"To jump from the partner to Palo Alto directly was challenging."
"It's more focused on network communication. If a customer wants to increase the level of protection and start working with documents, it's impossible to integrate these features into the system. It's more of a communication-oriented system than a content security-oriented system."
"The solution should enhance the ADR and reporting."
"When it comes to core analysis and security analysis, Cortex needs to provide more information."
"It is an enterprise-level solution. Its price could be less expensive."
"Their response time is okay, it works fine, but the time it takes to resolve escalated cases needs improvement."
"Microsoft support is not very good. You get stuck in low-level support for way longer than you should, instead of them escalating the issue up the chain."
"One of the biggest downsides of Microsoft products, in general, is that the menus are often difficult to find, as they tend to move from place to place between versions."
"The solution could improve by having better machine learning and AI. Additionally, the interface, documentation, and integration could be better."
"There's still some more work to be done there. Additionally, the limited terminal live access an analyst has is very restricted."
"What could be improved in Microsoft 365 Defender is its licensing, e.g. it should be more consolidated and would be good if it has some optimizations. Improving the alerts and notifications, in terms of adding more details, would also be good for this solution."
"The patching capability should be there. Patching is something that you cannot do even though you see the vulnerabilities present in your environment. For patching, you have to depend on another solution."
"It would be highly beneficial if CoPilot could identify anomalies within the network and notify the IT team."
"The solution should have better reporting."
"The solution should have better reporting."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is okay, although direct support can be expensive."
"It's the most expensive solution, but features-wise, it's quite strong. It's very good for protection, so the results are very good in the case of protection. I would rate it a two out of ten in terms of pricing."
"I feel it is fairly priced."
"The price of the product is not very economical."
"It is present, but when compared to other competitive products, I would say it is not less expensive; however, when all of the other added values are considered, the price is reasonable."
"Compared to CrowdStrike, Cortex XDR is an expensive solution."
"The solution has one subscription for endpoint protection and one subscription for detection and response. The two licenses combined give you the BRO version."
"The pricing is a little high. It is per user per year."
"Microsoft should provide lower-level licensing options. They should do it in such a way that even an individual could purchase a license, and it should be entirely flexible."
"Purchasing Microsoft Defender XDR as part of a Microsoft 365 bundle can be cost-effective, but acquiring it as a standalone product may be more expensive."
"The solution is affordable, and we haven't been hit with any hidden costs. The subscription model is straightforward, and it's easy to understand how much additional features cost. If we need to cancel a license or feature, we do that well in advance to avoid being charged for it, but overall, the pricing and licensing are simple and easy."
"The functionality is fantastic, but for medium and small-sized companies it's overpriced. It would be better if it were a little bit cheaper."
"I believe that the pricing of the licensing is fair."
"Microsoft is not competitive with the pricing of the solution. The competitors are able to offer lower discounts. The price of the solution is higher."
"The price of the solution is high compared to others and we have lost some customers because of it."
"The bundling of software makes it easier to manage our setup, but Microsoft purposefully obfuscates this through marketing ploys to hide costs."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business45
Midsize Enterprise20
Large Enterprise48
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business46
Midsize Enterprise27
Large Enterprise40
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Cortex XDR by Palo Alto vs. Sentinel One
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto vs. SentinelOne SentinelOne offers very detailed specifics with regard to risks or attacks. ...
Comparing CrowdStrike Falcon to Cortex XDR (Palo Alto)
Cortex XDR by Palo Alto vs. CrowdStrike Falcon Both Cortex XDR and Crowd Strike Falcon offer cloud-based solutions th...
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,...
What do you like most about Microsoft 365 Defender?
Microsoft Defender XDR provides strong identity protection with comprehensive insights into risky user behavior and p...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft 365 Defender?
My experience with the pricing, setup costs, and licensing of Microsoft Defender XDR is that we are on an E5 license,...
What needs improvement with Microsoft 365 Defender?
From my perspective, Microsoft Defender XDR can be improved with better visibility in certain areas where I can trigg...
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Also Known As

Cyvera, Cortex XDR, Palo Alto Networks Traps
Microsoft 365 Defender, Microsoft Threat Protection, MS 365 Defender
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

CBI Health Group, University Honda, VakifBank
Accenture, Deloitte, ExxonMobil, General Electric, IBM, Johnson & Johnson and many others.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about CrowdStrike, SentinelOne, TrendAI and others in Extended Detection and Response (XDR). Updated: April 2026.
892,611 professionals have used our research since 2012.