Palo Alto Networks K2-Series vs Palo Alto Networks PA-Series comparison

Palo Alto Networks K2-Series vs. Palo Alto Networks PA-Series

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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

Fortinet FortiGate

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 20.4%, up from 19.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Palo Alto Networks K2-Series is 0.1%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Palo Alto Networks PA-Series is 0.8%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Firewalls Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Fortinet FortiGate	20.4%
Palo Alto Networks PA-Series	0.8%
Palo Alto Networks K2-Series	0.1%
Other	78.7%

Firewalls

Featured Reviews

Vasu Gala

Manager, Information Technology Operation/Presales at TechMonarch

A stable solution with an intuitive interface and quick customer service

I have been working with Fortinet FortiGate, WatchGuard, Sophos, and SonicWall. I'm not as comfortable with SonicWall because of their UI and limitations. I prefer Fortinet above all other options. When it comes to configuration, I am confident in my ability to handle various tasks, including creating policies such as firewall rules, web policies, and application policies. Additionally, I can configure VPNs and implement load balancing, among other tasks. Overall, I feel much more comfortable working with Fortinet. Fortinet has made significant improvements by integrating AI with firewalls for threat analysis and prevention. In the past 2-3 years, they have launched FortiSASE and SIEM, and they also provide SOC services. Both Palo Alto and Fortinet FortiGate are excellent. While Fortinet FortiGate comes at higher prices, the functionality and support justify the cost. They promptly resolve firmware issues and inform all support providers about configuration changes.

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Krishnakumar M

enterprise architect at a tech services company with 1-10 employees

One of the best tools for the prevention of evasive threats

There is a feature called granular application controls, which I liked. Instead of relying on ports and IP addresses, they use AMP ID. This kind of solution is very good. Another valuable feature is the prevention of evasive threats, which is one of the best tools I've encountered. SSL decryption and app ID-based SSL decryption are also impressive, along with the integration with user ID. Identity-based policies ensuring only authorized users can access specific resources are excellent features. Normally, there is something called SIM or SCIM in IDA IDM, but this feature is provided on the box, which is exemplary.

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Bilal Mustafa

Operations Specialist - MX Operations at Bank Alfalah Limited

Manage security with leading firewall features while navigating AWS cloud challenges

The most effective features of the solution are its Magic Quadrant positioning, making it a leading firewall on perimeter areas and internet edges. It functions very well in data centers. Its effectiveness is highly dependent on budget and approach. Moreover, the return on investment is calculated according to my organization’s sizing and has never been an issue.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"FortiGate improved our security. It's one of the best hardware firewalls."

"Fortinet FortiGate is among the best firewall solutions, having a significant market share in Egypt."

"We use a lot of function on the IPS and it works well for us."

"The reliability of Fortinet FortiGate is through the roof, we're experiencing 99.999% availability consistently."

"Fortinet FortiGate is stable. It's used across all the countries, this is the way most multinationals run their system."

"It is very flexible to use."

"This solution has solid UTM features combined with a nice GUI."

"We've found the solution to be pretty stable."

More Fortinet FortiGate pros

"I like the tool's WildFire feature."

"Everything I could possibly want has already been implanted in the new version."

"Palo Alto has an approach that makes the configuration easier not only for the customers but also for the IT help for the customers."

"One of the most valuable features is Palo Alto's firewall management. We find it easier to manage the firewall centrally."

"K2-Series' best features include its scalability, which is the best on the market."

"The most valuable features are the intuitive user interface, ease of use, and reporting."

"This is a very reliable firewall and we have never had problems with it."

"Mainly, it is very easy to understand, and the logs are very good."

More Palo Alto Networks K2-Series pros

"The cloud-based aspect helps significantly. It integrates seamlessly with other Palo products like Prisma Cloud, offers robust VPN protection, and it's all in one convenient package."

"It has its own logging system. You can go to monitoring and check the logs to see if a connection is getting blocked. You can use multiple types of logs to check if a file or a port is getting blocked or if there are any TCP resets from the source or destination. It's easy to troubleshoot with the monitoring and logging it provides."

"The direct profiles is a valuable feature."

"The product's initial setup process was simple."

"The solution is used for security and IoT security."

"The product's most valuable feature is web filtering."

"It is a stable solution. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."

"It offers application-based policy enforcement. Palo Alto Networks firewalls help us recognize protocol anomalies, contrasting with other vendors that may require policies based on port numbers. With Palo Alto Networks, the port number isn't a constraint because their devices handle protocol traffic at Layer 7, allowing for accurate identification of protocol usage and port numbers. They can identify which protocol actually uses which port."

More Palo Alto Networks PA-Series pros

Cons

"The logging details need to be improved."

"From a reporting perspective, there's room for improvement. They're providing FortiAnalyzer through which one can get some enhancements, but the visibility and reporting still need slight improvement."

"They could continuously focus their improvements on network perimeter security, as that's what they're best at."

"The SD-WAN functionality is a bit overly complicated and not fully documented."

"This product needs to have an analysis feature, rather than having the analysis done through the integration of a different product."

"There's a limitation wherein you can only have about 30 virtual or secondary IPs on a particular interface."

"We haven't tapped into most of the functionalities that Fortinet FortiGate offers because we're using it just for gateway security. One of the things that I would prefer is a more expansive use of their analyzer. They could do more work on FortiAnalyzer in terms of the data and the information coming from it."

"The solution has limited scalability."

More Fortinet FortiGate cons

"Palo Alto doesn't have extended visibility to the end point in their firewalls."

"In the past, we've had trouble with Palo Alto's application filtering not getting it right. I would not be recommending layer 7 application filtering yet."

"I cannot think of anything specific to improve at the moment."

"Its networking features could be better."

"The tool needs to improve integration with more products from other vendors. I would like the product to add threat intelligence features as well."

"The product should get frequent updates allowing us to add new signatures."

"If we have issues, they take anywhere from two days to a week to respond. I even wrote to their CEO because there was no response. When it comes to support, this is the worst company."

"The solution's commitment time could be reduced as it often takes a lot of time to execute."

More Palo Alto Networks K2-Series cons

"The interface is complex."

"There seem to be some issues with TAC (Technical Assistance Center) or Palo Alto support. Anytime you open a case, a level one engineer joins, and then you have to escalate it to level two or three. The support system has changed in the past few years, and that's something they need to look into."

"Currently, they are not protected with any data security when they work from home or outside the network. They surf the Internet directly and should implement a proxy or firewall to monitor the data between the endpoint and the internet."

"Compared to other vendors, the solution's community should be strong enough to solve the problems engineers face."

"The pricing of the solution needs improvement."

"The UI definitely needs work. In my opinion, the UI could be simpler and more user-friendly for the average user."

"I have found that the tool works well for me, but there are areas where security testing and protection could be improved, especially in virtual or cloud environments. However, in this project, once we deployed it, we haven't encountered any issues. The cost is currently manageable, but as we migrate fully into the cloud, additional features like capacity upgrading and improvements to hardware resources will be necessary, especially since our equipment consists of older generation switches and routers. So, I'm looking for additional capabilities in these areas."

"In future releases, maybe Palo Alto can enhance and enlarge their portfolio with SIEM solutions. They already have an endpoint protection solution, SOAR solution, that's fine. But when it comes to standalone IDS/IPS solution or email security solution, for example, we don't have any product in that category for Palo Alto."

More Palo Alto Networks PA-Series cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is expensive. I rate its pricing a six out of ten."

"The pricing of Fortinet FortiGate is average, not cheap or overly expensive compared to other firewall solutions in the market. It's effective and affordable for customers."

"Its price could be better."

"The pricing is based on a licensing model for each IPS in your environment."

"Fortinet is the least expensive solution."

"It is very cost-effective. You get features similar to other firewalls, such as Palo Alto, but at a lower price."

"FortiGate SWG is a cost-effective solution well-suited for organisations of all sizes."

"The initial setup is super straight forward and as far as the licensing goes for the small product that we have, the pricing was pretty competitive. It wasn't as simple and as cheap as a SonicWall but for the service we would get it was a good price."

More Fortinet FortiGate pricing and cost advice

"This product is designed for large companies. The price would not be suitable for a small or medium size company."

"Pricing is a sensitive issue because the cost is high in this market."

"It is an expensive solution."

"We are on an annual license to use Palo Alto Networks K2-Series."

"Products by the leader in the field are justifiably a bit more expensive compared to other vendors."

"This solution is expensive compared to other, similar products."

"The price of the solution is expensive."

"If you compare K2-Series' quality with its price, I think it is reasonable."

More Palo Alto Networks K2-Series pricing and cost advice

"The tool's pricing was reasonable when we bought the product. We pay around 60,000 dollars per year."

"We have to pay a yearly licensing fee for the solution."

"Palo Alto is more expensive than FortiGate."

"It is a very expensive solution."

"From my perspective, managing the price is important, especially because we're a small business. For larger organizations like Barclays, we provide our requirements to the client, and they place the order on BigFix. It's their responsibility to consider their budget and make decisions accordingly. We appreciate the features we get, but the cost-sharing still depends on the client."

"Price-wise, Palo Alto offers high-price products."

"The solution's pricing is high compared to that of Cisco and Fortinet."

"The prices are pretty high, definitely on the upper end."

More Palo Alto Networks PA-Series pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

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869,566 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

15%

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Performing Arts

24%

Computer Software Company

16%

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Comms Service Provider

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	350
Midsize Enterprise	130
Large Enterprise	187

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	13
Midsize Enterprise	8
Large Enterprise	13

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	13
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	14

Questions from the Community

Which is the better NGFW: Fortinet Fortigate or Cisco Firepower?

When you compare these firewalls you can identify them with different features, advantages, practices and usage a...

What is the biggest difference between Sophos XG and FortiGate?

From my experience regarding both the Sophos and FortiGate firewalls, I personally would rather use FortiGate. I know...

What are the biggest technical differences between Sophos UTM and Fortinet FortiGate?

As a solution, Sophos UTM offers a lot of functionality, it scales well, and the stability and performance are quite ...

Features comparison between Palo Alto and Fortinet firewalls

In the best tradition of these questions, Feature-wise both are quite similar, but each has things it's better at, it...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Palo Alto Networks K2-Series?

The pricing for the Palo Alto Networks K2-Series solution is affordable and there are no complaints about the licensing.

What needs improvement with Palo Alto Networks K2-Series?

The graphical user interface is a little complex and difficult to manage. L1 engineers cannot work on the Palo Alto N...

What do you like most about Palo Alto Networks PA-Series?

The reporting feature and application ID functionality within Palo Alto Networks PA-Series are incredibly valuable to...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Palo Alto Networks PA-Series?

Regarding value for money, we brought this Palo Alto Networks PA-Series firewall last month, and we have taken up to ...

What needs improvement with Palo Alto Networks PA-Series?

I do not have any challenges or areas for improvement with Palo Alto Networks PA-Series. There are no AI integrations...

Sophos XG vs Fortinet FortiGate

Comparisons

Compared 17% of the time

Cisco Secure Firewall vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 11% of the time

Netgate pfSense vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 9% of the time

OPNsense vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 4% of the time

Cisco Meraki MX vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 4% of the time

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Cisco Secure Firewall vs Palo Alto Networks K2-Series

Compared 52% of the time

Juniper SRX Series Firewall vs Palo Alto Networks K2-Series

Compared 48% of the time

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OPNsense vs Palo Alto Networks PA-Series

Compared 17% of the time

Juniper SRX Series Firewall vs Palo Alto Networks PA-Series

Compared 13% of the time

Sophos XG vs Palo Alto Networks PA-Series

Compared 10% of the time

Sophos XGS vs Palo Alto Networks PA-Series

Compared 7% of the time

Cisco Meraki MX vs Palo Alto Networks PA-Series

Compared 6% of the time

More Palo Alto Networks PA-Series Competitors

Product Reports

Download Fortinet FortiGate product report

Fortinet FortiGate

October 2025

Palo Alto Networks K2-Series

Download Palo Alto Networks K2-Series product report

Palo Alto Networks PA-Series

Download Palo Alto Networks PA-Series product report

Overview

Fortinet FortiGate excels in providing integrated VPN, firewalling, and Unified Threat Management (UTM) with centralized management and high availability. It supports remote access and comprehensive threat protection, making it a preferred choice for securing networks.

Fortinet FortiGate offers a robust security platform with features such as strong intrusion prevention, application control, and web filtering. Its integration with Active Directory and SD-WAN functionality provides scalable solutions for large networks. Users appreciate its ease of use through centralized management interfaces, ensuring robust security with flexible configurations. However, FortiGate could enhance its graphical interface and technical support responsiveness, address firmware bugs and costly licensing, improve logging, integrate better with third-party tools, and strengthen scalability and memory for log storage. Complexity in configuration and the need for intuitive features are noted challenges, and there's a demand for advanced security, zero-trust capabilities, and AI integration.

What are the key features of Fortinet FortiGate?

VPN: Secure remote access and connectivity.
Firewalling: Protects networks from unauthorized access and attacks.
UTM: Offers a comprehensive approach to threat management.
SD-WAN: Optimizes traffic routing for efficient network performance.
Web Filtering: Controls and monitors web access and ensures Internet security.

What benefits or ROI should be considered?

Centralized Management: Simplifies administration and monitoring.
High Availability: Ensures consistent security and network availability.
Scalability: Adapts to the needs of growing networks.
Comprehensive Threat Protection: Provides robust security measures.
Ease of Use: Minimizes the complexity of security management.

Fortinet FortiGate is widely implemented across industries like education, finance, and government. Companies use it for firewall protection, VPN, and SD-WAN capabilities, ensuring secure perimeter and data center security. It facilitates remote access management and traffic routing optimization, offering reliable security and connectivity solutions.

Fortinet

Designed to handle growing throughput needs due to increasing amounts of application-, user-, and device-generated data, the K2-Series offers amazing performance and threat prevention capabilities to stop advanced cyberattacks and secure mobile network infrastructure, subscribers, and services.

Palo Alto Networks

Palo Alto Networks PA-Series is essential for firewall implementation, perimeter defense, securing infrastructure boundaries, web filtering, VPN, and threat prevention. Organizations deploy it for secure cloud connections, internet security, and managing network devices.

Companies trust Palo Alto Networks PA-Series to protect corporate networks from external threats, control traffic between networks, and meet regulatory compliance. Integrating well with applications, it offers centralized management and advanced security features such as IDS, IPS, and GlobalProtect. It ensures stable performance, application-based policy enforcement, and decryption of SSL traffic while providing efficient resource usage and comprehensive logging.

What are the key features?

Stability: Reliable performance for continuous protection.
App-ID: Application-based policy enforcement.
URL Filtering: Prevents access to malicious websites.
Security Controls: Comprehensive threat prevention mechanisms.
User-Friendly Interface: Simplifies management and operations.
Efficient Resource Usage: Optimized for minimal resource consumption.
Reporting: Detailed logs and analytics for better insights.
Antivirus: Protects against malware and viruses.
WildFire: Advanced threat prevention with machine learning AI.
Protocol Anomaly Detection: Identifies unusual network behavior.
SSL Decryption: Ensures secure traffic inspection.
Encryption: Safeguards sensitive data.
VPN Capabilities: Secure remote access for users.
Active Directory Integration: Streamlines user authentication.
Quality of Service (QoS): Manages network traffic efficiently.

What benefits should be evaluated?

Enhanced Security: Superior threat prevention and detection.
Centralized Management: Streamlined control of network devices.
Regulatory Compliance: Assists in meeting legal requirements.
Operational Efficiency: Reduced resource usage and downtime.
Comprehensive Reporting: Complete visibility into network activities.
Scalability: Adapts to growing network demands.
User Accessibility: Simplifies secure access for remote employees.

Palo Alto Networks PA-Series is implemented across industries like healthcare, finance, retail, and manufacturing. In healthcare, it ensures patient data protection and compliance with HIPAA. Financial institutions utilize it to secure transactions and meet regulatory standards. Retailers benefit from protecting customer information and securing online payments. Manufacturing companies deploy it to safeguard intellectual property and control plant floor operations.

Palo Alto Networks

Sample Customers

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Dell, HP, Oracle, Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Vodafone, Orange, BT Group, Telstra, Deutsche Telekom, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, CenturyLink, NTT Communications, Tata Communications, SoftBank, China Mobile, Singtel, Telus, Rogers Communications, Bell Canada, Telkom Indonesia, Telkom South Africa, Telmex, Telia Company, Telkom Kenya

State of North Dakota, SEGA, Alameda County Office of Education, Temple University, VERGE, CAME

Information Not Available

Palo Alto Networks K2-Series vs. Palo Alto Networks PA-Series