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Palo Alto Networks WildFire 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

Palo Alto Networks WildFire
Ranking in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
72
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
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 February 2026, in the Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) category, the mindshare of Palo Alto Networks WildFire is 7.5%, down from 11.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Advanced Threat Protection is 2.1%, up from 1.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Palo Alto Networks WildFire7.5%
Symantec Advanced Threat Protection2.1%
Other90.4%
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
 

Featured Reviews

RK
Engineer at Taalumgroup
Achieve effective threat prevention and seamless integration with powerful technical support
Integration with third-party products is possible. For example, connecting a mail gateway with Palo Alto Networks WildFire allows them to handle prevention. Palo Alto Networks WildFire is a cloud-based sandboxing solution. The firewall is connected to WildFire, and XDR performs sandboxing from the cloud. WildFire conducts malware scanning and emulation, then informs the firewall to block threats based on the response. It also generates reports regarding malware and other issues. The sandboxing process involves sending sample files to the cloud for scanning, checking file authenticity, certificates, and detecting malicious code. WildFire performs multiple checks and informs the XDR agent about file status. This automatic process occurs within minutes or seconds. For unknown or suspicious files, immediate blocking occurs while samples are sent to WildFire for identification. I rate Palo Alto Networks WildFire a 9 out of 10.
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

"The protection, prevention, detection, and prevention capabilities are very powerful."
"I give the initial setup an eight out of ten."
"The most valuable features are all of the security features in terms of protection and SSL and VPN."
"Scalable ATP solution that's quick to set up. It demonstrates good performance and stability."
"I like the analysis they apply to the unknown files, and I think they have good technology to use as a sandboxing tool. I didn't find something similar to WildFire in the marketplace."
"Being an application-based firewall, this is one of the critical focus factors along with the threat prevention services it provides."
"WildFire has default licenses for threat prevention. It updates its cloud-based database in real-time, and its dedicated team analyzes threats to provide remediation and prevention measures."
"Integrating Palo Alto Networks WildFire with various security protocols similar to a firewall has significantly improved the overall threat detection capabilities in our organization."
"The most valuable feature is Click-time URL protection."
"All of the solution's features are quite valuable for us. We especially like the threat protection it provides."
"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 technical support services are excellent."
"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 great advantage in using this product is it creates multiple services."
"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."
"Real-time threat analysis is quick and takes action on threats immediately."
 

Cons

"The only problem with this solution is the cost. It's expensive."
"Other vendors have some sort of bandwidth management built into the firewall itself and Palo Alto is missing that."
"The product's false positive logs could be more user-friendly to understand. They could provide examples of precious cases to learn."
"There are some formats that the solution cannot support ."
"There are more specialized solutions that compete with Wildfire. Therefore, they need to work on their machine learning and AI to be more competitive."
"Any enhancements should likely be focused on the firewall appliance to further strengthen overall security capabilities, such as refining app and user identity features."
"There are certain changes that I was expecting in the previous version, and I hope that they are soon fixed. All of the problems that I have faced so far have been resolved."
"Unfortunately, the support is getting worse. We have had some open tickets for months, maybe half a year, and there is no real answer."
"They could enhance the solution to work across all devices, including Android, iOS, and Mac, and make it more user-friendly."
"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."
"It also needs network-based threat protection for shared folders and files."
"There are limits with respect to blocking files by hash value or blocking IP addresses, and these limits should be removed."
"The administration interface needs a lot of improvement. It should be UI based, and simple. They need to improve it. It's pretty much not that friendly compared to what we were using as Bitdefender before. It's okay but is improving, actually."
"Scalability could be better."
"The support has dropped down to a five out of ten."
"It should be able to collect information if the agent is disabled."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is a bit expensive. You pay for security."
"There are different types of licenses."
"We pay between $3,000 and $4,000 CAD ($2,200 - $3,000 USD) per year to maintain this solution."
"It's comparable to what the competition is. It is probably a little lesser than what the competition is because, as a state government, we go for whatever the lowest cost is."
"It IS a bit expensive, but I think you get what you pay for. Value is there."
"It is expensive, a feature more accessible to enterprise class customers, but provides an enhanced possibility that Zero- or near-Zero-day threats may be identified and mitigated. The cost of the product weighed against the potential impact of even one successful crypto malware-type exploit may justify the expense."
"The solution is worth its price"
"We are on an annual subscription. When we purchased the firewall, we had activated this solutions license for a minimum of one year. The price of the solution is fair."
"Symantec Endpoint Protection has an average price."
"The pricing of this solution is inexpensive and affordable."
"The price is quite expensive."
"Symantec Advanced Threat Protection's pricing is comparable."
"Pricing is good. It is nice to have a great product at a fair price."
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Comparison Review

it_user206346 - PeerSpot reviewer
Security Consultant at Webernetz.net - Network Security Consulting
Mar 11, 2015
Cisco ASA vs. Palo Alto Networks
Cisco ASA vs. Palo Alto: Management Goodies You often have comparisons of both firewalls concerning security components. Of course, a firewall must block attacks, scan for viruses, build VPNs, etc. However, in this post I am discussing the advantages and disadvantages from both vendors concerning…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Marketing Services Firm
13%
University
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business37
Midsize Enterprise16
Large Enterprise29
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise13
 

Questions from the Community

How does Cisco Firepower NGFW Firewall compare with Palo Alto Networks Wildfire?
The Cisco Firepower NGFW Firewall is a very powerful and very complex piece of anti-viral software. When one considers that fact, it is all the more impressive that the setup is a fairly straightf...
Which is better - Wildfire or FortiGate?
FortiGate has a lot going for it and I consider it to be the best, most user-friendly firewall out there. What I like the most about it is that it has an attractive web dashboard with very easy nav...
How does Cisco ASA Firewall compare with Palo Alto's WildFire?
When looking to change our ASA Firewall, we looked into Palo Alto’s WildFire. It works especially in preventing advanced malware and zero-day exploits with real-time intelligence. The sandbox featu...
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.
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Novamedia, Nexon Asia Pacific, Lenovo, Samsonite, IOOF, Sinogrid, SanDisk Corporation
ECI
Find out what your peers are saying about Palo Alto Networks WildFire vs. Symantec Advanced Threat Protection and other solutions. Updated: January 2026.
882,260 professionals have used our research since 2012.