Sangfor NGAF vs Sophos UTM comparison

Sangfor and Sophos are both solutions in the Firewalls category. Additionally, 90% of Sangfor users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 90% of Sophos users who would recommend it.

Sangfor NGAF

Read 34 Sangfor NGAF reviews

4,864 Views
4,718 Comparison Views

90% willing to recommend

Sophos UTM

Read 120 Sophos UTM reviews

11,826 Views
5,558 Comparison Views

90% willing to recommend

Sangfor NGAF

Sophos UTM

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Sangfor NGAF and Sophos UTM based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

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Buyer's Guide

Firewalls

August 2026

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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

Sangfor NGAF

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Firewalls (23rd)

Sophos UTM

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.6

Number of Reviews

120

Ranking in other categories

Unified Threat Management (UTM) (5th)

Featured Reviews

Zaid Farooqui

CIO at Indus Motor Company

Enhanced threat detection with integrated security features and good support

We are using application firewalling, WAF, and SD-WAN. The capabilities are mostly within the box. For example, you will get web application firewall WAF as part and parcel of this. SD-WAN is also bundled. It integrates with their SIEM and SOAR solutions very nicely. Lastly, the pricing point is very cost-efficient as well.

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Heinz Raecke

CEO at iSource GmbH

Integrated security tools have supported critical infrastructure and improved network performance

Regarding Secureworks Taegis VDR Vulnerability Management, I do not have all these shortcuts in my head. Perhaps I have to ask my technicians, but we are in full stress because we have to change this entire firewall equipment, also the entire access points, because of the end of life. We also have the full product in for XDR and extensions. We are also part of the webinars from Sophos. It would be better if there were also some important webinars in German. Everything needs improvement, because also the wireless, also RED box and so on. The handling was much easier on the old equipment than on the new XGS. I think there should also be a little more automatic for SD-WAN routing and so on. Because we have to learn some things from the basic completely new because it is different than Sophos UTM, the XGS. The features that could be improved about Sophos UTM include the new features we have in XGS with a simpler interface. For example, in Sophos UTM, we could define IP hosts and use this IP host. We did not have to insert on every, for example, for wide area networks, we had to put the IP addresses from the other side by hand. In Sophos UTM, we could define it under definitions and then use this IP host where we needed it. In the new XGS, if there is a change in the IP address, we have to do it on all, for example, site-to-site VPN tunnels and so on. We have much more work and it is not so easy because we have to check all the definitions. It is also, for example, some of the male technicians like me, we have a biology handicap. For example, male technicians in Europe also have a red-green problem. So we use these light colors on the interface. In some cases, it is not easy to see the, for example, letters or numbers because of the contrast.

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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

"Sangfor NGAF's standout feature is its powerful application control, enabling precise restrictions on mobile user access to approved applications."

"Sangfor serves most of the basic purposes of a firewall, is particularly good in the DPI where we can inspect the inbound and outbound traffic on a very granular level, gives a very good predictive measure as well as the current measure of things going on in our network, and gives us value for money overall."

"Sangfor NGAF works accordingly with our customers, the solution has good performance, is easy to use, and integrates well with the endpoints."

"The product is very fast and reliable."

"In our hospital, Sangfor NGAF works well for us in terms of ensuring confidentiality and availability, which are crucial in the healthcare industry."

"Sangfor is a good solution that provides a WAF and firewall solution; most other vendors, like Sophos and Fortinet and Cisco, only provide one solution, and that's a valuable feature of Sangfor."

"It offers good value for money and is much cheaper compared to other firewalls."

"We use Sangfor NGAF primarily for security, which has helped save our files from being encrypted by ransomware."

More Sangfor NGAF pros

"Compared to other OEMs and other vendors' firewalls, Sophos UTM is very user-friendly."

"We chose Sophos for its ease of use and it detects malware and viruses that other companies can't detect."

"We are very happy with the product so far."

"I have no problem with the cost or licensing of this solution; this is a primary reason why I wanted this solution, as it does the same thing cheaper than other name brands."

"The zero-day protection and firewall rules are some of the most effective features for threat management."

"Their ability to firewall, filter and monitor network traffic and provide VPN connectivity really helped us day to day with such a complex network."

"The IT Admin or IT Security in any organization would like to have Sophos UTM because it is full of all the features you think about for enterprise."

"It has made our organization more secure, because we are using a VPN. We are not accessing services directly. It allows us to segregate some of the traffic for individuals which may be more of a developer role rather than an operational role needing access to developer resources, but not necessarily production operational resources."

More Sophos UTM pros

Cons

"The cost of licensing is very high compared to other firewalls available here. There should be improvements in hardware scalability, allowing for more storage and memory capacity."

"I would be happy if Sangfor developed a firewall designed specifically for home use, as well as for small businesses such as clinics and so on. A household version of the Sangfor firewall for your personal computer or laptop would be ideal, in my opinion."

"The firewall system needs gradual improvements because there are more threats and challenges in the world every day."

"The tool is expensive."

"The web interface needs to be improved, making it more user-friendly."

"It has an issue with the Sangfor Cloud Platform rather than the firewall. When we run a virtual machine, the window tabs display Chinese characters."

"The solution has too many bugs and these slow down the implementation."

"Scalability for any network device is not very easy in terms of vertical scalability."

More Sangfor NGAF cons

"There were a lot of features and functionality in Sophos SG UTM but nothing was state of the art in terms of technology. You did not get the latest functions. It was very monolithic as it was based on an old Linux PuTTY system."

"We'd like to see them offer their services on mobile devices like tablets. I'm not sure if that's an option or not."

"For the AWS version, it was atrocious. There is absolutely no support when using AWS."

"The pricing is too high."

"They could definitely improve on the support, especially in other countries."

"It would be nice if it had basic features, such as DLP (Data Loss Prevention)."

"Sophos UTM sometimes falls short in high-availability environments. They used to launch firmware that didn't work very well in a high-availability environment."

"Flexibility in pricing could be improved. It's more rigid in its pricing compared to its competitor: Kaspersky."

More Sophos UTM cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price falls in the mid-range, neither exceptionally low nor high."

"For over 2000 users, the cost is around 5000 to 6000 USD. If you want a web application firewall, you have to purchase an additional license for it."

"Sangfor is cheaper than competing vendors."

"Sangfor NGAF price is reasonable and there is an annual license. However, the maintenance cost can be a bit high."

"Price-wise, I would not consider Sangfor NGAF to be a cheap product. It is an expensive firewall solution, though not as expensive as something like Palo Alto, which is costly. However, the higher price point is justifiable given the feature set the tool provides that other firewalls may not offer in a single dedicated appliance."

"In my opinion, the price of the tool is good in the Pakistani market. We can easily get discounts if needed."

"If one is very cheap and ten is very expensive, I rate the tool's price as three out of ten."

"If you know you have around 200+ computer users on your network, then the Sangfor NGAF 5200-F-I model would be the minimum recommended model for that amount of users. This model includes modules for packet filtering, deep packet inspection, malware scanning, DSCP filtration, and many other features."

More Sangfor NGAF pricing and cost advice

"The appliance should be purchased and there is a fee for the license."

"It's expensive. It has a yearly license."

"The price is something that one will need to consider."

"The AWS Marketplace product should be a better fit, but it is a little pricier."

"The biggest issue with Sophos is the pricing. It's definitely more expensive. As I said, we looked at Webroot, which is a big alternative, and Sophos was almost three times the price of Webroot. That's a pretty big difference."

"The problem with the Sophos is not the cost of the hardware but the cost of the modules, packages, and the subscription."

"Pricing for the upgrade was very competitive as Sophos wanted to retain existing customers."

"The product pricing and licensing are higher, but they offer good value for the features and stability provided."

More Sophos UTM pricing and cost advice

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Comparison Review

it_user216600

Senior Technical Consultant with 51-200 employees

Jan 3, 2016

Sophos UTM vs. Fortinet FortiGate

I have used both Sophos and Fortinet products in production and I have found the Sophos UTM appliances (hardware and virtual) to be a better fit most of the time -- with a few caveats which I will touch on below. In both instances, the transition from TMG will be mostly straightforward. The main…

Read full review

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Comms Service Provider

12%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Construction Company

12%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Outsourcing Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	15
Midsize Enterprise	10
Large Enterprise	10

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	75
Midsize Enterprise	28
Large Enterprise	27

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Sangfor NGAF?

The licensing cost is quite high compared to other available firewalls in the market.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Sangfor NGAF?

The cost of licensing is very high compared to other firewalls available here. There should be improvements in hardware scalability, allowing for more storage and memory capacity. Making the soluti...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Sangfor NGAF?

We are hosting applications over the platform, including websites and NAT traffic from our side. Because it's deployed in our data center, which is fully operational, we have various applications h...

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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 good. The most valuable features for me are their web and email filtering. I wou...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Sophos UTM?

The pricing for Sophos UTM is reasonable; I do not have an issue with it, though I was considering RED because I have different sites I wanted to connect, and instead of doing site-to-site, the RED...

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What needs improvement with Sophos UTM?

See all answers

Comparisons

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Check Point Cloud Firewall (formerly CloudGuard Network Security) vs Sangfor NGAF

Compared 8% of the time

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Compared 11% of the time

OPNsense vs Sophos UTM

Compared 9% of the time

Netgate pfSense vs Sophos UTM

Compared 7% of the time

Cisco Secure Firewall vs Sophos UTM

Compared 6% of the time

WatchGuard Firebox vs Sophos UTM

Compared 5% of the time

More Sophos UTM Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Sangfor NGAF

July 2026

Download Sangfor NGAF product report

Buyer's Guide

Sophos UTM

July 2026

Download Sophos UTM product report

Also Known As

Sangfor NGAF Firewall Platform

Astaro

Overview

Sangfor NGAF offers a user-friendly firewall solution with a strong virus database and competitive pricing. It supports SSL VPN connectivity, intrusion detection, and is known for easy deployment and integration capabilities.

Sangfor NGAF is a comprehensive security platform providing robust network protection through its application control and detailed threat insights. While effective in preventing threats and ensuring network security, it has areas needing improvement such as real-time reporting and system support. It delivers secure internet and VPN connections, proficiently handling malware threats. However, it faces challenges with user experience, reporting capabilities, hardware scalability, and needs better third-party integration. Licensing costs are noted to be high, and there are performance variations between versions.

What are the key features of Sangfor NGAF?

User-friendly deployment: Offers an uncomplicated setup process.
Robust virus database: Provides reliable threat detection.
SSL VPN connectivity: Ensures secure remote access.
Application control: Manages application usage for enhanced security.
Intrusion detection: Detects unauthorized access attempts.
URL filtering: Prevents access to malicious websites.

What benefits should users expect when evaluating Sangfor NGAF?

Affordability: Competitive pricing compared to peers.
Integration: Good capabilities with existing systems.
Support: Noted for providing reliable customer service.
Threat prevention: Effective in securing networks against various threats.

Sangfor NGAF is widely used across industries including education, healthcare, and finance for its reliable network security. It is favored for securing internal servers, offering robust threat protection, and managing bandwidth efficiently at a budget-friendly rate.

Sangfor

Sophos UTM delivers comprehensive network security with features like firewall, intrusion prevention, and endpoint protection. Its user-friendly interface and scalable options make it ideal for businesses of varying sizes, ensuring seamless integration with AWS, cloud services, and other Sophos offerings.

With robust Advanced Threat Protection, Sophos UTM offers a holistic approach to security through its intuitive platform. It includes a centralized console for enhanced threat visibility, integrated web application firewall, and secure remote access via SSL VPN and RED device. Critiques focus on limited reporting capabilities, complex licensing, and requiring improvements in VPN and email protection, centralized management, and application control.

What are the key features of Sophos UTM?

Advanced Threat Protection: Protects against sophisticated attacks by integrating multiple security technologies.
Firewall and Web Protection: Provides core security measures with intrusion prevention and application control.
Integrated WAF: Shields applications from vulnerabilities, ensuring secure user interactions.
Scalable Deployment: Supports diverse setups from small businesses to large enterprises, including cloud integrations.

What benefits should users expect from Sophos UTM?

Unified Management: Simplifies security operations through a single management console for cohesive control.
Secure Remote Access: Extends network security to remote users without compromising protection quality.
Cost Efficiency: Offers scalable, cost-effective security solutions to adapt to growing business needs.

Sophos UTM sees implementations in industries needing strong perimeter protection and secure remote access, such as finance, healthcare, and education. It supports seamless network integration, ensuring businesses maintain compliance and safeguard their digital environments effectively.

Sophos

Sample Customers

The Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation (Indonesia), Lawson, Inc. (Philippines), Universiti Sultan Zainal Abidin (Indonesia), TEK Automotive (Italy), etc.

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