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Sophos Email vs Symantec Messaging Gateway 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

Cloudflare One
Sponsored
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
Email Security (21st), Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (15th), Data Loss Prevention (DLP) (20th), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (11th), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (7th), Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (13th), Access Management (13th), Bot Management (3rd), ZTNA as a Service (9th), ZTNA (4th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (10th), Remote Browser Isolation (RBI) (3rd)
Sophos Email
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
34
Ranking in other categories
Email Security (14th), Office 365 Protection (3rd)
Symantec Messaging Gateway
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
Secure Email Gateway (SEG) (11th)
 

Mindshare comparison

Email Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Sophos Email1.8%
Proofpoint Email Protection7.3%
Microsoft Defender for Office 3657.3%
Other83.6%
Email Security
Secure Email Gateway (SEG) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Symantec Messaging Gateway2.5%
Proofpoint Email Protection19.9%
Microsoft Defender for Office 36518.3%
Other59.3%
Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
 

Featured Reviews

CV
Network Architect at IP Dimension
Cloud security has improved remote access and has reduced costs for smaller client sites
I have used Cloudflare One's Identity-Aware Proxy, and it is quite straightforward from what I have seen so far. The app registration on the Azure side integrates fully into Cloudflare, and I am very satisfied with that part because it is easy to set up. The integration of Cloudflare One's Secure Web Gateway and Zero Trust Network Access works without any issues. That part is pretty automatic, and if you complete the rest of the setup, it comes together by itself with no issues from my side. What makes it nice is that we can actually start replacing on-site firewalls at this stage for the smaller clients because it does not matter if they go to a coffee shop or work from home; they are still secured by the same connection. The hops get shorter and you get better latency. We have done testing to see if it is better. One thing that we did notice with our proof of concept with our current client is that they have people connecting from the UK. When they used their previous VPN solution, uploading CAD drawings and other files to the server took a long time. They mentioned that it is much quicker on Cloudflare One's solution. I definitely believe that is part of the improved performance, and I am satisfied with that as well. What is nice about Cloudflare One is that it makes the setup easier and also easier to train technicians to maintain it. Compared to legacy systems, we do not need to get fancy firewalls in place that are costly. That is definitely also a cost-saver with Cloudflare One.
Kalyan  Chowdhury - PeerSpot reviewer
Founder at Computech infosysetm
Stronger email and mobile security has protected users from ransomware and simplified management
Price is obviously a challenging part, and I think it is the biggest problem we have suffered from over the last two or three years due to a 7 to 8% hike per year, twice a year, which is why we have some renewals on Sophos Email, Sophos XDR, EDR, and the firewall, but due to price hike, they are unable to renew it. The price is going to be very high. It would be better if Sophos can provide a more flexible pricing model for different types of businesses. Price could be lower. The main competitor for Sophos in the market is Palo Alto, which has reduced their price by more than 35 to 40%, making it a very challenging part to sell this product. Palo Alto provides the same functionality for email security, which adds to the challenge because the price is going very high.
Girish Vijay - PeerSpot reviewer
Deputy Manager IT at Carl Bechem Lubricants India Pvt. Ltd.
A stable and reasonably priced solution that performs well and has a very good malware database
Since Symantec merged with Broadcom, they might have lost some good technical engineers. Maybe that’s the reason why the product is performing poorly. When we have a good marketing and sales team, even though our product cannot perform, we will sell it at a high price because of the buzzwords. However, at the end of the day, the product should perform. Most of the products might not perform. Symantec is a very good product, but the services are basic. I rate the technical features of the product a nine out of ten. However, I would rate the services provided by the solution a six out of ten. Overall, I rate the tool an eight out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The best feature is rate limiting. If I'm expecting 500 visits per hour, Cloudflare will limit the requests if I suddenly get 50,000."
"It will take the blow rather than our applications should an attack occur."
"The blocking feature is very good."
"Cloudflare DDoS is better than its competitors for its security, deployment, and scalability."
"Cloudflare Access is part of the Zero Trust philosophy."
"Cloudflare is by far the most effective solution that I have come across."
"For Cloudflare Access, I am using the free plan...The most valuable feature is their protection."
"It's the endpoint exposition. We don't need to expose our VPN server to the internet and need a zero-test solution. I can apply some conditional access to the endpoint that's connecting to our network to check their security policies or the security condition of their workstation. Once the workstation is trying to connect to my internal network, then I would like to check the discrete condition of these endpoints that are trying to access my internal network. We created some conditional access. We have CrowdStrike, to check if the CrowdStrike is installed, to check if it's updated, and to check for Windows updates. We created some conditional policies to check it."
"The filtering capabilities are precious and far superior to others I've used. It's intuitive in what it pushes to quarantine, and users can quickly review, free, or delete items without needing an administrator, making it ideal for a multi-user environment."
"I found the user interface friendly."
"When you say email security, it's about everything, incoming email, outgoing email, spam, phishing emails, unwanted marketing emails. You can set rules, but the main feature of Sophos Email is to make sure you don't get hacked. 95% of people who are hacked do not get hacked by typing the router password. They are hacked from the inside out, which means they send you a document that is a zero-day attack, you open it, nothing happens, but technically the attack is running in the background of your computer. This is how they gain access to your PC."
"Good VIP protection, time of click protection and the Sandstorm feature."
"The solution protects users from phishing links and spam."
"The best thing about it is the logs."
"I would recommend Sophos Email to both end-users and other entities that want to protect their emails."
"Sophos Email offers encryption and malware protection, provides visibility into emails, has 99% accuracy in catching spam, enhances organizational safety, integrates with various vendors like Microsoft, is deployable with any email service, prevents data loss, features authentication rules, synchronizes with Active Directory and Azure, and includes a self-service portal. The product is very flexible."
"Symantec is a secure product."
"I like that it's simple and easy to configure, deploy, and manage. The reporting function has all the features we're looking for, and we are fine with that."
"Since Symantec Messaging Gateway is a Linux-based solution it is stable."
"It is a solid and stable product."
"I like that it's simple and easy to configure, deploy, and manage."
"The solution is stable and the performance is good."
"It has very good capabilities for managing malware."
"I've been using Messaging Gateway for ten years."
 

Cons

"Our customers no longer use Cloudflare because its service is subpar."
"They don't have a person to provide support for customers using the solution under their free plan."
"The initial onboarding was causing us some confusion."
"There are premium tier live service and lower tier live service, so we opted for the lower tier. But there is no medium tier where we pay a little extra and get a bit more service. So if that can be improved."
"Operating and tuning the product is difficult."
"Feedback could be enhanced. While I work efficiently with Clover as a partner in Mexico City, sometimes the information and requests are easier to manage with more concrete solutions."
"The pricing is an area that can be improved. Pricing, as far as I recall, was the source of our problems."
"I would like them to include a VPN feature to provide a secure connection to the data center."
"Sophos Email can improve security. We would like more security for our customers."
"The product could include all the essential features and capabilities, similar to the on-premise, server-based version."
"The tool's pricing is expensive. In its future release, the tool should make reporting easier to view."
"Email installation could be more user-friendly so that it can be done without involving the partner."
"I would like to see improvements in the initial setup process, ensuring better compatibility with diverse customer infrastructures."
"Sophos Email can improve mail security."
"Sophos Email could improve DLP features."
"Sophos Email needs to increase the number of promos."
"It is a nice product but is not user friendly in terms of the graphical interface. It is poor and is not rich in terms of the human interface."
"Sometimes the solution picks up false positive for viruses during scans."
"It could be more scalable."
"In a later release, it would be nice if the messaging gateway supported the cluster feature."
"They have updated the version of the Messaging Gateway and the new features they are adding the need to be re-evaluated. They have done some changes on the policy."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway can improve detection because most of them are false negatives or false positives that we are trying to troubleshoot. Additionally, we are having routing problems and they are somehow connected to DNS issues."
"The biggest problem is it's an on-prem product and we're trying to get out of having equipment in data centers."
"This product would benefit from better integration with Symantec Endpoint Protection."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is not that expensive."
"Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform's pricing is good."
"The pricing of the solution is cheap. The licensing cost is also very low. I rate the cost and pricing a three out of ten."
"The price tag is no longer $200,000, but rather $300,000 to $400,000. It's twice."
"The solution's pricing lacks transparency."
"The prices are slightly expensive."
"My company has to make yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to the solution. There are no hidden charges apart from the licensing costs of the solution."
"The pricing is somewhere in the middle. I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten."
"There is an additional fee for their central managed console."
"Most of our clients are on a perpetual license. If there is a budget issue, they can choose a subscription. However, most of the clients choose the perpetual license."
"The pricing is affordable, so I’d rate it around a four out of ten on the pricing scale. We pay about fifty pounds a month, including hardware so that costs may differ without it."
"The solution is expensive."
"Sophos Email is priced lower than its competitors."
"I would rate the pricing of Sophos Email as a six. It is considered affordable as a standalone product, and there are no additional costs besides licensing. The pricing is fixed."
"It is an expensive solution. On a scale of one to ten, where one is low price, and ten is high price, I rate the pricing a seven."
"Licensing is paid on a yearly basis."
"It's a bit expensive compared to its competitor Barracuda Email Security Gateway but cheaper than Sophos Email."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway’s pricing is very cheap."
"They're a little costly compared to Microsoft."
"For 150 users, we pay INR 1,60,000."
"The cost of Symantec Messaging Gateway is too expensive in general. However, the appliance also includes the price of the license in the same bundle."
"A subscription for technical support costs extra."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
21%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Healthcare Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
18%
Construction Company
9%
Computer Software Company
7%
Marketing Services Firm
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise11
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise5
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise8
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access has strong integration with Microsoft, among other platforms. However, when it comes to Kaspersky, ...
What is your primary use case for Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access provides secure access to internal applications for employees, external members of the organization...
What advice do you have for others considering Cloudflare Access?
Cloudflare Access is one of the best integrations available. While about two hundred vendors offer similar services, ...
What do you like most about Sophos Email?
The solution's identity proxy feature is very good and reliable.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Sophos Email?
Regarding Sophos Email pricing, I would rate it between six or seven out of ten.
What needs improvement with Sophos Email?
Price is obviously a challenging part, and I think it is the biggest problem we have suffered from over the last two ...
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Also Known As

Cloudflare Area 1 Email Security, Cloudflare Bot Management, Cloudflare Gateway, Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform, Cloudflare DDoS, Cloudflare SASE & SSE Platform
Sophos Email Security
Symantec.cloud, Symantec Email Security.cloud
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

23andMe
Del Monte Foods, Terra Verde, spicerhaart, RIVERLITE, Dataprise, SureBridge, Reed's School, Sayfol International School
Doric, Joblink Plus, Our Lady of Mercy College, Parramatta, PPB Advisory, Slater & Gordon Lawyers, Sydney Adventist Hospital Ltd.
Find out what your peers are saying about Sophos Email vs. Symantec Messaging Gateway and other solutions. Updated: January 2024.
890,088 professionals have used our research since 2012.