Sophos UTM vs Stormshield Network Security vs WatchGuard Firebox comparison

Sophos and Stormshield are both solutions in the Unified Threat Management (UTM) category. Sophos is ranked #6 with an average rating of 9.5, while Stormshield is ranked #13 with an average rating of 9.0. Sophos holds a 14.1% mindshare in UTMU, compared to Stormshield’s 5.0% mindshare. Additionally, 89% of Sophos users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 85% of Stormshield users who would recommend it.

Sophos UTM

Read 113 Sophos UTM reviews

7,772 Views
1,632 Comparison Views

89% willing to recommend

Stormshield Network Security

Read 17 Stormshield Network Security reviews

2,877 Views
489 Comparison Views

85% willing to recommend

WatchGuard Firebox

Read 125 WatchGuard Firebox reviews

11,734 Views
1,760 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

Sophos UTM

Stormshield Network Security

WatchGuard Firebox

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Sophos UTM, Stormshield Network Security, and WatchGuard Firebox based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Check Point Software Technologies, WatchGuard, Cisco and others in Unified Threat Management (UTM).

To learn more, read our detailed Unified Threat Management (UTM) Report (Updated: August 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Unified Threat Management (UTM)

August 2025

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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:

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Unified Threat Management (UTM) category, the mindshare of Sophos UTM is 14.1%, up from 13.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Stormshield Network Security is 5.0%, up from 4.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of WatchGuard Firebox is 13.7%, down from 15.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Unified Threat Management (UTM)

Featured Reviews

Samaila Yusuf

Associate Director - Management Support Services at CIHP

Network protection strengthens through effective threat management features and secure access control

The zero-day protection and firewall rules are some of the most effective features for threat management. I can set the rules and features, and also use IPsec to connect all my on-premises servers and link them to Sophos UTM so that they are protected even when in the cloud. Additionally, I use it to control access into the building through a captive portal integrated across all the PCs we have, ensuring secure access only for authenticated users.

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Benjamin

Network Engineer at ACS2I

The intrusion detection system helps our organization by automatically detecting and responding to potential threats

The tool's most valuable feature is its dashboard, which helps you manage different aspects of a single page. The intrusion detection system helps our organization by automatically detecting and responding to potential threats. It operates similarly to Darktrace, which detects and responds automatically based on the security rules you apply. Initially, you configure everything to block, and then you can whitelist specific items as needed.

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Rajesh Makwana

Regional Pre-Sales Engineer at Roundrobin Tech

Efficient bandwidth management and secure network access with a strong firewall

The primary use case of the Firebox mainly revolves around bandwidth management, unnecessary web blocking, application control, and protection against brute force attacks. It is also implemented for load balancing, SD-WAN, and branch-to-branch connectivity from one location to another. We also use…

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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

"Has great security features and does a good job of protecting the network."

"Sophos UTM has improved the porting section. It has improved security by seeing the gaps. For example, when you discover that an entry has been using a certain application, with Sophos UTM acting as a Layer 7 firewall, you can block the application, not the port."

"Sophos UTM provides security for our network here and access through a VPN connection for our remote users. It also offers the flexibility to create different tools for accessibility."

"The stability of Sophos UTM is very good. The solution has been stable since Sophos took over Cyberoam which was the original company providing this solution."

"The most valuable feature is the IPS. It also protects us from malware."

"The isolation of infected machines is a big feature. Also, the ability to detect external sources that change files on a file server is really big."

"The most valuable feature is the price. I've been requesting prices all over these years between different solutions like Fortinet, Palo Alto, and Check Point and Sophos has been the cheapest and the best of all of them that I have tried. I have been working with Fortinet, it's a fact that the price is surprisingly better."

"An easy solution to learn because the graphics are very intuitive."

More Sophos UTM pros

"Our organization's main concern is stability, and this is a stable solution."

"The most valuable features are the IPS, the firewall function, and the price."

"The tool's most valuable feature is its dashboard, which helps you manage different aspects of a single page."

"The scalability of the solution is good."

"I like that it works fine. Stormshield is a very good solution."

"The solution has improved my organization because I can see what traffic is happening and I can use it to block and prevent attacks."

"I like how you can configure the rules. There is the task for the rules and a task for the network configuration. It also provides SMD filtering, and it can be integrated with the active directory for the users, their mission, and the VPN configuration. We are here in Sudan, and Stormshield didn't work in Sudan for more than a decade. Stormshield is a very strong firewall and very easy to configure and maintain. I am just working with the firewall solution, and we don't have any other solutions like endpoint solutions or something like that."

"Ease of use is the best feature of the product."

More Stormshield Network Security pros

"When you download the executable file from the internet, it automatically sandboxes to make sure it's not doing anything incorrectly."

"The analytics are important because if there is an abnormality then it provides that information to us."

"The VPN and the filtering features are the most valuable. Its VPN is very strong, and its services are very nice. The main problem in India is the service. There are not enough Check Point and Fortinet Firewall services, but for this product, the service is very good."

"The client is easy to use and stable"

"The protection that it provides from ransomware is valuable. The awareness that it has is also valuable. It didn't have a central console earlier, but now it has a central console, which is pretty good."

"The ports that I have assigned appear to be unattainable to outside 'mal-actors,' unless they have an address registered on the internet that this thing is expecting. That's a layer of security."

"The most valuable feature of WatchGuard Firebox is its ease of use."

"It has everything we need in terms of functionality."

More WatchGuard Firebox pros

Cons

"Sophos should improve its ability to check something like bandwidth consumption for users or something more real-time."

"The solution is not scalable."

"The initial setup may be difficult for those not familiar with the product."

"Sophos UTM could improve if there was no limitation on users."

"Finding information about Sophos’ sizing guidelines can actually be difficult. Also, Sophos does not make it clear what they mean by “users” when you are sizing a firewall, which then leads to undersized implementations."

"Doesn't provide antivirus for individual computers."

"It needs a better user interface. The one they have is not so good."

"Sophos UTM could improve the way the configuration has to be done. I have to do the configuration through the command line interface but if it could be done through the graphical user interface it would be much better."

More Sophos UTM cons

"Not all the fields are activated yet and we were informed that it will take at least one month."

"It could be better if it were more user-friendly. It's too complicated for us to use it. The price could be better as well."

"This solution has a big problem with web filtering and it needs to be improved."

"The product must improve its pricing."

"Improvement is needed in terms of the technical support of the manufacturer."

"The SD card could be more secure."

"The filtering configuration could be better. We have some difficulties with the filtering configuration and the filter extension. It's not that easy. It's not that straightforward. In the next release, I would like to see a reporting system. Stormshield doesn't have any tutorials on how to do the configuration and things like that. They just have documentation on the website. If you want to configure, for example, Cisco or Fortinet, you can find tutorials on YouTube. They show you how to configure the features, and so on. In Stormshield, there is nothing on social media or the internet on how to configure different things. The lack of documentation or the lack of material makes it difficult for others to adopt this solution."

"This is not a next-generation firewall."

More Stormshield Network Security cons

"We bought Firebox four or five years ago, and with the first version I had to reboot it every two or three months for no apparent reason. We upgraded last year to the M370 and it's been running, but it is rebooting from time to time. I don't know why."

"What could use some significant improvement in WatchGuard Firebox would be its interface and policy management. An additional feature I'd like to see in the next release of WatchGuard Firebox is the ability to modify an existing policy instead of having to recreate a policy when changes are necessary. At the moment, there's no possibility to modify the policy. You have to delete the policy and recreate it."

"The main problem that WatchGuard Threat Detection and Response has is that they use several tools to do the same tasks, and they are sometimes very complicated to use and very slow."

"Once you start getting into proxy actions and setting up: "Okay, cool. Once this rule gets triggered, what actions have to happen?" I do know a few people who use WatchGuard and they still have to get assistance when they look at that. So I would file that as a con for WatchGuard. Proxy actions can be a little bit complicated."

"The control software is currently only available for Windows, which can be a little annoying for Linux users."

"One area for improvement is the limitation in the product portfolio compared to competitors like Fortinet, which offers a broader portfolio including Authentication, VPNs, FortiMail, Sandbox, and Email Security."

"The administrative UI/UX could be significantly improved."

"In terms of the reporting and management features — and this isn't necessarily a WatchGuard issue, this seems to be more of an industry-wide issue — you get reports, but a lot of times you don't know what you're looking at. You're so overwhelmed with the data. You're getting a lot of stuff that doesn't matter, so it takes time to parse through it, to actually get what you want to know."

More WatchGuard Firebox cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Our licensing fees are paid on a monthly basis."

"It will cost approximately $67 US per device. We have 300 devices in our organization."

"Unless you are in the United States, or you have to use Sophos, you can't contact Sophos directly. You have to use a third-party company, and they all have different ways of how they explain their licensing."

"Go to a vendor and let them assess your needs so you can get a right-sized device."

"The pricing for Sophos UTM is quite acceptable compared to other UTM vendors."

"Purchasing through the AWS Marketplace is pretty straightforward. Because were entirely on AWS and don't have anything anywhere else. It made the most sense for us as a one stop shop."

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

"Pricing for Sophos UTM is OK. Here in Egypt, many companies use the solution because of its price and features. My company pays the Sophos UTM license fee yearly."

More Sophos UTM pricing and cost advice

"The price of this solution and the price of support are ok."

"The SN200 series costs between $500 USD and $600 USD per year, whereas the SN700 series costs approximately $1,000 annually."

"For mid-sized companies, they sell their appliances for good prices."

"I think the price is good."

"The pricing could be better."

"We bought a three-year license, and we renew it whenever it expires. The price could be better. It's always very expensive."

"We chose Stormshield for its price, as the Azure firewall was too expensive."

"It's fair pricing, but it could always be reduced."

"The licensing costs are comparatively lower than other providers, and I would rate the pricing as five out of five."

"The solution is a bit more expensive than other options."

"The price is so small that I don't pay attention to it anymore. I think we pay a few thousand dollars for two to three years, so about $100 per month. That's for all of our users. There is an additional cost if we want to go with a deeper licensing model, but we just pay for antivirus, IPS, and main product support."

"Each one, for the primary unit, was $8,600 and the High Availability unit was $2,000. That's with three years of subscription and support and the Total Security Suite."

"WatchGuard had a very competitive price. It was only 10 to 20 percent more than a single instance device but with that extra cost it provided a second load balancing device... unlike other brands whose method of hardware and software licensing would have doubled our cost."

"The price of the solution is not expensive, it is less than FortiGate."

"WatchGuard Firebox has good quality, but it is expensive."

More WatchGuard Firebox 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

Computer Software Company

14%

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

Educational Organization

Computer Software Company

19%

Comms Service Provider

16%

Government

10%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

14%

Comms Service Provider

11%

Retailer

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

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 ...

See all answers

What do you like most about Sophos UTM?

The most valuable feature of Sophos UTM is the endpoint protection feature.

See all answers

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

The value between what I receive and what I pay is the best in the industry.

See all answers

What do you like most about Stormshield Network Security?

Ease of use is the best feature of the product.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Stormshield Network Security?

We pay for the quality we receive.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Stormshield Network Security?

The product must improve its pricing.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for WatchGuard Firebox?

We are providing our services to all WatchGuard customers in the region.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for WatchGuard Firebox?

We just use it as a secondary WiFi device. We're a small office and we needed to set up a WiFi device for a few of ou...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for WatchGuard Firebox?

We're a hospital and we use it for developing our incoming and outgoing policies, and we also use it for VPN.

See all answers

Comparisons

Fortinet FortiGate vs Sophos UTM

Compared 19% of the time

OPNsense vs Sophos UTM

Compared 12% of the time

Netgate pfSense vs Sophos UTM

Compared 10% of the time

Sophos XG vs Sophos UTM

Compared 8% of the time

More Sophos UTM Competitors

Fortinet FortiGate vs Stormshield Network Security

Compared 28% of the time

Netgate pfSense vs Stormshield Network Security

Compared 13% of the time

OPNsense vs Stormshield Network Security

Compared 8% of the time

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls vs Stormshield Network Security

Compared 5% of the time

Check Point NGFW vs Stormshield Network Security

Compared 3% of the time

More Stormshield Network Security Competitors

Fortinet FortiGate vs WatchGuard Firebox

Compared 30% of the time

OPNsense vs WatchGuard Firebox

Compared 6% of the time

Netgate pfSense vs WatchGuard Firebox

Compared 5% of the time

SonicWall TZ vs WatchGuard Firebox

Compared 5% of the time

Check Point NGFW vs WatchGuard Firebox

Compared 2% of the time

More WatchGuard Firebox Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Sophos UTM

July 2025

Download Sophos UTM product report

Buyer's Guide

Stormshield Network Security

July 2025

Download Stormshield Network Security product report

Buyer's Guide

WatchGuard Firebox

July 2025

Download WatchGuard Firebox product report

Also Known As

Astaro

NETASQ Firewalls

WatchGuard Threat Detection and Response, WatchGuard Application Control, WatchGuard Data Loss Prevention, WatchGuard Gateway AntiVirus, WatchGuard Intrusion Prevention Service

Overview

Sophos UTM is a unified threat management platform designed to protect your businesses from known and emerging malware including viruses, rootkits and spyware. The solution provides a complete network security package with everything your organization needs in a single modular appliance.

Sophos UTM Features

Sophos UTM has many valuable key features. Some of the most useful ones include:

Web and Email Filtering
General Management
Network Protection
Network Routing and Services
Advanced Threat Protection
Authentication
Email Encryption and DLP
Web Policy
End-User Portal
VPN IPsec Client, VPN SSL Client, and Clientless VPN
Web Application Firewall Protection
UTM Endpoint Protection and Management
SEC Endpoint Integration
Logging and Reporting

Sophos UTM Benefits

There are many benefits to implementing Sophos UTM. Some of the biggest advantages the solution offers include:

Simplifies your IT security without the complexity of multiple point solutions
Intuitive interface to help you quickly create policies to control security risks
Provides clear, detailed reports to give you the insight you need to improve your network performance and protection
Complete control to block, allow, shape and prioritize applications
Two-factor authentication with one-time password (OTP)
Integrated wireless controller
Allows you to connect remote offices with easy VPN and Wi-Fi

Reviews from Real Users

Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by PeerSpot users currently using the Sophos UTM solution.

PeerSpot user Dana B., Network Administrator at a manufacturing company, says “The web and email filtering are the two biggest and most valuable aspects of the solution for us. The solution overall has just been a good, cost-effective solution for us. The solution offers a lot of functionality. The solution scales well. We've found the technical support to be helpful. The stability and performance are quite good.”

A Technical Director at a security firm mentions, "Sophos SG UTM had all the basic functionality that you needed. It is user-friendly and easy to manage for any integrator."

Marek M., Senior Network Engineer at a computer software company, comments, “Sophos UTM is the simplest of these products to set up. If you follow the instructions using the wizard, which is just a few steps, then you will have a firewall to protect you and your customer.”

A Software Sales Manager at a tech services company explains, “The overall visibility of the console is what I find most valuable, plus it's very user-friendly. It can be integrated with other solutions such as SOAR, SIEM, etc., even when you have an existing firewall. I really like that the console can be integrated. You'll see everything on the same window, and the single window feature of the machine is so good. These are the features I really like.”

James D., IT Manager at Manual Workers Union, states, “The fact that it's on the cloud means we don't have to administer it on our network or deal with a physical machine, which saves us money. The solution has many great features. From the console, we can start different scannings on different machines. We enjoy the centralized reporting part of it. The initial setup is simple. We enjoy its general stability. The solution can scale. So far, the solution has been problem-free.”

Sophos

NETASQ's integrated intrusion prevention engine uses protocol conformity analysis, application filtering and antivirus analysis to inspect authorized traffic flows and strengthen application security. NETASQ enables you to establish and configure user-based security policies, giving you greater control over which network resources each user is authorized to access.

Stormshield

WatchGuard Firebox is a high-performance firewall known for its ease of setup, offering robust security with layered protection and centralized management capabilities.

WatchGuard Firebox stands out for its intuitive management and high throughput, addressing security needs with features like VPN, web filtering, and threat detection. Its centralized control and reporting abilities, along with Active Directory integration, make it popular among varied organizations. Its user-friendly interface and ongoing updates enhance usability and reliability. However, there's a call for better cloud-based administration, scalability, and improved integration with third-party vendors.

What are the key features of WatchGuard Firebox?

Ease of Setup: Quick and straightforward installation process.
GUI: User-friendly graphical interface for simplified navigation.
VPN Features: Secure and efficient virtual private network management.
Web Filtering: Advanced filtering for safer browsing experiences.
Threat Detection: Proactive monitoring and detection of cyber threats.

What benefits or ROI should be evaluated?

Centralized Control: Streamlined management from a single point.
High Throughput: Efficient data handling and processing capacity.
Stable Performance: Consistent and reliable operational functionality.
Active Directory Integration: Seamless connection with user directories.
Customer Service: Strong support service for customer inquiries.

WatchGuard Firebox is implemented across industries to secure internet gateways and protect data in multi-site businesses. Its applications span from Unified Threat Management (UTM) and intrusion prevention to compliance support in business environments requiring secure connectivity through VPNs.

WatchGuard

Sample Customers

One Housing Group

ACESUR group, Ministry of Education Oman, Anios Laboratories, Zain, DLM Location

Ellips, Diecutstickers.com, Clarke Energy, NCR, Wrest Park, Homeslice Pizza, Fortessa Tableware Solutions, The Phoenix Residence

Buyer's Guide

Unified Threat Management (UTM)

August 2025

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