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Sophos UTM vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall comparison

 

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:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
5.7
Sophos UTM offers quick returns, efficient network management, and cost savings, benefiting managed service providers and ensuring data protection.
Sentiment score
4.8
Zscaler Cloud Firewall enhances global security and efficiency with comprehensive features, delivering 60% savings in time and costs.
I have seen a return on investment with Sophos UTM, and I can share that the price is around thirty percent better, especially if you count in the employee time.
System Engineer SDDC / VCF at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
I have seen a return on investment with time saving and money saving.
Senior Devsecops Cloud Cybersecurity Specialist at CGI
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.7
Sophos UTM's customer service receives mixed reviews for response times but is praised for expertise and community resources.
Sentiment score
5.5
Zscaler Cloud Firewall support is generally helpful and responsive but may sometimes lack adequacy for premium expectations.
The technical support by Sophos is amazing, especially when I pay for the enhanced support.
Associate Director - Management Support Services at CIHP
I would rate the technical support by Sophos a 10.
Network and Infrastructure Manager at Sonysugar
I would rate the technical support with Sophos a seven because sometimes the time of the first resolution is not ideal.
IT Manager at a consultancy with 51-200 employees
The response and support are sometimes inadequate, which detracts from the overall experience of an otherwise impressive solution.
Director at Aquila ICT Solutions
The technical support from Zscaler was excellent.
Cyber Security Architect at Accenture
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.0
Sophos UTM is highly scalable, supporting growth via licenses, hardware, and clustering, adaptable to varying deployment sizes.
Sentiment score
5.7
Zscaler Cloud Firewall offers excellent scalability, supporting diverse organizations smoothly, with most users rating it between seven and ten.
You can have high availability clusters, so very, very scalable in my opinion.
System Engineer SDDC / VCF at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
In this case, Twingate will be very easy compared to Zscaler.
IT Security at a manufacturing company with 11-50 employees
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.5
Sophos UTM is praised for stability and reliability, with few issues occurring mainly during updates or resource demands.
Sentiment score
7.2
Zscaler Cloud Firewall is highly rated for stability and reliability despite minor latency and GUI lag issues.
There were some stability issues due to occasional latency and lags, particularly with the GUI and report generation.
Cyber Security Architect at Accenture
 

Room For Improvement

Sophos UTM needs enhancements in reporting, UI, threat protection, VPN, technical support, scalability, pricing, and configuration simplicity.
Zscaler Cloud Firewall needs deployment, support, features, UI, pricing, integration, and dashboard improvements for optimal performance and usability.
If you want to really implement some rules that are a little bit more difficult, Sophos always recommends getting the dedicated WAF, or web application firewall, but I would prefer to have more features on the web application firewall in the firewall itself because it would make more sense.
System Engineer SDDC / VCF at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
I would prefer to see additional features in the next release of Sophos UTM because cyber crime increases every day, so we also need to improve our game to prevent any chances for intrusion.
Network and Infrastructure Manager at Sonysugar
It would make my work much simpler because it makes decision-making much easier.
IT Manager at Vegol
For now, there is no dashboard or network management system available for Twingate.
IT Security at a manufacturing company with 11-50 employees
The reverse proxy feature for Data Loss Prevention (DLP) is missing.
Cyber Security Architect at Accenture
I believe the integration of AI could improve the dashboard by making it more agile and effective in monitoring and predicting threats.
Director at Aquila ICT Solutions
 

Setup Cost

Sophos UTM offers flexible pricing with incentives, praised for its features and value despite some regional variances.
Zscaler Cloud Firewall has subscription pricing influenced by user count and features, making it costlier than some competitors.
Pricing has become expensive recently due to the dollar hike and naira value changes in Nigeria.
Associate Director - Management Support Services at CIHP
The value between what I receive and what I pay is the best in the industry.
System Administrator at a training & coaching company with 11-50 employees
The pricing would be more economical if sold directly to the user compared to going through a partner, as they need to take their percentage.
Network and Infrastructure Manager at Sonysugar
Zscaler Cloud Firewall is quite expensive compared to competitors.
Cyber Security Architect at Accenture
 

Valuable Features

Sophos UTM excels in configuration ease, real-time reporting, cost-effectiveness, and flexible security features, benefiting efficient management.
Zscaler Cloud Firewall offers comprehensive security with real-time inspection, customizable controls, and automatic features, eliminating hardware needs.
The zero-day protection and firewall rules are some of the most effective features for threat management.
Associate Director - Management Support Services at CIHP
It helps us quite a lot, especially because since we use Sophos UTM, malware intrusions are not rampant.
Network and Infrastructure Manager at Sonysugar
Sophos UTM's valuable features include the cost, which is very competitive when compared with other vendors, balanced with the features that it delivers.
IT Manager at a consultancy with 51-200 employees
It is really customized, a security policy that can be applied to the users so they can access only the resources I enable them.
IT Security at a manufacturing company with 11-50 employees
Advanced threat protection features in Zscaler Cloud Firewall are practically the key component that every customer wants.
Director at Aquila ICT Solutions
The best features that Zscaler Cloud Firewall offers are that it is AI powered and automated.
Senior Devsecops Cloud Cybersecurity Specialist at CGI
 

Categories and Ranking

Sophos UTM
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
119
Ranking in other categories
Unified Threat Management (UTM) (5th)
Zscaler Cloud Firewall
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
Firewalls (38th)
 

Featured Reviews

Bashir Bashir - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Manager at Vegol
Firewall management has become simpler and now provides real-time visibility and bandwidth control
The features I have found most valuable in Sophos UTM are that it is much easier to configure, I appreciate the reporting side of it, and the rules are very straightforward to work with. Sophos UTM's real-time insights into network health help my organization because I get real-time reports on what is happening on my network, what is trying to access me, the destination, and all that. I can then be reactive or proactive, and for zero-day, I think it is beneficial because it can learn what my network does. If anything goes outside what it expects, it sends a report on Sophos Central, so I find zero-day makes my work a bit easier. The use of Sophos UTM's intuitive management console has impacted my security policy enforcement in that it is much easier to configure; I configure with information rather than with presumptions.
Carlos Snel - PeerSpot reviewer
Director at Aquila ICT Solutions
Has streamlined secure deployments across large enterprises while offering reliable protection and intuitive management
The centralized management console, also referred to as the Zscaler dashboard, impacts the ability of my customers to respond to security incidents significantly. I see it as user-friendly, and clients are really happy with using it, which motivates them to keep using Zscaler Cloud Firewall because they enjoy the GUI. It's very intuitive, making it easy to navigate alerts and incidents. My clients rarely have questions about where to find specific information once Zscaler Cloud Firewall is running. The interface speaks for itself, requiring little to no additional training, which is a major plus. Advanced threat protection features in Zscaler Cloud Firewall are practically the key component that every customer wants. Unfortunately, it is an option and not included in the basic package. Clients need to pay for the next higher bundle to access it, but practically all clients I have dealt with want this feature 100%. Regarding visibility, I can confirm that Zscaler Cloud Firewall indeed includes a feature for application layer visibility embedded in the service. It provides visibility into what you're doing, which is especially interesting nowadays when discussing AI tools, as companies do not want their employees to copy-paste sensitive information into AI systems. We have seen cases such as Samsung's chip design where sensitive info got exposed. The visibility of applications, including cloud applications and AI tools, is significant for compliance with data policies, and you can also run reports and alerts on it.
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Comparison Review

it_user216600 - PeerSpot reviewer
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…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
12%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Construction Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Marketing Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business75
Midsize Enterprise28
Large Enterprise27
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise13
 

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 good. The most valuable features for me are their web and email filtering. I wou...
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...
What needs improvement with Sophos UTM?
I would like to improve Sophos UTM in that there is software I use that goes deeper in the reporting on usage. There is software called Fastvue that breaks down everything in the firewall and whate...
Which lesser known firewall product has the best chance at unseating the market leaders?
Netscope, Zscaler if they continue route they are on now. FIrewalls needs great deal of automation on each end, datacenter and endpoint. In between you have branch office. So blending EPP and firew...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zscaler Cloud Firewall?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing was fine.
What needs improvement with Zscaler Cloud Firewall?
I think Zscaler Cloud Firewall can be improved by adding more features. The needed improvements involve scalability, which is something I wish they would address.
 

Also Known As

Astaro
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Overview

 

Sample Customers

One Housing Group
Zenith Live, Azure, Carlsberg Group
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