Stormshield Network Security vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall comparison

Stormshield Network Security vs. Zscaler Cloud Firewall

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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

Fortinet FortiGate

Featured Reviews

Abhinandan Yadav

Network Security Engineer at Arrow PC Network Pvt Ltd

Unified security and sd-wan have improved uptime and cut wan costs for multi-site branches

Users report stability issues in certain versions, which requires regular updates. Real-world attacks have also highlighted the need for urgent patching of vulnerabilities.Fortinet FortiGate, while a powerful and feature-rich web firewall, could improve in areas like firmware stability, documentation, and ease of use. The learning curve can be steep for some users. For beginners, support quality can vary, and frequent updates with occasional vulnerabilities call for careful patch management. However, once Fortinet FortiGate is configured, it remains highly reliable and efficient. Customer support needs improvement, as I find it very slow, with reports from other users reflecting that customer support is inadequate.

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Zsolt Jónás

System Administrator at NaxoNet

Advanced GUI and layered security have supported compliance and simplified intrusion prevention

I haven't had a task that I couldn't solve with Stormshield Network Security. The active-active high availability solution would be beneficial because currently, if you build a high availability solution with Stormshield Network Security, you have a main device and another one is a backup device. The HA can switch between them, but it would be good to have a master-master solution, not just a master-slave one. I could set a URL that I can call to update the DNS record. Currently, Stormshield Network Security devices support DynDNS, which is not a usual feature request from a server environment. I have my own solution instead of DynDNS because I don't prefer it, so I have my own service for that. However, the GUI does not support using a custom service instead of DynDNS. I had to solve it in the console on Stormshield Network Security device, but it would be much better if it was reachable on the GUI. I had to figure out a trick for the IPsec configuration. In the IPsec config, we have to provide the remote side's IP address, but it's always changing. This means that an office, for example a company that has an office but without a fixed IP address, cannot be used with IPsec VPN.

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Carlos Snel

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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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The performance is very good and the solution is simple to manage."

"The most valuable features of Fortinet FortiGate are the rules and quality of service."

"The secure web gateway module and the application control module are valuable. HA operations are very easy."

"This solution works well on a daily basis, detecting various types of malicious traffic."

"Before using this solution, we had many problems accessing our resources because we don't have a lot of internet bandwidth, and by using application control and traffic shaping, we were able to manage users to quickly access services that are important, and this tool has aided in the simplicity of our day-to-day management."

"Using this product makes the VPN seamless and almost invisible to me in the sense that I don't have to think about it."

"Great product with too many features at the right price."

"There are several benefits that Fortinet FortiGate brings to the table, and I cannot speak of only one or two as it is too extensive."

More Fortinet FortiGate pros

"Easily manageable in a variety of environments."

"I feel we have more options with the Stormshield firewall and new features that we haven't previously had."

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

"The performance of this solution is good."

"It's an easy, straightforward management platform to use."

"Stormshield is a very strong firewall and very easy to configure and maintain."

"This product has improved the way our organization functions."

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

More Stormshield Network Security pros

"Zscaler is still a very good product."

"With regards to ease, with regards to scalability, with regards to performance and support, those are the kind of top features that I would always look at and I have had a great experience in general."

"Users are offered protection from anywhere on any device, with a full set of security features including firewall, IPS, web security, CASB, and DLP."

"I like the ease of deployment and its flexibility. We don't need to deal with license, quotes, procurement, delivery, and installation. Everything is software-based, and it's very easy to operate."

"I like the advanced tech protection Cloud Sandbox, it's a nice feature."

"I like the ease of deployment and its flexibility; we don't need to deal with license, quotes, procurement, delivery, and installation, as everything is software-based and very easy to operate."

"We like URL filtering, category filtering, and content filtering."

"Zscaler Cloud Firewall understands the applications in the current generation and adapts to the present generation cloud applications."

More Zscaler Cloud Firewall pros

Cons

"The pricing could be a bit better, especially when you consider how they have the most basic offering priced."

"Fortinet already improved FortiGate, but in the current market, many brands of security devices have improved together. Fortinet still needs to catch up with market standards. Fortinet is lacking in features in comparison to competitors."

"There are some license issues. Not every feature must have a separate license."

"I would like to see improvements in the support from Fortinet. Here in the Philippines, whenever we have problems with a Fortinet product, we mostly ask for support from distributors and resellers and not directly from Fortinet."

"I would like to see more advanced developments of a wireless controller in the future."

"I would like to have SD-WAN as a part of the Next Generation Firewall. It would enhance high availability."

"The solution could improve the integration."

"The area that Fortinet may improve is customer support."

More Fortinet FortiGate cons

"The pricing of this solution needs to be decreased."

"This is not a next-generation firewall."

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

"It could be better if it were more user-friendly for us as we dont use it very often even if we never had problems to modify setup when needed."

"Being more cost effective. I went with a pair of Watchguard M300 recently when buying a new firewall cluster for our own use because it was way cheaper than NetASQ/Stormshield N700 while being faster, and it offers true multi-master firewall clustering if needed."

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

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

"A more user-friendly interface would be helpful."

More Stormshield Network Security cons

"I don't have the visibility of a control dashboard or a network management system."

"Instead of the standard license, they should certainly provide customers with the visibility to access and view the logs."

"Certain criteria need to be met if you want to scale this solution."

"The issue right now is probably that Zscaler is not providing web browser isolation."

"There are some areas it could improve when it comes to blocking, we have to block some things manually."

"The product could improve its integration with some legacy systems."

"There are some areas it could improve when it comes to blocking, we have to block some things manually. For example, if we block a top-level domain we have seen that the new IPs come through, the IPs are not blocked. There should be some more granular way of doing it. My only request is if you're blocking something at a top level, the sub-level sub-domains and all those other IPs should be blocked too automatically."

"We are having some issues with internet access being denied when organizational ID-based policies change."

More Zscaler Cloud Firewall cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is better compared to other solutions like Check Point, Arista, or Cisco."

"Price-wise, it's at a good price point for our market."

"There is a licensing fee; it is on a yearly basis."

"It is not expensive as compared to Cisco."

"Fortinet is competitive price-wise."

"It is quite affordable for our customers. There is a separate cost for IPS, antivirus, web filtering, and other features. They have a great choice of licenses. You can go for the license that you want, which is quite useful."

"Compared to Palo Alto, which we have used in the past, pricing and licensing are okay."

"Fortinet FortiGate is reasonably priced."

More Fortinet FortiGate pricing and cost advice

"The pricing could be better."

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

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

"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."

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

"There are licensing costs, and I would not say that it's a cheap vendor."

"It comes at a significantly reduced cost while ensuring control and effectiveness."

"It is expensive for small businesses."

"It is not the most budget-friendly solution, but it's important to consider its overall value."

"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing an eight out of ten."

"The product is a bit expensive compared to the solutions offered by its competitors, like Palo Alto. There is a need to make yearly payments towards the license in charges associated with the product."

"There are different subscription models available."

"The licensing is on a yearly basis. It is somewhere around 30 or 40 pounds per user for our organization."

More Zscaler Cloud Firewall pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

10%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Comms Service Provider

16%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Construction Company

10%

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	367
Midsize Enterprise	135
Large Enterprise	193

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	11
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	2

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	5
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	12

Questions from the Community

Which is the better NGFW: Fortinet Fortigate or Cisco Firepower?

When you compare these firewalls you can identify them with different features, advantages, practices and usage a...

What is the biggest difference between Sophos XG and FortiGate?

From my experience regarding both the Sophos and FortiGate firewalls, I personally would rather use FortiGate. I know...

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 ...

What needs improvement with Stormshield Network Security?

I haven't had a task that I couldn't solve with Stormshield Network Security. The active-active high availability sol...

What is your primary use case for Stormshield Network Security?

I already use Stormshield Network Security, and I am now looking for a new solution. I am already working with Storms...

What advice do you have for others considering Stormshield Network Security?

The pricing is increasing, and I would say it is a bit expensive. Palo Alto and others are much more expensive, but S...

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, datac...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zscaler Cloud Firewall?

Zscaler Cloud Firewall is quite expensive compared to competitors. However, it offered moderate value for money.

What needs improvement with Zscaler Cloud Firewall?

In terms of improvements for Zscaler Cloud Firewall, I think every product has needed enhancements over time, and cur...

Sophos Firewall vs Fortinet FortiGate

Comparisons

Compared 18% of the time

Cisco Secure Firewall vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 13% of the time

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 5% of the time

Netgate pfSense vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 3% of the time

Check Point Quantum Force (NGFW) vs Fortinet FortiGate

Compared 3% of the time

More Fortinet FortiGate Competitors

Netgate pfSense vs Stormshield Network Security

Compared 10% of the time

Sophos UTM vs Stormshield Network Security

Compared 7% of the time

OPNsense vs Stormshield Network Security

Compared 6% of the time

Sophos Firewall vs Stormshield Network Security

Compared 6% of the time

WatchGuard Firebox vs Stormshield Network Security

Compared 5% of the time

More Stormshield Network Security Competitors

Check Point Quantum Force vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall

Compared 19% of the time

Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall

Compared 8% of the time

Azure Firewall vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall

Compared 6% of the time

Cisco Multicloud Defense vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall

Compared 5% of the time

Cisco Secure Firewall Threat Defense Virtual vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall

Compared 5% of the time

More Zscaler Cloud Firewall Competitors

Product Reports

Download Fortinet FortiGate product report

Fortinet FortiGate

May 2026

Stormshield Network Security

Download Stormshield Network Security product report

Zscaler Cloud Firewall

Download Zscaler Cloud Firewall product report

Also Known As

Fortinet FortiGate Next-Generation Firewall

NETASQ Firewalls

No data available

Overview

Fortinet FortiGate is a versatile network security tool offering features like VPN, firewall, web filtering, intrusion prevention, and scalability. It is known for its performance and integration with other Fortinet products, making it a preferred choice for robust cybersecurity.

Fortinet FortiGate stands out as a comprehensive cybersecurity solution with strong performance and ease of configuration. It delivers unified threat management, integrating features such as dynamic routing, SD-WAN support, and centralized management. Despite its strengths, improvements in the web interface's stability, pricing structures, and reporting capabilities are needed. Users seek better integration with third-party tools and automation advancements to enhance the experience further. These enhancements, alongside improvements in bandwidth management and the reduction of licensing costs, are points of interest for users looking to capitalize on FortiGate's extensive capabilities.

What are Fortinet FortiGate's key features?

VPN: Ensures secure remote connections.
Firewall: Protects against unauthorized access.
Web Filtering: Blocks malicious sites and content.
Application Control: Manages and controls applications.
Intrusion Prevention: Detects and prevents vulnerabilities.
SSL Inspection: Enhances security by inspecting encrypted traffic.

What benefits should be considered when evaluating Fortinet FortiGate?

Affordability: Offers cost-effective security solutions.
Reliability: Known for consistent and stable performance.
Integration: Seamlessly integrates with other Fortinet products.
Comprehensive Protection: Provides broad threat protection capabilities.

Fortinet FortiGate is widely implemented across industries as a primary firewall system for securing internet gateways and safeguarding data centers. It supports businesses in achieving SD-WAN integration and enhances cybersecurity by providing essential features like antivirus, web filtering, and application control. Enterprises utilize FortiGate for securing remote connections and ensuring compliance with security standards, making it adaptable for different network sizes and industries.

Fortinet

Stormshield Network Security offers comprehensive protection with features like backup inspection, scalable interface, and load balancing, suitable for network security management.

Stormshield Network Security is designed for organizations requiring reliable IT infrastructure protection, providing firewall capabilities, intrusion detection, and application control. Users find VPN support, URL filtering, and UTM functions beneficial for network management. Models like SN200 and SN910 are used globally in clustered configurations, addressing different demands. Challenges include pricing, interface friendliness, filtering configurations, and technical support.

What are the key features of Stormshield Network Security?

Backup Inspection: Enhances reliability and recovery options.
Antivirus Controls: Provides robust virus protection.
Intrusion Detection: Alerts on potential threats.
Load Balancing: Distributes network traffic efficiently.
URL Filtering: Blocks malicious websites for safe browsing.

What benefits should users seek in reviews?

Scalability: Adapts to each organization's growing needs.
Reliability: Supports clustered configurations for uptime.
Management Ease: Intuitive dashboard aids network oversight.
Performance: High throughput with efficient clustering.

Stormshield Network Security is widely implemented in industries needing IT infrastructure protection, like finance or healthcare. Organizations deploy it in data centers or branch offices, benefiting from features ensuring safety and performance. The tool supports environments that demand high security levels and robust network monitoring.

Stormshield

Zscaler Cloud Firewall enhances network security through seamless integration, configuration management, and comprehensive visibility. With real-time threat detection and centralized control, it provides exceptional protection without hardware investments.

Zscaler Cloud Firewall is designed for efficient network traffic management and secure internet access. It allows granular policy setting, blocking malicious IPs and domains, and access control. This cloud-based service offers smooth integration with security platforms, replacing traditional firewalls and VPNs to ensure data protection and network integrity. The intuitive dashboard facilitates policy enforcement, while advanced features like SSL inspection, URL filtering, and sandboxing add layers of security. Its cloud operation supports scalability and cost-effectiveness with an OpEx model.

What are the key features of Zscaler Cloud Firewall?

Seamless integration: Connects smoothly with existing security tools.
Intuitive dashboard: Simplifies policy enforcement and configuration.
Granular rule-setting: Allows detailed policy customization.
Real-time threat detection: Identifies and mitigates risks instantly.
Centralized control: Manages firewall settings from one location.

What benefits should users expect from Zscaler Cloud Firewall?

Cost savings: Operates fully in the cloud, eliminating hardware needs.
Scalability: Adjusts to business requirements without additional investments.
Enhanced security: Provides advanced SSL inspection and sandboxing.
Flexibility: Blocks malicious traffic and secures various devices.
Integration: Works with other platforms for comprehensive security.

Zscaler Cloud Firewall is widely used by organizations needing to secure network communications for remote and office environments. It facilitates policy implementation to block unauthorized access and is integral in protecting data and network operations across sectors like finance, healthcare, and technology. Its ability to integrate with other platforms supports a multifaceted security approach, ensuring extensive coverage and adaptability.

Zscaler

Sample Customers

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Dell, HP, Oracle, Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Vodafone, Orange, BT Group, Telstra, Deutsche Telekom, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, CenturyLink, NTT Communications, Tata Communications, SoftBank, China Mobile, Singtel, Telus, Rogers Communications, Bell Canada, Telkom Indonesia, Telkom South Africa, Telmex, Telia Company, Telkom Kenya

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

Zenith Live, Azure, Carlsberg Group

Stormshield Network Security vs. Zscaler Cloud Firewall