Fortinet FortiGate Reviews

The typical use case for Fortinet FortiGate is perimeter security, which is why our clients use this solution.

We are an implementer of Fortinet solutions.

It works well to protect the edge. For protecting the edge, Fortinet FortiGate secures any data traversing the network back to the cloud or data center through encryption. I have found it easy to configure, which results in no problems.

The security services provided by Fortinet FortiGate firewall are among the best. They have been in Gartner's quadrant for a very long time, which always helps.

Fortinet FortiGate has been able to secure mission-critical data effectively. It secures our customer's network properly, so that's always beneficial.

The ability of Fortinet FortiGate to provide network and security convergence is impressive, as they have stable features including application control. They also have advanced routing policies that set themselves apart in network security. Their solutions gel effectively with a single console for management, which is a significant advantage.

FortiOS is quite good in my experience with Fortinet FortiGate, and it works very effectively and is stable for companies. The customers have given feedback that FortiOS has been very stable for a long time. 

From a feature standpoint, it's easy to set up if people want to try and set up VPNs and other configurations. Policy control is quite nice, and we have a lot of experience with this solution, which helps us a lot.

Their support can be better, and there should be better policies for immediate replacement in critical situations. Their replacement policy varies depending on the type of support subscription. With the standard support subscription, if the device goes down, the customer has to first ship the box, and then Fortinet sends the replacement. With the higher support, the customer has to ship the device after they have the replacement. It would be better for customers to get immediate replacements even with a standard subscription.

I have more than 10 years of experience working with Fortinet FortiGate.

It is very stable. I would rate it a ten out of ten for stability.

If you size the solution correctly based on the customer's network, number of users, and throughput required, there is no problem regarding scalability, so I would rate it a nine out of ten for scalability.

We have small, medium, and large customers who have opted for Fortinet FortiGate.

I would rate technical support from Fortinet an eight out of ten. Their technical support can be improved slightly as we sometimes experience delays in support for urgent customer needs.

Positive

The typical deployment model for Fortinet FortiGate is mostly on-premises. However, there is a virtual appliance available for cloud setups, but in India, most of the sales are for on-premises appliances.

Fortinet FortiGate definitely reduces the total cost of ownership because it offers better management capabilities through a single platform. Its widespread use makes skill sets more available, making it much more cost-effective for customers than other products which may require higher resource costs.

It is more affordable than Check Point and Palo Alto. Another thing is that all the features and the OS remain the same irrespective of the size of the device.

Pricing-wise, Fortinet typically provides one-year support with the firewall appliance. There is also an option for three years which is how their licensing works. They also offer add-ons for features to keep more logs or data, which is standard across their competitors as well.

The price-to-performance ratio for using Fortinet FortiGate is always better compared to any other competitor, so they are rated better than the likes of Check Point or Palo Alto.

The network availability improves when implementing a Fortinet solution; it's definitely much better for a customer compared to having no solutions in place. They are affordable overall.

I would rate Fortinet FortiGate a nine out of ten.

On-premises

I'm using it for web filter and then using it for VPN connection user to site, and I'm using it to make a virtual ID to link a real ID from the server to provider to my servers to publish servers.

I work with Fortinet FortiGate SD WAN. I configure the SD WAN to use two Internet service providers from two different service provider links. When one of them is down, the SD WAN goes down. I have to go to the SD WAN and remove this link from the SD WAN member. I confirmed that with the local provider and it's working. Sometimes, when a member of the SD WAN link is down, the SD WAN is down, and this is not the solution. I made the SD WAN for redundancy, however, when a member of the SD WAN link is down or I finish the quote of the Internet, all the SD WAN stops working and users experience problems.

With the web filter, when I go to post some websites under certain categories and open these categories, I experience some problems. 

Additionally, I face difficulties integrating Fortinet FortiGate with Active Directory. When I set preferences to use Active Directory users, it sometimes works and sometimes does not work. When I integrate Fortinet FortiGate with Active Directory and use this integration to make a web filter policy, the functionality is inconsistent. I have tried restarting the Active Directory domain controller and the firewall, but the problem persists. As a workaround, I use the MAC address of the user to define the settings.

I have been using the solution for about five years.

I haven't configured or experienced any stability issues.

It's safe and secures my network and applications in some sites. However, I have significant problems when implementing web filters, which is a very problematic issue for me.

I often ask for help from the local provider. I haven't found the required efficient help. Currently, I have problems connecting to some banking systems and departmental Texas portals. I have asked for help but haven't found assistance through the site or through the local provider. When trying to open a ticket, they reply with solutions that are not applicable to my situation.

Positive

I didn't have a firewall previously. That said, I did have a VPN gateway.

I haven't configured or used the initial setup.

I didn't choose or have knowledge about the implementation team.

The return on investment was good.

The setup cost was good. The Egyptian pound is declining, and upgrading Fortinet FortiGate yearly costs about $2000 USD, which equals one hundred Egyptian pounds. I maintain a business relationship with the vendor and receive support from them.

I considered switching to Sophos. Due to my previous experience with Fortinet FortiGate, I preferred to stay with Fortinet FortiGate.

The solution requires careful attention, and when problems occur, they typically don't repeat once resolved. 

I miss having local provider support here in Egypt. International support is difficult to obtain. Local support is preferable yet has become very expensive due to currency devaluation in Egypt. 

On-premises

Other

The typical use case for the Fortinet FortiGate firewall for my clients is its ease of use. My clients are using Fortinet FortiGate as SD-WAN.

The effectiveness of Fortinet's unified SASE in providing consistent security policies is notable because there is one security profile from either the head office or the branch office, allowing your profile to move seamlessly with you wherever you go. You have end-to-end visibility, and you can look at the analytics. To me, that moves towards SASE.

My clients appreciate it for its features. It is easy to install and manage, and it offers all-around protection, including web filtering, content filtering, IPS, and IDS.

My clients find the next-generation firewall feature of Fortinet FortiGate to be particularly valuable. It provides internet security, network security, cloud security, ZTNA, and SD-WAN security. There is a unified agent for FortiClient. There is centralized management.

Areas of improvement for Fortinet FortiGate include the need for more training and certification, especially when dealing with distributors globally, which presents challenges in product availability and delivery timelines.

There should also be more training and certification.

I have about 10 years of experience with Fortinet FortiGate.

I find Fortinet FortiGate to be a stable solution.

Fortinet FortiGate is a scalable solution, as you can start small, maybe with FortiGate 40F, and then move to FortiGate 60F or FortiGate 80F, depending on your needs.

It depends on who your distributor is. 

Neutral

It is not straightforward, but the implementation is pretty good overall. Every site is different for me. There is no standard site. We have a few different issues here and there, but overall, it's pretty good and straightforward to install. Its integration is not difficult.

It is a matter of learning and understanding the reasons why people need Fortinet FortiGate.

Fortinet FortiGate positively provides my clients' organizations with a high return on investment. There is visibility into network operations, allowing us to identify network issues. It has advanced security features. You can achieve about 200% ROI over three years, while enhancing IT teams' productivity by about 50%. It simplifies security across branches and enhances hybrid and cloud security. There is even a feature where you can predict the application performance.

It's very competitive.

Many users nowadays prefer agentless installations over installing agents on their devices, which presents challenges for endpoint security, especially concerning ZTNA, VPN, and endpoint protection.

I would rate Fortinet FortiGate an eight out of ten.

On-premises

In our organization, FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) serves as the main security system for our firewall needs. I have utilized it to manage the firewalls and some other security appliances, such as VPNs. Currently, my usage focuses primarily on firewall management. I set up rules, search for logs, and consult logs when issues arise. This approach covers most of our security management tasks.

One of the most valuable features of FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) is the ease of usability it offers. It is quite easy for me to learn to use. Additionally, FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) has improved our efficiency in setting up security and provided us with more visibility over some issues and incidents we previously faced.

FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) could be improved by including more templates for setting rules or regular jobs. I do not recall if the software includes any AI features.

I have had experience with FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) for about five or six years.

When deploying FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW), it required one week for the initial setup and just two hours for effective deployment. There were no significant issues during this process.

In my experience, there are usually no significant stability issues with FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW). However, updating the software during issues can be quite convoluted, especially if there is an unexpected attack, such as on a Saturday.

Customer service with Fortinet for FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) has been quite good. We experienced a major issue during one of the upgrades, and it took about an hour to reach support and rectify the problem.

Positive

Before using FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW), we used Cisco for our firewall needs. Cisco presented a lot of usability challenges. Setting up firewalls and rules with Cisco was difficult and required extensive knowledge of their system, which led us to switch to FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW).

The initial setup of FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) was relatively smooth. It took about one week for the complete setup and two hours for the actual deployment.

The deployment involved two people from my side, and we also had assistance from a vendor during the setup.

In terms of return on investment, FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) has been straightforward. It has notably improved our efficiency and visibility.

The pricing of FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) is reasonably affordable. It is suitable for mid-level and high-level companies, though it might not be cheap for small companies.

I would recommend FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) to others. Despite some issues with upgrades and vulnerabilities, Fortinet quickly addresses concerns. Overall, on a scale of one to ten, I would rate FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) as an eight.

I primarily use FortiGate IPS to protect my company from advanced threats like zero-day attacks and other cybersecurity threats.

The most valuable feature is the deep inspection for traffic, which is capable of identifying zero-day attacks. This solution works well on a daily basis, detecting various types of malicious traffic. Integration with FortiFabric enables easy management and scalability across different locations.

There could be improvements in the mathematical algorithms used for behavior analytics of traffic. More advanced AI capabilities would be beneficial in future updates.

I have been using FortiGate IPS for about two years.

The stability of the solution is excellent. I rate it as nine out of ten. There are no issues with stability, and it integrates seamlessly with the main product, which is a firewall.

FortiGate IPS is highly scalable. I can easily integrate it with FortiFabric and manage multiple firewalls and other Fortinet solutions from a single dashboard.

Fortinet support is very responsive. I would rate their support as eight out of ten.

Positive

I also use Cisco for email security. Fortinet was chosen since it is a popular solution for middle-sized companies in my region.

The initial setup took about two to three hours and included setup and configuration.

The implementation involved two engineers. It was handled internally.

I have not calculated ROI specifically, however, the primary goal was to enhance cybersecurity.

There are no extra expenses involved after purchasing the solution. Pricing could be better, however, overall, it is considered a middle-level price for a middle-level company.

I am currently working mostly with Fortinet as well as with Cisco for email security.

I recommend FortiGate IPS for those looking to add an additional layer of security on top of a firewall to combat cyberattacks. I would rate the overall solution as seven out of ten.

Our use case for Fortinet FortiGate is network administration and network security; this is the use for Fortinet FortiGate.

The best features of Fortinet FortiGate are security, configuration facility, and easy configuration. Additionally, we get very good support from the manufacturer. The major impact of Fortinet FortiGate for clients is providing a redundant path from the service locations or servers location to the users that are in another location; this is the best impact.

One area for improvement for Fortinet FortiGate could be the price, as my clients here are small companies, and they might not have the resources or money to always buy a Fortinet FortiGate solution or FortiGate products.

I have been with that platform for about two to three years.

In general, Fortinet FortiGate's stability is very good, but in some cases, there are unusual situations. For example, we have one client with high availability with two Fortinet FortiGates, where one of them has high processor and memory usage while the other one is low, and they work in a passive-active scheme for availability. The strange part is that one Fortinet FortiGate works perfectly, and the other one has high processor and memory consumption.

Most clients are in one location, but two or three clients have SD-WAN characteristics in their implementations.

I would rate their support a nine out of ten. The support is very good, but it's not always easy to find a Spanish speaker, as some clients don't know how to speak English and need support in Spanish.

I integrate SD-WAN features for some clients; specifically, I have three or four clients with SD-WAN integrations, while most of my clients are with one location. I find it easy integrating these capabilities.

Security is very good with Fortinet for my clients; this is one of the best reasons to make a decision to buy a Fortinet solution.

Fortinet FortiGate saves a lot of time in expert hours from an expert engineer because the administration of the Fortinet FortiGate solution is easy, which may lead to fewer hours of an engineer spent on Fortinet FortiGate. It could save approximately 40 hours a month.

I would recommend this solution to others; it's the best solution in the market. The main advice I give to people who consider using Fortinet FortiGate is for security and administration, as we can get complete visibility of the network.

On a scale of 1-10, I rate this solution a 10.

On-premises

Other

I used Fortinet FortiGate to protect some perimeters, and I used it a lot for detection, filtering, domain control, and security functions and features. 

I worked for a company that used Fortinet FortiGate to provide services to many customers across various industries and through different environments. Some companies ranged from five to 50 to 100 users, and others were double that size, and even more.

We improved a lot of our users' security, including malware from outbound internet. It reduced downtime and helped detect and block malicious actions. The realization of benefits was immediate.

The most valuable features of Fortinet FortiGate are that it's simple to implement all necessary settings, and it's quite fast. 

Their web interface to manage it is excellent, even compared with other providers. 

With Fortinet FortiGate, we improved security significantly. It blocks a lot of malware from the internet and even between our hosts in different networks, thus enhancing our security and reducing any downtime by blocking problems that could stop operations.

One of the most important areas for improvement for Fortinet FortiGate is the limited resources for tests. I was limited to a few interfaces for one month, and it would be great if Fortinet could improve these features in their test versions.

I used Fortinet FortiGate for three years in total.

I would rate the support with Fortinet FortiGate a ten out of ten. 

We had a few problems, and whenever we needed support, they attended to us in a few hours or days based on the severity level, resolving the problems with minimal impact on the environment.

Positive

They were using SonicWall and pfSense before switching to Fortinet FortiGate.

Fortinet FortiGate is more user-friendly when it comes to the interface and setting every feature you need, and keeping it working as expected to protect the network, while SonicWall is too advanced and very laggy and confusing to use. SonicWall does not do anything better than Fortinet FortiGate.

The initial setup for clients was very straightforward, easy to implement, and required few steps to keep it working with Fortinet FortiGate. It takes about one day, around ten hours of work for small companies and normal offices to deploy Fortinet FortiGate. That said, it might take longer for bigger networks. However, it's not too much time compared to other companies or providers.

It required around two or three people who understand the network to deploy Fortinet FortiGate, along with one or two more for setting devices or any changes and tests to ensure everything is working as expected. The total was somewhere around five people or slightly less, depending on your knowledge about the existing network.

I cannot calculate the exact return on investment from Fortinet FortiGate. We evaluate it based on the impact of downtime when we have problems in the environment, however, the ROI is less than a year. 

Fortinet FortiGate helps save time and improve efficiency by aggregating logs that help us understand what's happening, thus improving our detection time and reducing operational errors. We reduced our time by approximately 30% with Fortinet FortiGate.

Fortinet FortiGate's pricing is comparable to others.

I am currently working for another company and not using Fortinet FortiGate. The last time I used Fortinet FortiGate was on March 25th, just a few months ago. 

I work as a technical user in cybersecurity monitoring. My current company is a partner, however, I don't have any relation with sales. 

On a scale of one to ten, I rate Fortinet FortiGate a ten.

We put FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) after the ISP; we use the internet, and before we put our server through the internet, we put FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) as a firewall in our internal network.

We follow ISO 27001, which includes web filtering, spam, and IPS functionality.

We sometimes face challenges if we have new server configurations and need to consider compatibility with FortiGate.

We hope that FortiGate uses AI to carefully identify something abnormal, and we believe that will be helpful.

The multi-threat protection feature helps us secure our organization.

We understand that FortiGate cannot be standalone without others, such as FortiManager, so for small businesses, if FortiGate can provide something similar to FortiManager, it will be better.

I have been using FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) for about nine years.

I would rate the stability of FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) as a nine.

I would rate the scalability as a nine also.

I would rate the technical support as a seven.

The installation of FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) is actually moderate; it depends on the needs, so it's not so easy but it's not so difficult.

The installation requires a couple of days, and actually, it takes about one day because some parameters need to be set, especially if there are a lot of users.

I have a person in charge of that.

From a cost perspective, I think it's quite reasonable, not so cheap, but I think it's quite similar compared to others.

Two people are involved in the maintenance.

We use many FortiGates. We are using the 60F and 100F, which are the newest versions.

Our staff handles maintenance ourselves; we are not using a third-party service.

About 30 people are using this product in our organization.

We are payroll outsourcing consultants, so basically they calculate payroll.

I would recommend FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) to others.

I would rate FortiGate Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) in general as an eight.

On-premises