FarooqKhan - PeerSpot reviewer
Assistant VP Solution Departments at a computer software company with 201-500 employees
Real User
Top 10
Comprehensive solution that's easy to set up
Pros and Cons
  • "FortiMail is a stable product."
  • "FortiMail's dashboard is somewhat complex and could be made simpler."

What is our primary use case?

I use FortiMail for email security, ransomware and phishing protection, risk and compliance, security, and automation.

What needs improvement?

FortiMail's dashboard is somewhat complex and could be made simpler. Its integration could also be easier.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been working with FortiMail for four to five years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

FortiMail is a stable product.

Buyer's Guide
Fortinet FortiMail
May 2024
Learn what your peers think about Fortinet FortiMail. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2024.
769,599 professionals have used our research since 2012.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

FortiMail is scalable.

How are customer service and support?

Fortinet's support system lags behind the rest of its offerings and needs to be fine-tuned and polished.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is straightforward.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

FortiMail has extra charges for installation, configuration, and project management.

What other advice do I have?

I recommend FortiMail to other users and rate it eight out of ten.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Integrator
PeerSpot user
Information Security Officer at State Audit Office
Real User
Safeguards our company's emails with minimal configuration and no stress
Pros and Cons
  • "FortiMail is extremely flexible and very easy to learn. Compared to other email security products that we've tried, it is mainly the ease of configuration that makes FortiMail valuable to us."
  • "I have little to say about possible improvements, but the configuration for content blocking could be better. So, for example, if the email includes the line "You have a Bitcoin", I would like it to be easier to block it before it enters an inbox. Fortinet could maybe offer better or simpler help on how to do this properly."

What is our primary use case?

We have FortiMail running on-premises on a virtual client. It is currently serving emails for about 400 employees that we have here. All this is taking place on the same server, and for the past three months it has been our main guarantee for email security.

How has it helped my organization?

FortiMail has taken good care of the deliverability and security of emails within our organization, protecting our many users from all kinds of security threats.

What is most valuable?

FortiMail is extremely flexible and very easy to learn. Compared to other email security products that we've tried, it is mainly the ease of configuration that makes FortiMail valuable to us.

It doesn't take an engineer to be able to get up and running with FortiMail, and one can get by with little more than the online documentation and YouTube, for example.

What needs improvement?

I have little to say about possible improvements, but the configuration for content blocking could be better. So, for example, if the email text and/or subject includes any kind of keyword and/or phrase, for example "You have a Bitcoin", I would like it to be easier to block it before it enters an inbox. Fortinet could maybe offer better or simpler help on how to do this properly. 

Besides that, I feel that we have everything we need for our company with FortiMail.

For how long have I used the solution?

Our company has been using Fortinet FortiMail for three months now. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

During testing we have found FortiMail to be very stable and there have been no major incidents. It is one of the most stable Fortinet products we have used.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We have successfully used FortiMail for around 400 email users so far. It is very flexible.

How are customer service and technical support?

We don't have any experience with the official international support because our partners at High Tech Solutions in Georgia, with whom we have a close business relationship, are our main support channel.

They are highly professional, well-educated, and always available to help us. Even when working hours are over, they are happy to offer support from their excellent engineers. They truly stand behind Fortinet products and it shows.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

For email security purposes, we previously used Barracuda Firewall. We had the firewall installed in the system which we were using for free emails. Now we are transforming our system to use FortiMail as it is more of an all-in-one solution that has everything we need.

How was the initial setup?

FortiMail is very easy to set up and configure. This is one of the main reasons why we enjoy using it.

What about the implementation team?

There is just one guy who works on the admin and configuration, and an InfoSec officer who looks into incidents by analyzing events and logs. Beyond that, we also receive input from the head of department and other management.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

In terms of licensing, we are using a virtual machine license for the single virtual server which it runs on. Doing it this way enables us to cut costs by only licensing FortiMail for our exact use case. If you need to expand in future, you can later buy extra licenses per virtual machine.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We could have continued with Barracuda, but after trying out FortiMail for a short time, we now prefer it over Barracuda. 

What other advice do I have?

After three months of evaluating FortiMail, it has exceeded our expectations and we will definitely continue using it.

I would rate Fortinet FortiMail a ten out of ten. 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Fortinet FortiMail
May 2024
Learn what your peers think about Fortinet FortiMail. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2024.
769,599 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Ahmet Coruk - PeerSpot reviewer
Co-founder at Korunet
Real User
The GUI is easy to use, setup is simple, and support is responsive
Pros and Cons
  • "The GUI isn't hard to use. When we do a demo and explain the features of Fortinet products to our customers, they understand very quickly. They can easily manage their systems without us."
  • "Maybe FortiMail's integration could be better."

What is our primary use case?

We are an integrator company, so we are installing to these products, the different customers.  We explain Fortinet solutions to our customers, and if they want, we can do a proof of concept for one month or so. Then, if they are happy and want to move forward, we will install it on their site. After that, we provide support for one to three years, depending on the contract. I did the POC of FortiMail for three big companies, and later they had no budget because they ran into a cash flow problem, and we ended up just waiting. Still, we are contacting our customers and trying to sell the Fortinet product FortiMail.

What is most valuable?

The GUI isn't hard to use. When we do a demo and explain the features of Fortinet products to our customers, they understand very quickly. They can easily manage their systems without us. But other products are a little more complicated. For example, if we're talking about firewall systems, I use Palo Alto, but I prefer the Fortinet solution because it's easier to use. They're effortless. When I try to configure the SD-WAN, it's just one or two clicks. I can route all applications with the destination. It's no problem for me. The other configuration also is very easy. Palo Alto may be more powerful for inspection, but my priority is making the customer happy. Also, they have the Fabric architecture, so when we sell one Fortinet product to the government, we can easily sell the others because they have the Fabric architecture as well. We are working with other products from different companies, but if you ask about email solutions, we prefer FortiMail.

What needs improvement?

Maybe FortiMail's integration could be better.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using FortiMail for about five years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

FortiMail is very stable. We haven't had any problems with it.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

FortiMail is highly scalable. We've installed it in big government agencies without any problems.

How are customer service and support?

Fortinet's support responds very fast. Normally within Turkey, we can get support. We don't talk to the central Fortinet support. The Turkey partner program companies are enough for us. Currently, we have the high technical Fortinet certification, but sometimes we have trouble, so we contact the Fortinet Turkey technical managers and get a fast response from them.

How was the initial setup?

Installation is effortless with all Fortinet products. With simple settings, the initial installation takes half an hour tops. Then, if the customer wants a custom configuration, that might take five additional minutes. Customers almost always want something, and we have to update the configuration. One admin is enough to handle everything. The admin has to talk to the customer. You can do some templates, but every customer's needs are different. For example, sending 5,000 emails from one source to a destination is a big problem. You could get flagged as spam. But for some personal reasons, this setup might be needed because the customer is in a relationship with others, so perhaps he will send advertising emails to the customers, so 5,000 is okay. You can allow just this functionality for just one person and deny it to others. So it's adaptable for the needs of each customer, but one admin guy is enough.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I don't know the price of other products, but the cost of FortiMail is moderate. The customers don't want to haggle. When they see what the solution can do, they are willing to pay for it. They are most likely getting quotes from various companies, and the Fortinet product is the most cost-effective. The performance is very high because they're trying all the products on their site. At the end of the day, they look at the performance and the price, and  Fortinet covers all the bases.

What other advice do I have?

I rate FortiMail nine out of 10. I don't know what other solution is the best, but we are happy with Fortinet products. We offer FortiMail to all our customers. For example, when I go to any customer to explain the different solutions, I mention FortiMail if they don't have a mail solution. Or perhaps they have another product that they're using, say Kaspersky Mail Protection, but they're not getting any support from Kaspersky, so nobody knows how it's working. They installed the device, but nobody provided them support. In a situation like this, our sales pitch for Fortinet is that we will provide three years of support. Also, Fortinet itself provides support for them 24-7, so they're getting a fast response from Fortinet.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
PeerSpot user
Database/Server Specialist Computer Services at a university with 201-500 employees
Real User
Scalable, great for spam outbreaks, and offers great technical support
Pros and Cons
  • "The solution can scale."
  • "Sometimes it takes a little bit too long to determine if an email is good or not. If they could shorten that time span, it'd be so much better. It does delay our email, which does not make users happy. That said, I would have to say we have not been blacklisted for quite a while now."

What is our primary use case?

The solution is primarily used for identifying spam, viruses, zero-day spamming, and any other kind of spam issues our organization might face.

What is most valuable?

We have several of these solutions in place. We do have, as of late, spam outbreaks. This solution has been pretty reliable in dealing with them. 

The solution can scale.

The solution is mostly stable.

What needs improvement?

Sometimes it takes a little bit too long to determine if an email is good or not. If they could shorten that time span, it'd be so much better. It does delay our email, which does not make users happy. That said, I would have to say we have not been blacklisted for quite a while now.

Sometimes there are false positives.

When spam goes into system quarantine, it would be ideal if there was a safe way to let the users review the email in question and release it themselves, as opposed to having to wait on an administrator, to search for it and release it. It could be done securely. I understand why the system quarantines. However, a lot of users have their financial documents or lawyer's documents get thrown into the system quarantine and they're waiting on them. They need them within the hour as they are often time-sensitive matters. Due to this, they have to contact me. They wait for a while because they don't know when it's going to come, however, eventually they have to contact me. It's a delay. People understandably get very impatient.

There are some emails that go through that should be given a login code - for example, like whenever you're signing up for Microsoft in the cloud and they have to send you a login code. These codes from well-known vendors get stuck in the spam outbreak. They get stuck in different places. 

Whitelisting should be a little bit friendlier for the users. It was actually easier a few versions back. Once you logged into your Fortimail account, you could whitelist very easily. Now, you have to kind of navigate through the email to do it. We cannot turn on the auto whitelist feature on because then there are users that will download anything without thinking, so we never use the auto whitelist feature. That's why it's so important to make whitelisting individually an easy task.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've used the solution within the last 12 months.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The stability of the solution is mainly good. We do occasionally get false positives, however, it's rare.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It is very scalable and it does work well for what it's doing.

How are customer service and technical support?

We've been satisfied with the technical support. They always are able to help us with upgrades and implementations. We find them to be quite knowledgeable.

How was the initial setup?

For us, the setup is pretty straightforward. However, it's that way due to the fact that we use technical support to assist us. If we were to do it on our own, it may be difficult to implement. It's not something that I could just pull up and do on my own. I don't feel like I could. The knowledge of the engineers is very beneficial.

What about the implementation team?

In our use case scenario, we do have support to help us set it up. In all the scenarios, even when I migrate to another upgrade or to a different box, even though we've had this for several years, we always use support.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We did evaluate other options before choosing this solution.

What other advice do I have?

We're just customers. We don't have a business relationship with the company.

I would rate the solution nine out of ten. If it weren't for issues surrounding quarantining emails, I'd rate it higher.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Manager IT at OTE
Real User
The reporting and various tools that protect our mail domain are very valuable
Pros and Cons
  • "I think the spamming feature is very valuable."
  • "Online support sometimes takes up to a week to get back to you."

What is our primary use case?

We have implemented this solution in our VMware environment to host our own mail domain. So when the mails come in, we use the security profile and all the features of the FortiMail very efficiently - all the blacklists, safe lists, block lists, and other securities that are there to change and contain. We use spamming and content filtering and attachment filtering. 

How has it helped my organization?

The solution provides different tools and reporting so now one can prevent malicious spam coming through. You can put that on the blacklist, white list or accordingly. Based on the IP repetition score, there are so many things the developers have improved which weren't available in the earlier versions. there. Now the filtering is really effective to protect any mail environment of any company. 

What is most valuable?

I think the spamming feature is very valuable. One of the features of FortiMail is the sandbox. If any suspicious or malicious thing is detected, it uploads to the FortiMail, and then to the database, and then it's checked. Once it's confirmed that the mail is good content, then it's moved inside and forwarded to its destination. So the sandboxing is a really valuable feature. 

What needs improvement?

FortiMail is currently available in the appliance mode so I believe the technology can be improved a little. There are a lot of viruses and malicious things out there that can damage your environment. So I think they need to be analytical in their quiet mode implementation so that these things get updated constantly. If anything new is in the market, it should be blocked by the FortiMail immediately.

For how long have I used the solution?

We've been using Fortinet FortiMail for a year now.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It is a very stable solution. We rarely get any complaint from the users getting spam. Even my own finance head and managing directors are satisfied. 

How are customer service and technical support?

I will not give good marks on their support team. The support is not good at all. If you call in with an emergency thing, they will send you some PDF to read rather than sending it to their technical team. We therefore use our own expertise team who then uses Google to search for a solution. Online support sometimes takes up to a week to get back to you. 

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We used Trend Micro Gateway and another McAfee gateway, but Fortinet is a good product. We were using McAfee, the email gateway security filtering, anti-spam filtering. 

What other advice do I have?

The filtering is really effective to protect any mail environment of any company. I can definitely recommend this solution and my rating is a nine out of ten.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Cyber Security Solutions Manager at Summit Technology Solution
Real User
Actively works to ensure reliable delivery and containment of threats and spam
Pros and Cons
  • "A full-featured email gateway solution that contains security threats reliably."
  • "Limited ability to upgrade hardware may lead to some performance issues that might otherwise be improved."

What is our primary use case?

I'm not working on the local FortiMail installation and really concentrate on servicing and deploying FortiMail to clients. The primary uses depending on the client are anti-spam and anti-fishing as well as threat isolation.

How has it helped my organization?

This product has improved our organization by giving us another opportunity to sell a top product to our clients that will do what it was designed to do.

What is most valuable?

Personally, I believe that FortiMail is a very good antispam solution. Clients use this solution as well for anti-spam and anti-phishing.

What needs improvement?

I believe the product needs better integration with FortiSandbox and integration with third-party Sandbox solutions.

What clients would like, I think, is more features on the appliances. Processing power is very important and this is dependent on abilities to upgrade the appliance.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been working with the solution for at least almost three, four years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The clients seem to always like the stability of the product. They always like the way it functions, the support knowledge we provide when necessary and that they really have to do nothing to keep the product functioning.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The product is definitely a scalable solution. For example, we have a customer — a very technical customer who recently expanded operations — and we managed to expand the solution to fit their new needs on request.

It is a very good solution compared to the competition due to the capacity of the appliance and the number or volume of emails it can handle. It is almost independent of the number of users. That's why it has a very good competitive advantage.

How are customer service and technical support?

We have a good support team to contact at Fortinet if we need them. They are available and reliable.

How was the initial setup?

I believe that the complexity of the initial setup depends on the customer's environment and their need. This can increase or decrease the complexity of deployment. Generally, it takes between 10 to 20 working days to fully deploy. And then we require only occasional support for maintenance, again depending on the case.

What about the implementation team?

We are Fortinet partners and act as consultants while also doing installations and maintenance.

What was our ROI?

According to clients, there is a return on investment in the cost of ownership and value. That is it ends up costing most clients less than other solutions while providing as much in features and services or more.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

There are subscription fees but I don't think there is an additional cost. The pricing is not my area of expertise, but clients seem to suggest the license cost is competitive. It depends on capacity and not the number of users.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

My title at our company is Presale Security Solutions Manager for service security. I service presale and consulting for FortiGate and other mail gateway solutions. Fortinet is one of our top products in this sector. I'm often selling different Fortinet solutions like FortiGate, FortiMail, and FortiSandbox as well. Sometimes we will consider other products but this is our main line.

What other advice do I have?

With the Fortinet FortiMail solution, you have a lot of advantages because of the effectiveness of security. You also see a return on investment in the cost of ownership and value. The licensing value — as I hear from clients — is very good, and the capacity of FortiMail is very scalable. You can have a large number of users and pay according to the capacity, not on the number of users so you pay for actual use. 

On a scale from one to ten, where one is the worst and 10 is the best, I give FortiMail an eight out of ten.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner.
PeerSpot user
Nikorn Soemklang - PeerSpot reviewer
Director - Technical & Services at Bangkok Business Solutions
Real User
Great anti-spam and blocking capabilities with an initial easy setup
Pros and Cons
  • "It can block a lot of fake emails."
  • "It can be easier to configure or connect to the cloud to report on the attachments."

What is our primary use case?

I primarily just use the product as an email gateway for our email server.

How has it helped my organization?

Before I used the solution, I got a lot of spam emails.

What is most valuable?

The anti-spam and the IPS to help block items and attachments that come with the email are both quite helpful. It can block a lot of fake emails.

The initial setup is easy.

I have found the product to be stable. 

The solution can scale. 

What needs improvement?

So far I don't need any improvements right now. I'm quite happy with the product as-is.

At some point, FortiMail and Fortigate should merge together in one box. If they did that, it would be really helpful for the user. 

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using the solution for one year.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It is, overall, a stable solution. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. It is reliable and the performance is good. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Currently, I'm using it for around 600 to 700 email users. It still performs quite well for me. There is no delay to speak of.

How are customer service and support?

I've never used technical support and have never reached out to them in the past.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I'm also familiar with Cisco. This product is easier to set up than Cisco. 

How was the initial setup?

We found the initial setup process to be very simple. It's not difficult. 

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The pricing is very reasonable. It's not overly expensive. We pay a yearly licensing fee. 

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

I compared quite a few options with Cisco. In the end, this was the cost-effective option and the features are excellent.

What other advice do I have?

We're just customers and end-users.

The version we are using is the newest one, as I already updated the OS and I just bought it last year.

For those considering the solution, they better have a very clear idea about how they will place the FortiMail in their network. For example, either as the email server itself or as the email gateway. If you decided correctly in the first place, then you can configure it easily.

FortiMail has a low cost and high support. Support is very helpful, however, so far, I don't need to use them at all. At the very least, I have someone that I can call and ask questions in Thai. This is not the case, for example, with Cisco. 

I'd rate the solution an eight out of ten. I'll rate it higher when it can be easier to configure or connect to the cloud to report on the attachments.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Cyber Security Analyst at Sixtema Spa
Real User
A stable and reliable way to protect the data of our customers
Pros and Cons
  • "The solution is very reliable and very stable."

    What is our primary use case?

    Our primary use case of this solution is to protect data from our customers and from our internal network. We now have a substitute for the Palo Alto Network and nowadays we also use FortiGate.

    What is most valuable?

    I like the possibility of getting reports offered by this solution, which is better than what Palo Alto offered. It is a very reliable program and it works great.

    What needs improvement?

    In the future, I would like it if there's a possibility to lower the price of the bandwidth and UTM. It is quite expensive.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    I have been using Fortinet FortiMail for ten years now.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    The solution is very reliable and very stable. It has never been down or unresponsive. It's perfect.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    We currently have about 3,000 users on Fortinet, mostly customers. The solution is scalable.

    How are customer service and technical support?

    There was no need for us to use technical support so far.

    Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

    We've also worked on the Palo Alto Network and FortiGate.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    There are additional costs to the license fees. The solution is rather expensive.

    What other advice do I have?

    I will definitely recommend this solution to others, and my rating is nine out of ten. It is very reliable and always available. In the future, I would like to see better management of the monitoring dashboard. Perhaps they can add a pie chart or other charts in the report because they are very useful and customers will really appreciate them.

    Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
    PeerSpot user
    Buyer's Guide
    Download our free Fortinet FortiMail Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
    Updated: May 2024
    Product Categories
    Email Security
    Buyer's Guide
    Download our free Fortinet FortiMail Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.