Sophos XG Reviews

I use Sophos XG for security products and have two lower sites. One is for production, and one is for security. I use it for security. For our management team, I will use it for production in the future. We focus on network security, and for threat protection, customers also use other products like Bitdefender and Kaspersky on their workstations and servers.

For network security, I use Sophos XG for entire network protection. The AI-enhanced security features are important to me, as they provide enhanced features for business reporting and automation. Our customers are also happy because of its AI capabilities, which satisfy them in terms of security features. Sophos XG focuses on network security, a crucial aspect for me.

The main improvement needed is in the pricing. It is a little higher when compared to competitors like Huawei. There are many Chinese products in Myanmar, and their prices are more competitive. Sometimes, for budgets with limitations, I offer Chinese products like Huawei. Additionally, Sophos XG's response time is sometimes delayed due to time zone differences in customer support.

I have been using Sophos XG for one year.

I rate the stability of Sophos XG as eight out of ten because there are sometimes delays in response, likely due to time zone differences.

I have tried Sophos's technical support, and it's okay. If I rate it, I would give it an eight out of ten.

Positive

It's not difficult for me and my team to install, but technicians need experience.

Three to five engineers usually take part from our side in maintenance.

The pricing is a little higher compared to Chinese products like Huawei. For those on a limited budget, I sometimes prefer Huawei. However, if the customer focuses on security features and reliability, I don't use Chinese products.

Comparisons were made with competitors like Huawei, Fortinet, and other Chinese products.

I recommend Sophos XG to other customers. For overall reliability, network security, threat protection, and everything, I rate it nine out of ten. The AI-enhanced security features are significant and satisfying. Reporting and automation features are valuable. Sometimes, there are delays in customer support responses due to time zone differences. Overall, I rate the solution nine out of ten.

On-premises

The primary use case for Sophos XG is basic firewalling and configuration. We use it primarily for installation purposes.

Time-saving and cost-saving benefits are realized, with stability contributing to these advantages. It provides approximately 10% to 15% savings in time and costs.

The most valuable features of Sophos XG include having rules and policies as a firewall. It is easy to configure.

The areas needing improvement are support and configuration. The delays in technical support can be handled better. Sometimes, configuration gives some issues.

I have been using Sophos XG for almost one year.

No hardware or software solution is 100% stable. I would rate it at about 99% accuracy.

Sophos XG has excellent scalability features. It is already available on cloud as well as on-premises, and you can scale up to multiple firewalls with centralized management. No limitations have been faced regarding scalability.

Customer service and support can be improved as there are delays. I would rate the support at eight out of ten.

Positive

Sophos XG is easy to install, generally requiring one person and takes about two to three hours depending on the rules and policies.

One person is usually sufficient for installation unless multiple dynamics are involved.

The return on investment is judged to be around three point five out of five in terms of stability, time saving, and cost saving.

The solution is considered cheap in terms of pricing.

For small and midsize enterprises, Sophos XG is a good choice without any major issues.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

Actually, we are using Tekton for creating CI/CD pipelines for building and deploying applications to different environments.

It helped a lot in terms of automation. We sometimes use Tekton for purposes like sending emails, running batch jobs, and similar tasks.

The valuable features include cloud-native integration, which makes it highly available and efficient in modern containerized environments. Another feature is the modular pipeline that allows reusing CI/CD manifests for different purposes. This modularity helps in reducing redundancy and maintaining a streamlined process.

One area of improvement is the lack of cross-cluster capability, meaning you need different sets of tasks and pipelines for each Kubernetes cluster. Tekton also has an unstable API with frequent changes, making it challenging to maintain consistency across versions. Additionally, there's a need for a better dashboard and built-in authentication mechanisms.

It's about one and a half years we have been working with Tekton.

Tekton is quite stable when used in a well-established Kubernetes cluster. The stability largely depends on the stability of the Kubernetes environment itself, which is designed for high availability.

Tekton's scalability is one of its most advanced features. Since it uses the underlying Kubernetes infrastructure, it can scale easily if the Kubernetes cluster is sufficiently large. I would rate it eight out of ten for scalability.

We primarily used community resources like Stack Overflow for addressing our issues and did not directly contact Tekton's customer service.

Positive

In my previous company, we used GitLab and Jenkins for creating CICD pipelines. Currently, Tekton is the primary tool we are using, with Jenkins as a backup solution if Tekton encounters any issues.

The initial setup was manageable but required extensive reading and understanding of documentation. If the Kubernetes cluster is already in place, the setup can be completed in less than ten minutes.

The deployment of Tekton was done in-house with a team of six to seven people handling deployment, creating CI/CD pipelines, and maintaining the solution.

Tekton is an open-source tool, meaning there are no setup costs associated with it. I would rate the cost at one, indicating it is free to use.

In my previous company, we used GitLab and Jenkins for similar purposes.

My advice is to avoid using Tekton if possible due to its complex setup and lack of user-friendly features like a comprehensive dashboard and built-in authentication mechanisms.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

On-premises

We sell Sophos XG devices.

Sophos XG includes all basic features and has a secured proxy mechanism. Network security proxy authentication is available through a web-based proxy. The older proxy mechanism is not there. Pricing is very competitive, much cheaper compared to other brands like Palo Alto, Check Point, and Fortinet. Additionally, the performance of the hardware has been increased, although it is not negligible compared to other brands.

The direct proxy or proxy mechanism is missing. Legacy applications should have this option, but Sophos XG has removed it. This feature was available in UTM nine but not in XG.

I have been using Sophos XG for one or two years.

Deploying Sophos XG was not difficult. It took a couple of weeks to fully deploy the solution, and the process was quite fast and not complicated.

I have premium support from Sophos, and the support is good. They respond well and have a good support team.

Neutral

Pricing of Sophos XG is very good compared to other brands. The pricing is very cheap. For example, if Palo Alto is priced at 200, then Sophos is priced at 75, which is a significant difference.

On a scale of one to ten, I would rate the overall solution between seven and eight.

I use Sophos XG as a channel partner, providing it to our customers for next-generation firewall solutions, Wi-Fi access points, and other security features. My customers include industries such as banking, manufacturing, IT, hospitals, and healthcare.

I regard Sophos XG as a superior choice among firewalls due to its advanced security, user manual, and control panel features, among others. The firewall offers effective policy management, bandwidth management, and group policy features from a sales perspective. 

Additionally, customer support is highly regarded, with a technical representative swiftly addressing customer queries through the Sophos partner portal.

Sophos XG is reaching its end-of-life and end-of-support; therefore, the user count limitation of particular models should be improved.

I have been working with Sophos XG for around five to six years.

I would rate the stability of Sophos XG as ten out of ten.

I rate scalability as ten out of ten, indicating that it is easy to scale up for a larger number of users.

The technical support from Sophos XG is excellent. When my customers raise a ticket, a customer representative calls them immediately to address their queries. I rate customer service nine out of ten.

Positive

The setup process is easy and I would rate it ten out of ten.

My customers see a return on investment and value for money with Sophos XG.

I consider the pricing reasonable; it depends on the model and license type, like one-year, two-year, or five-year licenses. Compared to other firewalls like Fortigate, SonicWall, and Palo Alto, I find Sophos XG cost-effective. 

I highly recommend using Sophos XG for enhanced security purposes and organizational structure implementation. Furthermore, I rate Sophos XG as ten out of ten.

On-premises

Most of our customers want to block their websites, especially those in the financial sector. They desire access to only required websites while blocking the rest. We have also installed certificate-based scanning for inspection.

Sophos XG provides us with unlimited VPN users, which is very useful. Its in-built reporting functionality is also highly beneficial. Additionally, we are currently utilizing the threat intelligence features.

Sophos XG should concentrate on improving SD-WAN solutions. Currently, the in-built GUI doesn't support configuring SD-WAN. If configuration from the firewall itself was possible, it would be very useful for us. Presently, we rely on Sophos Central to make configuration changes.

I have been working with Sophos XG for over six years.

I would rate the stability of Sophos XG as a nine out of ten.

I would rate the scalability of Sophos XG as a six out of ten. There is room for improvement in the scalability aspects.

The technical support from Sophos is good and satisfactory.

Positive

The initial setup of Sophos XG is simple.

The pricing for Sophos XG is comparatively low. Compared to other firewalls, it is low in price.

I would compare Sophos XG to SonicWall. SonicWall has multiple features, including inbuilt endpoint security and a lot of features compared to Sophos XG.

Overall, I would rate Sophos XG as a seven out of ten.

Hybrid Cloud

I use Sophos XG mainly as a gateway. It also serves as the DHCP server on my network and is utilized for web control.

The Sophos XG offers intuitive configurations, which is primarily what I find valuable. It is easy to configure due to its graphical interface, reducing the reliance on specialized IT personnel and cuts down on time used for support and troubleshooting.

The reporting side could use improvement. Having more reports on the dashboard would be beneficial. While there might be different tools or licenses for various purposes, having more reports available would be helpful.

I have been working with Sophos XG for nearly five years. I started with Cyberoam and then transitioned to Sophos.

The deployment process was smooth. There were trained engineers available, and it was easy for my team to adopt.

The solution has been stable. It's on 24/7 and has consistently been reliable over the years.

I have not had the need to scale, which might be due to having more capacity than needed.

I rely on local vendor support, so I haven't directly engaged with Sophos technical support.

Neutral

Before Sophos, I used Linux-based firewalls that I configured myself. Cyberoam was my first physical firewall, which naturally progressed to Sophos due to cost considerations and local support.

The initial setup was straightforward. It wasn't a lengthy project, and within three days, the deployment was completed.

I did not use a specific project methodology. I followed my regular project plan, which included an initial meeting to kick off the deployment.

I benefit from reduced reliance on specialized IT skills, especially during staff turnover. The graphical interface of Sophos XG simplifies configurations, saving time in support and troubleshooting compared to the Linux-based solution I previously used.

The decision to go with Sophos was influenced by pricing and strong local support.

During my evaluation process, I looked at Cisco and Palo Alto in addition to Cyberoam.

For organizations considering Sophos, it is important to evaluate their network deployment plan, especially if they have a hybrid environment. They should consider if Sophos XG, in its basic deployment, can provide sufficient security or if additional tools are required. I would rate the overall solution an eight out of ten.

On-premises

We use Sophos XG firewall primarily for threat management, including firewall and endpoint equipment protection. We are in the process of upgrading to Sophos XG 33 firewall.

Sophos has greatly improved our network's security posture. In terms of network security and user activity reporting, it has helped us to manage and analyze the activities of the users. From the reporting, we can now see areas where we need improvements, such as blocking certain sites from users.

The most valuable features are its protection capabilities like threat prevention, malware security, web protection, and web security. The security features are very good.

There should be a workaround in case of equipment breakdown, like a stopgap measure while the equipment is being returned or replaced. An improvement in the product's pricing would also be beneficial so that more people can afford it.

We have been using Sophos XG since 2018.

Sophos' technical support is very prompt and efficient. For instance, when our equipment failed to reboot, their team was quick to diagnose and resolve the problem by exchanging the equipment within two weeks.

Positive

We used another firewall before Sophos.

Having a Unified Threat Management system like Sophos XG has helped us spend less on network security, thus providing a good return on investment by managing our income effectively.

The price is reasonable, but if reduced, it could become accessible to more people. Currently, it costs about four million shillings in Kenya.

Before using Sophos, we used another firewall.

Regular prompts from Sophos to the users for instant reporting of any challenges would be very beneficial. Including more YouTube videos, webinars, and other educational content would also help users understand and utilize the product more effectively.

I'd rate the solution nine out of ten.

On-premises