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Cisco Secure Firewall vs. Palo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Cisco Secure Firewall

    Score8.4 out of 10
    N/ACisco Secure Firewall delivers comprehensive threat protection for modern, distributed networks. Built to support hybrid workforces and multicloud environments, it enables Zero Trust access, application visibility, and secure remote connectivity. With integration across the Cisco Secure portfolio, including SecureX and Talos threat intelligence, the firewall powers organizations to detect and stop more sophisticated threats. Centralized management simplifies policy enforcement, orchestration,…N/A

    Palo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series

    Score10 out of 10
    N/AThe VM-Series is a virtualized form of Palo Alto next-generation firewall that can be deployed in a range of cloud environments. The VM-Series natively analyzes all traffic in a single pass to determine the application identity, the content within, and the user identity.N/A
    Pricing
    Cisco Secure FirewallPalo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Cisco Secure FirewallPalo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
    Free Trial
    YesNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Cisco Secure FirewallPalo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
    Considered Both Products
    Cisco
    Chose Cisco Secure Firewall
    Good
    Incentivized
    Chose Cisco Secure Firewall
    Cisco Firepower NGFW is much more user friendly than its competitors and their customer service is top notch. It was a no brainer in choosing a company that has the backing to help provide a great product and service to its customers. Cisco Firepower NGFW is easy to use, easy …
    Incentivized
    Palo Alto Networks
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Would buy again
    7 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    7 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    7 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    7 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    No answers on this topic
    86%
    Implementation went as expected
    6 Answers
    Features
    Cisco Secure FirewallPalo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
    Firewall
    Comparison of Firewall features of Cisco Secure Firewall and Palo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
    Feature
    Cisco Secure Firewall
    7.9
    79 Ratings
    9% below category average
    Palo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
    9.5
    6 Ratings
    10% above category average
    Identification Technologies8.168 Ratings9.76 Ratings
    Visualization Tools7.072 Ratings9.56 Ratings
    Content Inspection8.371 Ratings10.06 Ratings
    Policy-based Controls8.876 Ratings9.56 Ratings
    Active Directory and LDAP8.865 Ratings9.56 Ratings
    Firewall Management Console8.274 Ratings9.46 Ratings
    Reporting and Logging7.275 Ratings9.36 Ratings
    VPN7.665 Ratings9.26 Ratings
    High Availability8.571 Ratings8.85 Ratings
    Stateful Inspection7.870 Ratings10.06 Ratings
    Proxy Server6.741 Ratings9.44 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Cisco Secure FirewallPalo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
    Small Businesses
    SonicWall NSA Series
    Score8.5 out of 10
    SonicWall NSA Series
    Score8.5 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Barracuda CloudGen Firewall
    Score9.4 out of 10
    Barracuda CloudGen Firewall
    Score9.4 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software
    Score9 out of 10
    Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software
    Score9 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Cisco Secure FirewallPalo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.1
    (84 ratings)
    9.5
    (8 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    7.2
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Usability
    9.0
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Availability
    9.1
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Performance
    5.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Support Rating
    7.6
    (35 ratings)
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    5.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Cisco Secure FirewallPalo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Cisco
    The software offers advanced firewall solutions from Web threats management to behavioural analytics and comprehensive application security. Cisco Secure firewall software is incredibly easy to deploy and implement. Customer support services providers are concise and very responsive. Integration and customization of the software are exceptional. The product boasts impressive capabilities, enabling it to stop threats and manage all security flaws in real time.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Palo Alto Networks
    PaloAlto VM-200 is a virtualized firewall with high processing power and network edge protection. The great advantage is being able to implement in a VMware environment without worrying about hardware, rack space, physical network connections and others. It can be easily managed via the web and remotely to create protection, access and reporting rules. The VM-200 firewall can be used by any company, small or large because it has several models available according to the real needs of each one.
    Incentivized
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    Pros
    Cisco
    • It's good at segregating networks and ensuring that you only give the access that you need to give. Especially with medical devices, you want to only give the access that they need and keep them in their own separate areas so that they can't just communicate with the rest of the network. It's also good at the border for keeping attackers out of the network.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Palo Alto Networks
    • Decrypt internet traffic
    • daily reporting of top internet users
    • classify internet traffic in real-time to allow us to understand the organization needs.
    • Strong AI capabilities
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Cisco
    • I wish that the deployment of the updates to the sensors from the FMC was faster.
    • Cisco ASA firewall did a great job of authentication and authorization on the local firewall. FTD does not authorize users well in terms that an AAA must be setup to provide the granular tools that the ASA did.
    • Cisco's method of licensing the firewall can be improved. The FMC and the FTD are licensed through the Cisco software manager and there are instances where the devices are licensed but the firewall still displays and error due to licensing.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Palo Alto Networks
    • High Availability can be improved to allow active-active deployment
    • All command line documentation to provide and support automation
    • It will be nice to have link aggregation just like in the hardware firewall models.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Cisco
    It works really well. We can do most anything we want or need to with it, and you don’t have to have a doctorate or multiple certs to necessarily figure it out. The thing that would probably have to happen to make us switch would be if we just got priced out - Cisco’s more powerful and higher bandwidth models cost a pretty penny.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Palo Alto Networks
    No answers on this topic
    Usability
    Cisco
    The platform is powerful and feature-rich, especially when paired with tools like Firepower Management Center (FMC) and SecureX. The policy structure is logical, and the visibility into traffic flows, threat activity, and rule hits is quite strong once you're familiar with the interface
    Incentivized
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    Palo Alto Networks
    It is very easy to use, even for those with little experience in this particular firewall. Some of the advanced content filtering and content-based policies are difficult to pick up; however, almost all required decoders are built in. Built-in logging and rule testing make rule definition easy, and labels/tags allow filtering, grouping, and categorisation of rules. Updates are easy, and high availability is also reliable.
    Incentivized
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    Reliability and Availability
    Cisco
    As for the availability, in general we did not experience any issues with it, neither in situations where there's only one physical device implemented nor when there's and High Availability pair. Failover works like a charm, no complaints here, it works as it should and so far it has been highly reliable.
    Incentivized
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    Palo Alto Networks
    No answers on this topic
    Performance
    Cisco
    no slowing down, vpn is working fast
    Incentivized
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    Palo Alto Networks
    No answers on this topic
    Support Rating
    Cisco
    Firewall support is professional just like any other technology Cisco sells. From answering simple questions to bringing out outages affecting a large population of our workforce, Cisco support is always courteous, professional, and communicates with our team to keep our request on their radar. Some of the brightest people I've met are from Cisco support both in IQ and EQ which shows the talent Cisco is able to onboard to their team.
    Incentivized
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    Palo Alto Networks
    Palo Alto VM series are best selling and industry's top-selling security product which customers prefer while securing their public cloud environment
    Incentivized
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    In-Person Training
    Cisco
    very good
    Incentivized
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    Palo Alto Networks
    No answers on this topic
    Online Training
    Cisco
    was a good training but questions was answered not so good. Training was "Fundamentals of Cisco Firewall Threat Defense and Intrusion Prevention (SFWIPF)".
    Incentivized
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    Palo Alto Networks
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation Rating
    Cisco
    Our initial implementation was aided by Cisco's professional services and was excellent. The engineer was very knowledgeable and helped us work through issues while building out our new internet security edge Part of this involved tools to migrate the firewall configuration from old to new.
    Incentivized
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    Palo Alto Networks
    No answers on this topic
    Alternatives Considered
    Cisco
    Cisco Secure Firewall works better with the Cisco ecosystem when we can utilize it and feels beefy enough when we utilize it in the data center. The Fortinet we have found are great, small cost boxes for remote offices with a better UI then Cisco Secure Firewalls. The feature set included with the firewalls feels similar from a security point of view.
    Incentivized
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    Palo Alto Networks
    palo alto firewalls are application-oriented systems. They can beat other product which are based on layer 3/4 inspection. Vm series are also quickly available and could be useful in urgent deployment needs . other vendors like Fortinet and cisco could take much more time to provide the VM and in some cases installation and license validation are complicated
    Incentivized
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    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    Cisco
    was not involved
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Palo Alto Networks
    No answers on this topic
    Scalability
    Cisco
    you can choose up to 50 devices i think thats enough for our organization
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Palo Alto Networks
    No answers on this topic
    Professional Services
    Cisco
    was not involved
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Palo Alto Networks
    No answers on this topic
    Return on Investment
    Cisco
    • Positive impact. Cisco is a big player in IT environment. It is future stuff, everything, what you learn today, maybe something can be tomorrow. And yes, it's quite important to learn the new stuff every day. And yes, that's it. Yes, I'm happy with Cisco.
    Incentivized
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    Palo Alto Networks
    • ROI has been achieved quickly through lack of security incidents.
    • Inline filtering happens at line rate, unline Sourcefire from Cisco.
    • Great incentives from PAN to switch made a difference in the choice to change.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    Cisco Secure Firewall Screenshots

    Screenshot of Cisco Secure 1200 Series Firewall FamilyScreenshot of Cisco Secure 4200 SeriesScreenshot of Cisco Secure 4200 SeriesScreenshot of Cisco Secure Firewall 1200 Stack FamilyScreenshot of Cisco Secure Firewall 200 SeriesScreenshot of Cisco Secure Firewall 200 Series