We performed a comparison between Netgate pfSense and Zscaler Internet Access based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out in this report how the two Firewalls solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI."The wireless control is helpful."
"Fortigate is very scalable to serve our customers' needs. We have scaled already from fifty to more than a hundred instances of Fortinet FortiGate. Around 20 staff are required for deployment and maintenance, mostly engineers."
"The solution is scalable."
"Fortinet FortiGate's most valuable features are ease of use, flexibility, and most of the configuration we can be done using the GUI. When we compare Fortinet FortiGate with other solutions the firewall policy are very easy to understand."
"Some of the valuable features are the firewall, IPS, web filter, and gateway capabilities. Additionally, it is easy to use and flexible."
"Our security improved from being able to put in rules and close off unwanted traffic."
"It is useful for protecting and segregating the internal networks from the internet. Most of our customers also use the FortiGate client to connect to their offices by using the VPN client, and of course, they usually activate the antivirus, deep inspection, and intrusion prevention services. They are also using it for web filtering and implementing various policies dealing with forwardings, NAT, etc."
"The main reason why I purchased the particular unit was that it had good reviews and what other people were saying as far as its completeness and its leading capabilities in terms of endpoint security was very good."
"Its features rival many of the high cost solutions out there."
"There is good documentation with a fantastic community and enterprise support."
"What I like about pfSense is that it works well and runs on an inexpensive appliance."
"The gain in performance and security from configuring the VPN connections was significant."
"pfSense allows us to spread the hours of connection and do the filtering on the pfSense site."
"Is good at blocking IP addresses."
"The intrusion detection feature is the most valuable. It is an open-source firewall, so there is a lot of material on it. I also find the open VPN capability very nice. It is pretty customizable. The clustering and the high availability are the two biggest things to be able to get out of a firewall."
"The product’s documentation is good."
"Zscaler Internet Access protects using data loss prevention. If you have a CASB exposing your cloud out into the network, then Zscaler Internet Access will go ahead and control that unknown cloud application in the CASB, protecting it. There is also data detection with exact data match. This improves the data coming into your cloud so you are protecting it."
"The data loss prevention feature is the most valuable. It stops our users from inadvertently leaking our customers' data to the Internet or anywhere else it shouldn't go."
"The most valuable features I found in Zscaler Internet Access are the restriction of users for a particular URL, the security feature related to stopping DDoS, and the VPN."
"We don't have to buy equipment to use it. And when our engineers set it up on our side, we just configured a few settings and we were in."
"I like the granularity of the control of all the traffic, including SSL inspection. I also like the fact that the user interface is intuitive. The latencies with Zscaler are minimal compared to those of any other competitor. Other competitors do not really have the global scale that Zscaler has and cannot promise low latencies."
"For our needs, the cloud-native proxy architecture is a very good solution. We are moving away from on-prem appliances and moving more toward cloud-based solutions. Zscaler is a good fit for our strategy. This architecture helps with cyber threats because we inspect most of the traffic and we can see that a lot of threats are stopped directly in the secure web gateway."
"Tech support is good."
"The VPN is valuable, as the whole technology is very different from a traditional VPN."
"You do need some IT knowledge in order to effectively work with the solution."
"There is one big configuration file with no separations for the unique VDOMs. Maybe they could separate individual VDOM configuration files with the root VDOM configuration file referencing the individual VDOM config files."
"The solution is very expensive."
"FortiGate is really good. We have been using it for quite some time. Initially, when we started off, we had around 70 plus devices of FortiGate, but then Check Point and Palo Alto took over the place. From the product perspective, there are no issues, but from the account perspective, we have had issues. Fortinet's presence in our company is very less. I don't see any Fortinet account managers talking to us, and that presence has diluted in the last two and a half or three years. We have close to 1,500 firewalls. Out of these, 60% of firewalls are from Palo Alto, and a few firewalls are from Check Point. FortiGate firewalls are very less now. It is not because of the product; it is because of the relationship. I don't think they had a good relationship with us, and there was some kind of disconnect for a very long time. The relationship between their accounts team and my leadership team seems to be the reason for phasing out FortiGate."
"The cloud management and automation capability could be improved."
"I think they need to improve more in order to be a competitor with the leaders of the field."
"In the balance between links feature normally you can just choose one option to balance. It would be better for the solution to have more than one option, preferably three."
"They need faster serviceability and more security features."
"Their support could be better in terms of the response time."
"The GUI could use more “bells and whistles”. It's got plenty of info for a Sysadmin but some people like shiny things."
"Also, simplifying the rules for the GeoIP. Making it simpler to understand would be an improvement."
"I would like to see multiple DNS servers running on individual interfaces."
"The technical support needs to be improved."
"If you want to take advantage of all of the solution's options, you need to have a bit of a technical background. It's not for a layperson."
"The hotspot and the portal feature in this solution are not stable for WiFi access. We use it at least once or twice every day and it crashes. Some modules can be better by improving detection and having new updates. Additionally, we have some issues with clustering and load balancing that could improve."
"There's a bit of a learning curve during the initial implementation."
"In terms of usage, here in the GCC, it's still growing a growing market, so the combination of DLP, data leak prevention, to a certain extent is fine. But what it requires is user-based access or role-based access. The solution needs to grow into that, which definitely takes time. There's not an easy way to integrate it, when you have a cloud-based solution."
"Do not expect to pay for the service and start using it, like Gmail. Zscaler requires a proper implementation to be done to make it successful."
"The solution can be improved by advancing some of the newer technologies such as the DLP feature, and adding email security."
"The price of the solution could be improved."
"What could be improved in Zscaler Internet Access is its price. It could be cheaper."
"Zscaler Internet Access could improve by adding a VPN feature."
"There are a few features that are not compatible with the Azure cloud."
"In every cloud service in the world, you have multiple upstream internet providers to create diversity so that if one of your providers fails, your network just continues. In South Africa, there is only one upstream provider, and that's not right. That that's a problem."
Netgate pfSense is ranked 1st in Firewalls with 128 reviews while Zscaler Internet Access is ranked 2nd in Secure Web Gateways (SWG) with 46 reviews. Netgate pfSense is rated 8.6, while Zscaler Internet Access is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Netgate pfSense writes "User-friendly, easy to manage the firewall, rule-wise and interface-wise". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Zscaler Internet Access writes "Provides integrated CASB and file sandboxing but could be less expensive ". Netgate pfSense is most compared with OPNsense, Sophos XG, KerioControl, Sophos UTM and Cisco Secure Firewall, whereas Zscaler Internet Access is most compared with Cisco Umbrella, Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps, Netskope , Prisma Access by Palo Alto Networks and Appgate SDP. See our Netgate pfSense vs. Zscaler Internet Access report.
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