Cisco Secure Firewall vs. SonicWall TZ

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Cisco Secure Firewall
Score 8.2 out of 10
N/A
Cisco 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
SonicWall TZ
Score 8.3 out of 10
N/A
SonicWall TZ is an entry to mid-tier NGFW for small to mid-sized companies. It is a Unified Threat Management solution, with additional native decryption and deep-packet inspection capabilities.
$399
one-time fee
Pricing
Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall TZ
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
SonicWall TZ270 High Availability
$329.60
SonicWall TZ270 (hardware only)
$414.04
SonicWall TZ370 High Availability
$493.04
SonicWall TZ270 Wireless-AC (hardware only)
$502.57
SonicWall TZ370 (hardware only)
$618.34
SonicWall TZ270 TotalSecure - Essential Edition (1 Year)
$689.16
SonicWall TZ370 Wireless-AC (hardware only)
$708.23
SonicWall TZ270 TotalSecure - Advanced Edition (1 Year)
$769.52
SonicWall TZ470 High Availability
$776.33
SonicWall TZ270 Wireless-AC TotalSecure - Essential Edition (1 Year)
$796.76
SonicWall TZ270 Wireless-AC TotalSecure - Advanced Edition (1 Year)
$930.24
SonicWall TZ370 TotalSecure - Essential Edition (1 Year)
$973.82
SonicWall TZ470 (hardware only)
$973.82
SonicWall TZ570 High Availability (HA) Unit
$988.80
SonicWall TZ470 Wireless-AC (hardware only)
$1063.71
SonicWall TZ370 TotalSecure - Advanced Edition (1 Year)
$1085.50
SonicWall TZ370 Wireless-AC TotalSecure - Essential Edition (1 Year)
$1107.29
SonicWall TZ370 Wireless-AC TotalSecure - Advanced Edition (1 Year)
$1232.60
SonicWall TZ570
$1240.77
SonicWall TZ670 High Availability (HA) Unit
$1273.46
SonicWall TZ570 Wireless-AC
$1356.54
SonicWall TZ570 with 8x5 Support (1 Year)
$1450.51
SonicWall TZ570 Wireless-AC with 8x5 Support (1 Year)
$1588.07
SonicWall TZ470 TotalSecure - Essential Edition (1 Year)
$1596.25
SonicWall TZ670
$1596.25
SonicWall TZ470 Wireless-AC TotalSecure - Essential Edition (1 Year)
$1729.72
SonicWall TZ470 TotalSecure - Advanced Edition (1 Year)
$1805.99
SonicWall TZ670 with 8x5 Support (1 Year)
$1867.28
SonicWall TZ470 Wireless-AC TotalSecure - Advanced Edition (1 Year)
$1876.82
SonicWall TZ570 TotalSecure - Essential Edition (1 Year)
$2006.20
SonicWall TZ570 Wireless-AC TotalSecure - Essential Edition (1 Year)
$2192.80
SonicWall TZ570 TotalSecure - Advanced Edition (1 Year)
$2200.97
SonicWall TZ570 Wireless-AC TotalSecure - Advanced Edition (1 Year)
$2442.04
SonicWall TZ670 TotalSecure - Essential Edition (1 Year)
$2574.15
SonicWall TZ670 TotalSecure - Advanced Edition (1 Year)
$2868.34
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall TZ
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsSee pricing link for TZ Series (Gen6) editions. All prices have been converted from pounds. Conversion rates may change.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall TZ
Features
Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall TZ
Firewall
Comparison of Firewall features of Product A and Product B
Cisco Secure Firewall
8.0
139 Ratings
8% below category average
SonicWall TZ
7.9
15 Ratings
9% below category average
Identification Technologies8.3123 Ratings8.815 Ratings
Visualization Tools7.4125 Ratings8.114 Ratings
Content Inspection8.0122 Ratings8.315 Ratings
Policy-based Controls8.5130 Ratings7.715 Ratings
Active Directory and LDAP8.3113 Ratings6.512 Ratings
Firewall Management Console7.6129 Ratings7.115 Ratings
Reporting and Logging7.7131 Ratings7.314 Ratings
VPN8.0116 Ratings8.315 Ratings
High Availability8.6125 Ratings8.714 Ratings
Stateful Inspection8.5121 Ratings7.914 Ratings
Proxy Server7.369 Ratings7.810 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall TZ
Small Businesses
pfSense
pfSense
Score 8.8 out of 10
pfSense
pfSense
Score 8.8 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Quantum Firewalls and Security Gateways
Quantum Firewalls and Security Gateways
Score 9.3 out of 10
Quantum Firewalls and Security Gateways
Quantum Firewalls and Security Gateways
Score 9.3 out of 10
Enterprises
Palo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
Palo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
Score 9.2 out of 10
Palo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
Palo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
Score 9.2 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall TZ
Likelihood to Recommend
7.9
(144 ratings)
9.2
(21 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.5
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
6.4
(3 ratings)
8.0
(6 ratings)
Availability
8.7
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
5.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
7.3
(79 ratings)
8.2
(9 ratings)
Implementation Rating
8.8
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
7.9
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
5.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall TZ
Likelihood to Recommend
Cisco
This security solution is well-suited for a complex environment that requires a scalable and secure solution with granular control. It is also recommended that it be implemented with other Cisco security solutions. Requirements are Security-First. It is less appropriate in a small business scenario where advanced configurations are not required. It should be well-trained on this solution.
Read full review
SonicWall
Based on my experience, this is a solid platform for a small to mid sized company, especially when there is someone who has IT experience, or can get outsourced IT help. I would not recommend for someone who is a technology novice. Also, this is a competent device for someone who is looking to add VPN services for remote workers.
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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.
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SonicWall
  • If you have multiple sites and you want the connect the sites through secure medium this is best firewall for you.
  • There are very advanced features helps you to connect the device easily and securely.
  • Easy to connect the sites through advanced routing protocols.
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.
Read full review
SonicWall
  • There are Service Bundles in SonicWall TZ that are Unlicensed and do not know why they have not be Activated - would need help to further understand benefits
  • Do not know why Standard Support is Unlicensed
  • WiFi range of TZ270W is very limited - need to add Access Points or Extended to obtain adequate coverage
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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.
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SonicWall
No answers on this topic
Usability
Cisco
i think overall after ALOT of tac cases it works allright now. But still have alot of issues if you use cloud based mangement. fx, if you open 2 windows of access policys, both of the pages, rules starte to jump form side to side. if you then open one more list, its start to jump even faster. if you close the 2 of them, its back to normal. ALSO the extended access lists for VPN, SUCKS. Its the tiniest window when opening the editor, and you are not able to give the rules names, Which means finding and editing rules SUCKS, its a horrible experience, and eveytime we have to we want to yell :P
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SonicWall
Overall the new interface is very logical and easy to navigate. We did struggle at first coming from the older interface and finding our way around the new. But our new users found it very simple to find what they were looking for. One negative we do all struggle with is packet cpature not always being clear how its set/what is being monitored. this could do with more information on teh intial page instead of having to look for it
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Reliability and Availability
Cisco
would rate Cisco Secure Firewall’s availability a 9 out of 10.
In our production environments at Rackspace, the platform has been consistently reliable. We’ve deployed it in high-availability pairs, and failover works as expected with minimal disruption. Over the past several quarters, we’ve had no major unplanned outages directly attributable to the firewall itself.
The software has been stable
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SonicWall
No answers on this topic
Performance
Cisco
no slowing down, vpn is working fast
Read full review
SonicWall
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.
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SonicWall
Once you get to a competent technician the support experience is better. But I have found that the lower tiers of support are very slow to respond (like 1 email per day) and you typically have to re-explain yourself a couple times before they get it. I have not used Phone support, and that may be a better experience.
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In-Person Training
Cisco
very good
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SonicWall
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)".
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SonicWall
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.
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SonicWall
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.
Read full review
SonicWall
SonicWall and WatchGuard are both fine appliances, but I am accustomed to the Barracuda NG. The Barracuda Control Center is so powerful and useful that it beats out the other two. SonicWall does a great job of dividing up firewall rules and NAT policies, but this is a preference among engineers.
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Contract Terms and Pricing Model
Cisco
was not involved
Read full review
SonicWall
No answers on this topic
Scalability
Cisco
you can choose up to 50 devices i think thats enough for our organization
Read full review
SonicWall
No answers on this topic
Professional Services
Cisco
was not involved
Read full review
SonicWall
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.
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SonicWall
  • We have three SonicWall TZ devices and they are very helpful in a VPN set up.
  • The subscription costs for the different features has a great return on investment. It is very well worth the money.
  • The antivirus component has been very effective on the computers and servers the SonicWall TZ device protects.
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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

SonicWall TZ Screenshots

Screenshot of the SonicWall TZ 570 applianceScreenshot of the SonicWall TZ 370W appliance