Cisco Secure Firewall vs. SonicWall TZ

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Cisco Secure Firewall
ScoreĀ 8.0Ā outĀ ofĀ 10
N/A
Cisco Secure Firewall delivers comprehensive threat protection for modern, distributed environments. It offers an architecture designed to support hybrid and multicloud strategies, enabling Zero Trust access, robust application visibility, and secure remote work. With integrations across the Cisco Secure portfolio and threat intelligence from Talos, Cisco Secure Firewall helps organizations stop more threats, respond faster, and reduce complexity through centralized management and automation.N/A
SonicWall TZ
ScoreĀ 8.1Ā outĀ ofĀ 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 Details—See 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
7.8
128 Ratings
10% below category average
SonicWall TZ
7.8
15 Ratings
10% below category average
Identification Technologies8.0112 Ratings8.715 Ratings
Visualization Tools7.0113 Ratings8.014 Ratings
Content Inspection7.8110 Ratings8.215 Ratings
Policy-based Controls8.4118 Ratings7.515 Ratings
Active Directory and LDAP8.0101 Ratings6.412 Ratings
Firewall Management Console7.5117 Ratings7.015 Ratings
Reporting and Logging7.5119 Ratings7.214 Ratings
VPN7.9104 Ratings8.215 Ratings
High Availability8.3113 Ratings8.614 Ratings
Stateful Inspection8.3109 Ratings7.814 Ratings
Proxy Server6.958 Ratings7.710 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall TZ
Small Businesses
pfSense
pfSense
ScoreĀ 9.2Ā outĀ ofĀ 10
pfSense
pfSense
ScoreĀ 9.2Ā outĀ ofĀ 10
Medium-sized Companies
Quantum Firewalls and Security Gateways
Quantum Firewalls and Security Gateways
ScoreĀ 9.3Ā outĀ ofĀ 10
Quantum Firewalls and Security Gateways
Quantum Firewalls and Security Gateways
ScoreĀ 9.3Ā outĀ ofĀ 10
Enterprises
Palo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
Palo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
ScoreĀ 9.4Ā outĀ ofĀ 10
Palo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
Palo Alto Networks Virtualized Next-Generation Firewalls - VM Series
ScoreĀ 9.4Ā outĀ ofĀ 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall TZ
Likelihood to Recommend
7.8
(136 ratings)
8.5
(22 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.3
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
9.0
(2 ratings)
7.9
(6 ratings)
Availability
9.1
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
5.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
7.3
(77 ratings)
8.0
(9 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.0
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
8.2
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
5.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Cisco Secure FirewallSonicWall TZ
Likelihood to Recommend
Cisco
Kind of going back to my previous point, segregating networks, it's super useful for that. It's easy to look through firewall logs and see what's going on in your network. Also like intrusion detection and prevention. So great security products for the network.
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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
  • Gives detailed information on what user is utilizing the VPN such as Ip address and the origin of country for the Ip address.
  • The graphical user interface is detailed and organized, a good level of intuition.
  • It provides troubleshooting tools such as packet tracer, that allows individuals to see where the packets are being accepted or dropped.
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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.
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Cons
Cisco
  • I have one argument, failover scenario. It's not quite easy. Failover scenario of firewalls. It's sometimes not quite easy to know the issue. But if we open a tech case, a technical case to Cisco, Cisco will help us, it's a little bit con, but we are happy with this product.
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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
Solution is highly effective, offers a lot of features with constant improvements and additions of new features over time. It's relatively easy to get familiar with the system, especially if transitioning from adaptive security appliances. If this is not the case, as for learnability there's a learning curve but once learned it is relatively easy to remember the details about the system even after a period of non-use
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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
We have had really good success with Cisco Secure Firewall when it comes to availability. Even when we’ve had temporary issues with one appliance or the other, or with the Firewall Management Center, it has stayed up and defended our network diligently. We even had an issue where the licensing got disabled for multiple days, and it kept spinning like a top
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SonicWall
No answers on this topic
Performance
Cisco
no slowing down, vpn is working fast
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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
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SonicWall
No answers on this topic
Scalability
Cisco
you can choose up to 50 devices i think thats enough for our organization
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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
  • I think it's all been positive, except for the fact, like I was mentioning before, when we had problems with the initial integration, we were trying to migrate over to the new FMC and from the 1500 to the 1600, we had some downtime during that time and we had to do some escalations within Cisco Tech. They were very helpful, but I think that was the biggest thing, and that's long since been resolved. So I don't really have any other thing, anything negative to say at this point. I think it's all positive.
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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

SonicWall TZ Screenshots

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