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Cisco Secure Firewall pros and cons

Vendor: Cisco

4.1 out of 5

456 reviews
83% willing to recommend

Pros & Cons summary

Cisco Secure Firewall is reliable, providing continuous protection and seamless integration with other Cisco tools for comprehensive threat defense. While offering advanced security features like IPS, IDS, and VPN capabilities, it enhances organizational efficiency. Users praise its technical support but find adaptation from ASA firewalls challenging. Difficulties exist in navigating logs and cloud integration. Competitors are progressing, and its high licensing costs present challenges for buyers seeking improved capabilities.

Buyer's Guide

Get pricing advice, tips, use cases and valuable features from real users of this product.

Prominent pros & cons

PROS

Cisco Secure Firewall is reliable and stable, with no downtime, ensuring continuous protection for an organization's network infrastructure.

The integration capabilities of Cisco Secure Firewall with other Cisco tools offer comprehensive threat defense and seamless management across different components.

Many users highlight the strong technical support provided by Cisco, rating it highly and asserting its value in maintaining network security.

With advanced security features like IPS, IDS, and DDoS protection, Cisco Secure Firewall effectively guards against various cyber threats while ensuring secure remote access through VPN capabilities.

Cisco Secure Firewall enhances organizational efficiency and security posture through features like AnyConnect, application visibility, traffic monitoring, and the ability to push centralized policies across the network.

CONS

Former ASA firewall users find Cisco Secure Firewall challenging to adapt to its different features and functionalities.

Users experience difficulty navigating logs and locating specific network flows.

Competitors like Palo Alto and Fortinet are moving ahead, surpassing Cisco's capabilities.

Integration with cloud providers and third-party solutions requires improvement.

Licensing complexity and high costs present challenges for users.

Cisco Secure Firewall Pros review quotes

Infrastructure Expert at a tech company with 51-200 employees

Aug 30, 2012

I have never seen such a powerful device which can handle 2 million connections at 20Gbps speed.

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Network Engineer at a university with 51-200 employees

Nov 28, 2012

Cisco delivers a powerful firewall -- it’s not just a firewall but also a modular device that can deliver IPS hosting and wireless LAN controller as well.

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Senior Consultant at Unify Square

Dec 11, 2017

ASA is stable and with a low level of work required on the maintenance side.

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Cisco Secure Firewall

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Learn what your peers think about Cisco Secure Firewall. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: March 2026.

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Manager of Infrastructure at a manufacturing company with 51-200 employees

May 5, 2013

We choose Cisco ASA 5500 Series for our branch office primarily because it is a stable firewall.

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Network Manager at a insurance company with 1,001-5,000 employees

May 6, 2013

In my opinion it is a nice firewall product at a low price and good value for medium and large enterprises.

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DS

Owner at David Strom Inc.

Aug 20, 2017

The user interface of the Prime Security Manager is, well, prime and one of the best pieces of software I have seen from them, and the features are on par if not better than what their competitors offer.

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MZ

Marcelo Zamorano

Middle-Tier Admin Integrator at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

Aug 22, 2016

Customer Service: Excellent Technical Support: Excellent

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RS

Network Security Consultant at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

Aug 23, 2015

Cisco ASA is a reliable product and it benefits you a lot in your network.

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Network Consultant at a tech consulting company with 51-200 employees

Mar 24, 2015

The most valuable features are the IPS and Botnet software modules.

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Senior Network Engineer at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Mar 28, 2015

Firewall rules are easy to understand, and enable or disable.

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Show 10 more reviews (out of 368)

Cisco Secure Firewall Cons review quotes

Infrastructure Expert at a tech company with 51-200 employees

Aug 30, 2012

The product is expensive. A 5580 series costs more than $50000.

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Network Engineer at a university with 51-200 employees

Nov 28, 2012

Latency and delay due to configuration and monitoring of multiple VLANs and traffic.

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Senior Consultant at Unify Square

Dec 11, 2017

You have to know the ASA command line very well because not all operations are available in the graphical interface

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Cisco Secure Firewall

Free Report: Cisco Secure Firewall Reviews and More

Learn what your peers think about Cisco Secure Firewall. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: March 2026.

884,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Manager of Infrastructure at a manufacturing company with 51-200 employees

May 5, 2013

Extraordinary learning curve, especially if you do not have previous skill with Cisco PIX or routers.

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Network Manager at a insurance company with 1,001-5,000 employees

May 6, 2013

When I integrate Cisco ASA with Cisco IPS it creates lots of problem such as an increase in CPU utilization - as a result I have to stop the IPS service.

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DS

Owner at David Strom Inc.

Aug 20, 2017

Prime manager is just for the CX line for now. CX features also add about a 30% overhead on throughput.

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MZ

Marcelo Zamorano

Middle-Tier Admin Integrator at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

Aug 22, 2016

Price maybe...

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RS

Network Security Consultant at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

Aug 23, 2015

It would be great if they would add web filtering functionality to this product.

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Network Consultant at a tech consulting company with 51-200 employees

Mar 24, 2015

Since most features are license based and some licenses are time-based, there should be a way for the device to alert via SNMP that licenses are about to expire.

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Senior Network Engineer at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Mar 28, 2015

The new NAT configuration is difficult to understand especially for people familiar with the pre v8.3 code.

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Show 10 more reviews (out of 368)

Product Categories

Product Categories

Cisco Security Portfolio

Next-Generation Firewall (NGFW)

Firewall Solutions for Enterprises

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Product Categories

Product Categories

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Next-Generation Firewall (NGFW)

Firewall Solutions for Enterprises

Popular Comparisons

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Fortinet FortiGate vs Cisco Secure Firewall

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