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it_user1196163 - PeerSpot reviewer
General Manager at a mining and metals company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Feb 3, 2021
Good web filtering features, stable, and scalable, but the security could be improved
Pros and Cons
  • "The most valuable features of this solution are the Web Filtering and the APT."
  • "The most valuable features of this solution are the Web Filtering and the APT."
  • "If the security issues are taken care of it would be better."
  • "The detection of wireless attacks or targeted attacks reports many false rates. This is an area that needs some improvement."

What is our primary use case?

We use Cisco Umbrella in our clients' companies.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable features of this solution are the Web Filtering and the APT. The APT is something that I find to be very good in Cisco.

What needs improvement?

The detection of wireless attacks or targeted attacks reports many false rates. This is an area that needs some improvement.

It should be more specific. This can help the customers to know the exact incident details.

The intel logs and the incident proactive security incidents for targeted attacks are also something that needs to be improved.

If the security issues are taken care of it would be better.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been working with Cisco Umbrella for two years.

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Cisco Umbrella
May 2026
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What do I think about the stability of the solution?

This solution is stable. There are no issues with stability.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It's a scalable solution.

How are customer service and support?

I am not managing this area. I have not contacted technical support.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We have worked with Forcepoint and vScaler.

I would recommend vScaler. On the Cloud front, the product is quite stable, and it is easy to manage.

vScaler and Cisco Umbrella are comparable.

How was the initial setup?

I was not a part of the installation and deployment.

I have not received any complaints, it appears that it was seamless.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The price could be lower.

What other advice do I have?

The web filtering works well. On the endpoint, the implementation should be properly planned, meticulously planned, to avoid missing any configuration that could cause major issues.

I would rate Cisco Umbrella a seven out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
reviewer1411335 - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Presales Consultant : Cisco Security at a computer software company with 201-500 employees
Reseller
Sep 15, 2020
Segmenting email and web proxy features stand out but missing pieces leave holes to be filled
Pros and Cons
  • "Helps block personal email accounts."
  • "Web proxy adds an effective layer for security."
  • "I had worked for Juniper support before and I worked for other tech support teams and I feel that Cisco's type of support is the best."
  • "Missing a real data leakage prevention solution."
  • "Data reporting could be improved."
  • "Data reporting is something I would like to see improved."

What is our primary use case?

Cisco has its own cloud that they manage Umbrella on. So Umbrella is not like any part of AWS or Azure or GPP. Our use case for Umbrella all depends on our customer's requirements. Cisco Umbrella has many packages to help address these requirements. The current package which we are working on incorporating more is Cisco Umbrella SIG, which is the Secure Internet Gateway. It has just been launched as part of Umbrella and we are currently exploring its capabilities and utility for our clients.  

There are a lot of use cases for Umbrella, and for us those use cases include the following:  

  • One of the more important use cases for clients is using the product as a web proxy.  
  • A second thing would be a situation where a customer wants to block access to an employee's personal email account and allow only corporate email accounts.  
  • A third would be the cloud-delivered firewall. This would cover a situation where a customer would create a tunnel between their on-prem firewall to the Cisco Umbrella cloud. This would make it so that all the traffic is filtered by the Cisco Cloud Firewall.  
  • We use it to support our MDM (Mobile Device Management) integration. Umbrella can be integrated with various MDM products, like AirWatch and MobileIron, and that category of products.  
  • Umbrella supports family integrations. So we can search for information from AWS or Azure-based clouds and we can create family-based policies using Umbrella.  
  • Umbrella provides support for some features of Kaspersky. For example, it can tell you what all apps are running on the endpoints and it can give you granular control over those apps.  

These are only a few of the use cases which I think are most important for us and our clients at this time when using Umbrella.  

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature which I found in Umbrella is the segmentation of personal accounts from corporate accounts. In order to work with this, Umbrella has a feature where we add the ID of the customer's Gmail account or the Azure account. That ID is then used as a filter to separate access so that only corporate Gmail will be accessible and it can block personal accounts.  

The second very valuable feature is the web proxy part which is effective in determining if a feed may be malicious.  

What needs improvement?

Data reporting is something I would like to see improved.  

Cisco is currently rolling out data centers for this type of solution. Currently, they do not have data centers everywhere. For example, they do have one in Singapore but they do not have one in India. My clients are in India and they find an issue of slowness in the services from the Singapore data center. Cisco is working on building a data center in India to address the issue but information about the completion of that project are lacking details.  

In the next release of Cisco Umbrella, I would like to see a DLP solution. That could be a feature someone can addon. But it should be a real Data Leakage Prevention solution to more securely handle the data.  

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been working with Umbrella for around three years now.  

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

This product is stable and it is very easy also to scale up.  

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Usually, a product is really designed for small, medium, or big companies. I think Umbrella is good to serve any size customer. The range could start from 200 users and then you have an interface that can handle anywhere up to 5,000 to 6,000 users. I think anything is possible with Umbrella as far as scaling usage because of the package and licensing options.  

If you want to increase the number of users you just have to inform Cisco to tell them to increase the seat count on Umbrella. We can renew our licenses to be in compliance with the Cisco licensing policy.  

How are customer service and technical support?

I had worked for Juniper support before and I worked for other tech support teams and I feel that Cisco's type of support is the best. The response time has been right on and then they isolate all of the issues. It is the best product support I have seen in a long time.  

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is very simple, you can set up Umbrella within two minutes I would say. You just have to point the DNS to Umbrella and that is it. So it is very easy to deploy and set up.  

Actually, I am from the research team. We make the solution requirements, then the product moves on to the process team. Once I have made a solution, then the product team takes care of rolling out the implementation.  

As this solution is a public cloud solution, there is very little maintenance which the customer has left to do. The setup is relatively easy and it is very good for the client.  

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The licensing part for Umbrella is really flexible. If a customer purchases a thousand licenses, and if at any point the customer overshoots the available license count, Umbrella would not stop working for the additional users. Cisco would be informed that there is an attempt at overconsumption of the licenses and they would inform the customers that their license count has been increased. It will do this automatically. The customer can take action to renew those licenses. So it is flexible.  

There are three models for licensing. There is the Cisco Umbrella essential plan, then you have the advantage plan, and then they have the plan including SID. Every license comes with a different feature set.  

What other advice do I have?

The advice that I would give someone looking at the Umbrella solution is that they can evaluate Umbrella because it is very easy to set up. You can get started discovering the product and do a little to check it out. They should make sure that all their use cases are covered by Umbrella.  

On a scale from one to ten (where one is the worst and ten is the best), I would rate Cisco Umbrella as somewhere between a seven-point-five to eight, personally. But I will give it a seven overall.  

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud

If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

Other
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer. Distributor
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Cisco Umbrella
May 2026
Learn what your peers think about Cisco Umbrella. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2026.
893,244 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Chief Executive Officer at Cynexlink, LLC
Real User
Aug 6, 2020
Before it lets you go, it filters and gives you the okay to move forward with the website you're looking for
Pros and Cons
  • "It's very stable, reliable and does its job."
  • "We use Cisco Umbrella for web security and it's very good."
  • "It has happened in the past that Cisco Umbrella has denied us access to secure websites."
  • "In the past, Cisco Umbrella has denied us access to secure websites."

What is our primary use case?

We use Cisco Umbrella for web security and it's very good. It acts as web filtration combined with security and I am very supportive of it, especially with cybersecurity trending these days and the amount of malware and spyware out there. It's important for end-users to have some sort of protection when they're browsing the internet and this product does that. Before it lets you go, it filters and gives you the okay to move forward with the website you're looking for. A lot of customers tend to make typos when they're searching for websites, which then leads them to unknown websites that automatically download malware to their computer — now they're infected. That's why you need web security. 

We currently have about 1500 endpoints under Cisco Umbrella, but of course, we plan to increase our numbers. We offer Cisco Umbrella in our packages so whenever we get new customers on board, they get it. 

What needs improvement?

In the past, Cisco Umbrella has denied us access to secure websites. I haven't seen it lately, but they have blocked different legitimate websites. However, they have good tools that allow you to refresh and verify whether a website is legitimate or not. They have so many servers across the United States and even globally. I believe that it helps you to identify a website. 

In other words, the solution is good, we like it and we've been using it. We have a big customer of about 1,200 users and they're happy. The only thing I am not happy with is Cisco themselves. Not because of a technical or support issue, but because a division of Cisco poached one of my clients, stole them from me, which is completely unethical. When I talked to our account managers about it, they said there was nothing they could do about it because it was a different department. I said, "What do you mean different departments? This is my client and you guys went and provided them with a solution that I am already providing them?" So, that was a big deal for me. 

Also, I think Cisco Umbrella has an automatic push feature, which is the automated updating agent, but if I am wrong, they should get it.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using Cisco Umbrella for roughly five years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

We have been using Cisco Umbrella for three years; it's very stable, reliable and does its job. We experience minor hiccups here and there, but it's nothing that our team cannot handle, and if for some reason they cannot, then they can always reach out to customer support.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Cisco Umbrella is very scalable. You can do anything and it's very useful for MSP. It's basically a single window that allows us to manage different servers and different clients. That's the beauty of it, no more logging in and out for different clients, which is nice.

How are customer service and technical support?

For me personally, I consider Cisco to offer premier support. Currently, due to COVID-19, we cannot call them now for obvious reasons, but prior to COVID-19, Cisco support was one of the best, especially in regards to Umbrella. Honestly, we almost never have to contact them. I don't recall having to contact them even once over the last year or so.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

For web filtration, we tried Websense before but now I believe the cloud solution is the way to go, it's much better. We had a customer and they needed to have different layers of protection, especially today with cybersecurity, and open DNS is one of them. I believe it's mandatory that you must have some sort of defense because it's is up in the air, there may be other solutions, but something needs to protect you from going to the wrong websites.

How was the initial setup?

They have different setups. For example, you can integrate with the Cisco Firewall and I believe you can integrate with any platform with an agent, on each device. So, it really depends on how comfortable you feel with the setup. If you need to get more information and analytics, I believe it says the agent is the best way to go. The agent gives you every machine: for example, what has been blocked? What kind of security breaches have been attempted? Open DNS has defended this particular endpoint, but there are definitely many flexible, different integration methods to integrate a solution.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I am not sure, I don't have the numbers in front of me, but I think it's $1.00 or so per device/month.

What other advice do I have?

I like this product and I'd really recommend it to everyone. Obviously, it's not the only product out there, but today, every endpoint should have multiple layers of security. You need to protect your users when they are browsing—open DNS. You need to protect them from emails, both inbound and outbound and you need to protect the endpoint from breaching. 

I would rate Cisco Umbrella a nine out of ten.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer. Partner
PeerSpot user
John Okunade - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Support Engineer at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Real User
Jun 10, 2022
A cloud-delivered security solution with a useful DNS layer security feature
Pros and Cons
  • "I like the DNS layer security."
  • "Cisco Umbrella has improved our organization in the sense that we have more users working from home because of the pandemic."
  • "It would be better if there was a little bit of flexibility for organizations that don't have SD One in their environment. Because of the complexity of the environment, it's not easy to actually turn on the feature of the secure internet gateway for our users. We have not been able to explore that option yet."
  • "It would be better if there was a little bit of flexibility for organizations that don't have SD One in their environment. Because of the complexity of the environment, it's not easy to actually turn on the feature of the secure internet gateway for our users."

What is our primary use case?

We are using Cisco Umbrella temporarily for DNS security, but we want to migrate to secure the internet gateway, which is what we are working on at the moment.

How has it helped my organization?

Cisco Umbrella has improved our organization in the sense that we have more users working from home because of the pandemic. We have a lot of users working outside of the office. 

Cisco Umbrella helps secure our environment more because we've deployed some of our applications to the cloud. Our 365 team applications are running on the cloud. Cisco Umbrella helps protect us by guiding threats in external parameters. 

It's been helpful for us in the sense that we can see and guide what is coming into the enterprise using Cisco Umbrella in the cloud. This is good for users that are working outside of the office environment and working from other remote locations.

What is most valuable?

I like the DNS layer security.

What needs improvement?

It would be better if there was a little bit of flexibility for organizations that don't have SD One in their environment. Because of the complexity of the environment, it's not easy to actually turn on the feature of the secure internet gateway for our users. We have not been able to explore that option yet.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Cisco Umbrella for almost six months.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

For stability, I will give it 30%

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Scalability is okay. I think it has that functionality. Depending on the perspective of the environment, you can scale to any capacity you want because this is a cloud solution. 

How are customer service and support?

Technical support is okay. 

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We had issues with our traditional secure web gateway. Our environment is not entirely SD One supported yet. We had problems with the SWG device for dot com users. We got advice from Cisco that Cisco data can do the same functionality for that. So, we'll be using it.

We were using Broadcom as our secure web, but we had issues with the number of connections that it could handle. That's the setback, and that's why we're opting for the Cisco umbrella solution.

We have a partnership with a company here, and we have a partnership with Cisco. Most of our appliances in the environment are Cisco products, and we felt that going for a product from them would serve our data. We didn't look at other products.

How was the initial setup?

This solution was deployed across different locations for different users. 
We have six remote locations, and we have two data centers. It's deployed across all of those locations.

What other advice do I have?

I would encourage potential users to go for it.

On a scale from one to ten, I would give Cisco Umbrella an eight.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
John Okunade - PeerSpot reviewer
John OkunadeNetwork Support Engineer at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Real User

The introduction of Cisco umbrella into our infrastructure was a tremendous change. It has helped to protect the infrastructure better. Because every traffic exiting to the internet is now being filtered. Also combined with Cisco WSA for web proxy, it is a good one.

Cyber Security Consultant at flydubai
Real User
Apr 14, 2022
A good cloud-based solution for DNS security, but its on-prem rollout is quite challenging
Pros and Cons
  • "It is a good cloud-based solution for DNS security."
  • "It is a good cloud-based solution for DNS security."
  • "Its on-prem rollout is quite challenging. It needs better coordination with the Internet Service Provider. It is a cloud-based solution, and any endpoint that connects to it has to go through all the gateway ISPs, but some of the ISPs block HTTPS-based DNS. That's where the challenge occurs with Umbrella."
  • "Its on-prem rollout is quite challenging. It needs better coordination with the Internet Service Provider."

What is most valuable?

It is a good cloud-based solution for DNS security.

What needs improvement?

Its on-prem rollout is quite challenging. It needs better coordination with the Internet Service Provider. It is a cloud-based solution, and any endpoint that connects to it has to go through all the gateway ISPs, but some of the ISPs block HTTPS-based DNS. That's where the challenge occurs with Umbrella.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using this solution for almost two years.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Its scalability is good.

How are customer service and support?

I have not interacted with them because it is done through the vendor.

What other advice do I have?

They need to engage the local service provider to do the technology improvements, such as for HTTPS-based DNS, which is a primary requirement for the customers.

I would rate it a seven out of ten.

Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
PeerSpot user
Director at seamlessinfotech.com
Real User
Aug 9, 2021
A cloud security service with valuable data and intelligence built-in
Pros and Cons
  • "I like that it integrates with the infrastructure. I also like the kind of data and intelligence that's built-in. It helps create innovative reports for security."
  • "I like that it integrates with the infrastructure, and I also like the kind of data and intelligence that's built-in, as it helps create innovative reports for security."
  • "It could be more secure. It would be better if they provided a transferring proxy as an add-on and more integration."
  • "It could be more secure. It would be better if they provided a transferring proxy as an add-on and more integration."

What is our primary use case?

We use Cisco Umbrella for monitoring and more.

What is most valuable?

I like that it integrates with the infrastructure. I also like the kind of data and intelligence that's built-in. It helps create innovative reports for security. 

What needs improvement?

It could be more secure. It would be better if they provided a transferring proxy as an add-on and more integration.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been dealing with Cisco Umbrella for two and a half years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Cisco Umbrella is a stable solution.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Cisco Umbrella is very scalable at the cloud level. All you have to do is increase the internet bandwidth and pay for the license. 

How are customer service and technical support?

Technical support is excellent.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was pretty straightforward. It was simple. 

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The price depends on the use case, and it's a bit linear. But it depends on the customer's strategy and how Cisco plans to optimize the costs. 

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend this solution to potential users.

On a scale from one to ten, I would give Cisco Umbrella a ten.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer. Partner
PeerSpot user
General Manager at Datasoft Comnet
Real User
Top 10
Jun 6, 2021
A stable cloud-delivered security solution with a useful DNS security feature
Pros and Cons
  • "We like Cisco Umbrella because of DNS security. It's one step ahead of whatever we are using for regular web filtering. In that way, it's more secure than other web filtering products."
  • "We like Cisco Umbrella because of DNS security; it's one step ahead of whatever we are using for regular web filtering, and in that way, it's more secure than other web filtering products."
  • "The price could be better. The price is definitely a bit high, but we have to pay a premium for Cisco products."
  • "Cisco Umbrella is expensive and could be cheaper."

What is most valuable?

We like Cisco Umbrella because of DNS security. It's one step ahead of whatever we are using for regular web filtering. In that way, it's more secure than other web filtering products.

What needs improvement?

The price could be better. The price is definitely a bit high, but we have to pay a premium for Cisco products. 

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Cisco Umbrella for more than a year.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It's a stable product.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Cisco Umbrella is scalable.

How are customer service and technical support?

Technical support is helpful and provides quick and fast resolutions.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is very easy. Even the integrations are very easy.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Cisco Umbrella is expensive and could be cheaper.

What other advice do I have?

I will recommend this product to other users.

On a scale from one to ten, I would give Cisco Umbrella a ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer. Partner
PeerSpot user
it_user1563006 - PeerSpot reviewer
Consultant at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Consultant
Apr 30, 2021
Can be used to provide more security when employees are working from home
Pros and Cons
  • "I think recently with many people working from home, Cisco Umbrella has been very useful. For example, we can manage the device and the network when the employee is not working on the local host. Cisco Umbrella is very valuable for this kind of infrastructure."
  • "I think recently with many people working from home, Cisco Umbrella has been very useful, for example, we can manage the device and the network when the employee is not working on the local host, and Cisco Umbrella is very valuable for this kind of infrastructure."
  • "I think it's a very basic solution, and because of that, Cisco Umbrella would not be a suitable solution for large companies."
  • "I think it's a very basic solution, and because of that, we provide it to the small business market."

What is our primary use case?

The customers that we provide this solution to are small businesses that have 10 to 25 employees.

Employees working from home normally don't have security, so through the cloud we can manage the devices, the endpoints, a mobile or notebook, etc. We can provide more security for these devices when the employee is not working on VPN, for example.

What is most valuable?

I think recently with many people working from home, Cisco Umbrella has been very useful. For example, we can manage the device and the network when the employee is not working on the local host. Cisco Umbrella is very valuable for this kind of infrastructure.

What needs improvement?

I think it's a very basic solution, and because of that, we provide it to the small business market. Cisco Umbrella would not be a suitable solution for large companies.

In the next release, integration or shoulder, for example, to a firewall on-premises using Cisco Umbrella to connect would be good. If possible, it would be good to take the weight off the shoulder of the solutions.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been working with Cisco Umbrella for around one year.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Our customers have not had any problems with stability.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The scalability of Cisco Umbrella is very good.

How are customer service and technical support?

When we had problems, technical support was 100% helpful, so I think it is very good.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is very simple. We usually have one engineer per customer for deployment and maintenance.

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend this solution to small businesses. Compared to the next-generation firewall, I think Cisco Umbrella is more basic than other solutions.

I would rate it at nine on a scale from one to ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer. Partner
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Cisco Umbrella Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
Updated: May 2026
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Cisco Umbrella Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.