Azure Firewall Manager vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud comparison

Azure Firewall Manager and Microsoft Defender for Cloud are both solutions in the Microsoft Security Suite category. Azure Firewall Manager is ranked #28 with an average rating of 9.3, while Microsoft Defender for Cloud is ranked #7 with an average rating of 8.1. Azure Firewall Manager holds a 0.6% mindshare in Microsoft Security Suite, compared to Microsoft Defender for Cloud’s 6.1% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Azure Firewall Manager users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 94% of Microsoft Defender for Cloud users who would recommend it.

Azure Firewall Manager

Read 8 Azure Firewall Manager reviews

861 Views
327 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Read 78 Microsoft Defender for Cloud reviews

21,544 Views
4,309 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

Azure Firewall Manager

Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Azure Firewall Manager and Microsoft Defender for Cloud based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Microsoft Security Suite solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed Azure Firewall Manager vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Azure Firewall Manager vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud

July 2025

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Helped 865,295 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Azure Firewall Manager

Ranking in Microsoft Security Suite

28th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Firewall Security Management (12th)

Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Ranking in Microsoft Security Suite

7th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Vulnerability Management (7th), Container Management (8th), Container Security (7th), Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (1st), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (4th), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (4th), Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (5th), Compliance Management (5th)

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Microsoft Security Suite category, the mindshare of Azure Firewall Manager is 0.6%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is 6.1%, down from 9.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Microsoft Security Suite

Featured Reviews

MuhammadShakeel

Senior System Engineer at Confiz Solutions

Manages multiple firewalls effortlessly but faces challenges with cost efficiency

Azure Firewall Manager is good most of the time, but it could be improved regarding cost. The cost is a significant concern because we are in a region where the dollar is not our default currency, and converting to dollars makes it very expensive. Microsoft should calculate and show the products in local currencies, such as PKR or Bangladesh currency, and also introduce Indian currency similarly for Pakistan. The technical support could be improved. When a resource is assigned, that resource should follow the ticket and respond swiftly, including sending an email to inform me that an agent has been assigned. I still find myself waiting for an agent to connect with me and resolve my issues. I have not been integrating Azure Firewall Manager with Azure Virtual WAN.

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Vibhor Goel

Senior Cloud Platform Engineer at Deutsche Börse

A single tool for complete visibility and addressing security gaps

Currently, issues are structured in Microsoft Defender for Cloud at severity levels of high, critical, or warning, but these severity levels are not always right. For example, Microsoft might consider a port being open as critical, but that might not be the case for our company. Similarly, it might suggest closing some management ports, but you might need them to be able to log in, so the severity levels for certain things can be improved. Even though Microsoft Defender for Cloud provides a way to temporarily disable certain alerts or notifications without affecting our security score, it would be better to have more granularized control over these recommendations. Currently, we cannot even disable certain alerts or notifications. There should be an automated mechanism to design Azure policies based on the recommendations, possibly with AI integration. Instead of an engineer having to write a policy to fix security gaps, which is very time-consuming, there should be an inbuilt capability to auto-remediate everything and have proper control in place. Additionally, enabling Defender for Cloud at the resource group level, rather than only at the subscription level, would be beneficial.

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Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The best feature of Azure Firewall Manager is that it is easy to maintain and configure."

"The tool's support is good."

"The solution is very easy to set up."

"Azure Firewall Manager centralizes network security management with a hub and spoke architecture."

"The most valuable feature of Azure Firewall Manager is the testing and configuration."

"The solution has improved our organization with its firewall."

"We are utilizing Azure Entra ID for group labeling, so Active Directory, or now it is Entra ID, securing our application for everyone who accesses it, and Azure Firewall Manager is definitely securing our projects and all its features are fine."

"It is easy to install and does not require any plugins for your browser."

More Azure Firewall Manager pros

"The most valuable feature is the hunting feature, which integrates well into the entire Microsoft ecosystem."

"Everything is built into Azure, and if we go for cross-cloud development with Azure Arc, we can use most of the features. While it's possible to deploy and convert third-party applications, it is difficult to maintain, whereas Azure deployments to the cloud are always easier. Also, Microsoft is a big company, so they always provide enough support, and we trust the Microsoft brand."

"Microsoft Defender for Cloud has significantly enhanced our overall security posture by approximately 20 to 25 percent."

"Defender for Cloud is a plug-and-play solution that provides continuous posture management once enabled."

"The most valuable feature is that it's intuitive. It's very intuitive."

"The security alerts and correlated alerts are most valuable. It correlates the logs and gives us correlated alerts, which can be fed into any security information and event management (SIEM) tool. It is an analyzed correlation tool for monitoring security. It gives us alerts when there is any kind of unauthorized access, or when there is any malfunctioning in multifactor authentication (MFA). If our Azure is connected with Azure Security Center, we get to know what types of authentication are happening in our infra."

"Microsoft Defender for Cloud has definitely helped us manage and secure our multi-cloud environment by providing ease of use."

"The most valuable feature is the hunting feature, which integrates well into the entire Microsoft ecosystem."

More Microsoft Defender for Cloud pros

Cons

"For Azure Firewall Manager, the learning curve for new people is a bit challenging, but the integration should be more straightforward for configuring a centralized system."

"The price is okay. This said, the solution is certainly expensive in comparison with other cloud services."

"We could do only one-way NAT-ing, where the traffic comes from outside to internal, to Azure, which is fine. However, when we actually do NAT-ed traffic to hit the firewall, that way is not working."

"There should be a simple one-click deployment for a firewall, rather than a set of setup instructions that include steps such as the DNS configuration, et cetera."

"The configuration and settings require substantial time for learning, particularly for new users. Improvements in ease of configuration would benefit users significantly."

"The tool's security features need to improve. It needs also to include a monitoring system for logs. It is also complicated to find a query on the Azure firewall."

"The cost is a significant concern because we are in a region where the dollar is not our default currency, and converting to dollars makes it very expensive."

"The solution can improve the integration with open-source tools."

More Azure Firewall Manager cons

"Although Microsoft Defender for Cloud is based on security, I wish it went beyond providing assessments, reports, and generic steps. More detailed procedures would be helpful, especially for lower-level support staff."

"Microsoft Defender for Cloud is not compatible with Linux machines."

"Support needs to be highly responsive, especially in large enterprise environments."

"If a customer is already using Okta as an SSO in its entire environment, they will want to continue with it. But Security Center doesn't understand that and keeps making recommendations. It would help if it let us resolve a recommendation, even if it is not implemented."

"The user interface of Microsoft Defender for Cloud, like many Microsoft portals, undergoes frequent changes and feature relocation."

"Microsoft Graph needs improvement."

"There are challenges with the licensing policies, which are quite complicated."

"It's hard to reach someone who understands my problems. I haven't had many issues, so I haven't called them."

More Microsoft Defender for Cloud cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of the solution is reasonable but it is reasonable for the features."

"The solution is certainly expensive in comparison with other cloud services."

"I am not involved much with the pricing but the bundle offering is good."

"The solution is expensive, and I rate it a five to six out of ten."

"The pricing model for most plans is generally good, but the cost of the new Defender for Storage plan is high and should be revisited, as it could lead to disabling desirable security features due to cost."

"Our clients complain about the cost of Microsoft Defender for Cloud."

"I am not involved in this area. However, I believe its price is okay because even small customers are using Azure Security Center. I don't think it is very expensive."

"The cost is fair. There aren't any costs in addition to the standard licensing fee."

"Pricing depends on your workload size, but it is very cheap. If you're talking about virtual machines, it is $5 or something for each machine, which is minimal. If you go for some agent-based solution for every virtual machine, then you need to pay the same thing or more than that. For an on-premises solution like this, we were paying around $30 to $50 based on size. With Defender, Microsoft doesn't bother about the size. You pay based on the number of machines. So, if you have 10 virtual machines, and 10 virtual machines are being monitored, you are paying based on that rather than the size of the virtual machine. Thus, you are paying for the number of units rather than paying for the size of your units."

"It is bundled with our enterprise subscription, which makes it easy to go for it. It is available by default, and there is no extra cost for using the standard features."

More Microsoft Defender for Cloud pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

21%

Computer Software Company

18%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Computer Software Company

13%

Financial Services Firm

13%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Azure Firewall Manager?

The most valuable feature of Azure Firewall Manager is the testing and configuration.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Firewall Manager?

The pricing for Azure Firewall Manager seems okay compared to its good features. Although extra expenses are incurred for additional services, these are not directly related to the firewall, and th...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Azure Firewall Manager?

See all answers

How is Prisma Cloud vs Azure Security Center for security?

Azure Security Center is very easy to use, integrates well, and gives very good visibility on what is happening across your ecosystem. It also has great remote workforce capabilities and supports a...

See all answers

What do you like most about Microsoft Defender for Cloud?

The entire Defender Suite is tightly coupled, integrated, and collaborative.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Defender for Cloud?

The pricing is pretty standard.

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 33% of the time

FortiGate Cloud-Native Firewall (FortiGate CNF) vs Azure Firewall Manager

Compared 27% of the time

Palo Alto Networks Panorama vs Azure Firewall Manager

Compared 13% of the time

AlgoSec vs Azure Firewall Manager

Compared 11% of the time

AWS Firewall Manager vs Azure Firewall Manager

Compared 9% of the time

More Azure Firewall Manager Competitors

AWS GuardDuty vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Compared 25% of the time

Wiz vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Compared 12% of the time

Prisma Cloud by Palo Alto Networks vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Compared 8% of the time

Microsoft Defender XDR vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Compared 5% of the time

Orca Security vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Compared 3% of the time

More Microsoft Defender for Cloud Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Azure Firewall Manager

August 2025

Download Azure Firewall Manager product report

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Defender for Cloud

August 2025

Download Microsoft Defender for Cloud product report

Also Known As

No data available

Microsoft Azure Security Center, Azure Security Center, Microsoft ASC, Azure Defender

Interactive Demo

Demo not available

Microsoft

Overview

Azure Firewall Manager is a security management service that provides central security policy and route management for cloud-based security perimeters.

To learn more about our solution, ask questions, and share feedback, join our Microsoft Security, Compliance and Identity Community.

Microsoft

Microsoft Defender for Cloud is a comprehensive security solution that provides advanced threat protection for cloud workloads. It offers real-time visibility into the security posture of cloud environments, enabling organizations to quickly identify and respond to potential threats. With its advanced machine learning capabilities, Microsoft Defender for Cloud can detect and block sophisticated attacks, including zero-day exploits and fileless malware.

The solution also provides automated remediation capabilities, allowing security teams to quickly and easily respond to security incidents. With Microsoft Defender for Cloud, organizations can ensure the security and compliance of their cloud workloads, while reducing the burden on their security teams.

Microsoft

Sample Customers

Information Not Available

Microsoft Defender for Cloud is trusted by companies such as ASOS, Vatenfall, SWC Technology Partners, and more.

Buyer's Guide

Azure Firewall Manager vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud

July 2025

Free Report: Azure Firewall Manager vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Find out what your peers are saying about Azure Firewall Manager vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.

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