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BigFix vs Symantec Endpoint Security comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 9, 2024

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

BigFix
Ranking in Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
26th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
97
Ranking in other categories
Configuration Management (6th), Patch Management (3rd), Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) (4th)
Symantec Endpoint Security
Ranking in Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
13th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
145
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) category, the mindshare of BigFix is 1.2%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Endpoint Security is 3.8%, down from 4.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
 

Featured Reviews

Bella Yakoby - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers third-party patching feature, good scalability, and enhance endpoint management capabilities
From the perspective of the team that's handling the environment, it's not so user-friendly compared to other solutions, the competitors. We hire new teams from time to time, and they are complaining, look, although BigFix is very robust and cross-platform, it's not so fun to work with. The user interface for the technical teams is not so advanced. It's not so intuitive compared to SCCM, compared to ManageEngine. And this is the fact that they have, with the teams, because they have the rejection. The look and feel of the system are old-fashioned. For new employees, it's less easy to find someone I don't need to educate on how to work with BigFix. Although it's easy, it's not as intuitive as the other solutions, and the functionality of the other solutions is less advanced. Let's summarize: The user interface has to be changed from the perspective of the teams that are managing the product. It's old school.
Kumbesh Rajagopal - PeerSpot reviewer
Management becomes easier with minimal complications, but improvement in support tools needed
Regarding areas of improvement for Symantec Endpoint Security, there are many changes, and the support portal tool is complicated compared to other tools. When trying to get service from Symantec, the process is complex. I'm not sure whether it's because of my project or something else. Though it is easy to manage, easy to get, easy to install, and works efficiently for managing policies, we faced a significant disadvantage. We wanted to add multiple hashes because of numerous new alerts coming, but we could only add them one by one, which is a considerable disadvantage in Symantec.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Prior to BigFix we used Altiris, which was distributed. We had to manage multiple servers, and duplicate the tasks that we did on each server. BigFix tremendously reduced the amount of work that we had to do on each server in a centralized manner. We could minimize the work that we had to do, and we had a lot more control over the tasks and what machines they ran on."
"I recommend BigFix to others."
"I think BigFix is a very good solution, and I rate it ten out of ten."
"The tool's most valuable features are patching and integration with vulnerability scanners."
"Before we had BigFix, we had problems with some malware. BigFix allows us to immediately patch all instances of endpoints that were vulnerable to antivirus and initiate scans. That's key."
"Vulnerability scanning and patch automation."
"Patch Management for a variety of operating systems makes it valuable as we can rely on a single tool for obtaining patch compliance of the entire compute infrastructure."
"The most valuable feature is patch management, a must have, even for Linux and iOS."
"With Symantec, I always know this tool will be reliable and with the latest protection."
"What I like most about Symantec is the intrusion detection module. If you are scanning the environment, it will flag a possible intruder and tell you the IP and where the attack is coming from. Traditional antivirus solutions will never flag that. If you have a traditional SIEM, you might be able to pick that up. Symantec is a holistic endpoint security solution, so when you scan an endpoint, Symantec will let you know that something is happening to it."
"We are using it on 1,600 computers. All the systems and servers are protected with the Symantec solution. Our environment has an uptime of 99.9% because we never had any attack or issue related to viruses. There is zero downtime."
"Symantec has cloud-based endpoint protection, so whether a user is off the network or on the network, the endpoint will be protected by the cloud."
"The solution can be scaled to handle different threats."
"The pricing is pretty good."
"The product has valuable features for insights."
"Symantec Endpoint Security is easy to use, fast, and good for small and medium-sized businesses."
 

Cons

"While performing integration, we face many issues with IBM solution. We need detailed information about those issues that can help users to mitigate them."
"Maybe the online help could be improved. It'd be nice if you would have a lot more phrases and keywords that you could search for and find answers with the help."
"They don't have a proper mobile device management capability. They're working on it, however, that's the one thing that needs improvement so that you can have full unified endpoint management."
"The new EDR (Endpoint Detection and Response) feature, Detect, is new and still needs a few updates."
"BigFix could improve its asset management capabilities to discover assets, including hardware."
"The tool should be more friendly in terms of Web UI and should be having better vulnerability scanning mechanisms so a third-party application is not required to fulfill that aspect."
"One aspect that could be improved is the speed of the console. Sometimes it can be slow, which is something that needs to be addressed."
"The self-service application seems to need some work to replace the client UI. There are a lot of pop-ups if you use a baseline as the object that you're setting to a workstation. Unless you're using web UI, the message is not customizable in the user notification."
"The platform itself can be improved as there's no way to track how infections get into the organization."
"This latest version has proven unreliable for management and installation."
"The monitoring capabilities could be further developed."
"It's not cheap."
"They are lacking the visibility that you get in a heuristical, next-generation AI product."
"The detection and response can always be improved."
"We were having a problem in Version 14, where the client machines used to go into the health state and once it restarted, and never came back again."
"Multi-domain policy options for exceptions and global blocks."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"So, the pricing is slightly more expensive than the others. I have to keep buying licenses every time I add a new device."
"The price is reasonable, but our customers find it expensive."
"The price of BigFix is better than the solutions. You are able to pay monthly or annually. There are not any hidden costs with BigFix. There is an additional cost for the SQL database."
"I can estimate the reduced cost of servers maintenance to approximatively $500,000."
"It is too costly. It is one of the best tools, but because of pricing, not all clients support it. Its licensing is on a yearly basis."
"I would stay with the Managed Virtual Server license model, which is a 1-to-1 license per OS whether it is virtual or physical."
"The tool's price continues to go up. The cost per endpoint can vary, ranging from approximately 30 to 80 dollars per year. Compared to other products, pricing is in the middle. You need to buy an additional database license, but most users already have it."
"You get what we call the Platform Edition, which you get for free. The patch service is maybe $0.50 per workstation per month. Then there's the basic server cost, which is about $1.50 per server per month. You also get into Lifecycle which does power management, OSD remote control, and those types of things, and that might be about 10 times the price - which works out to about $13 per server and, maybe $5 per workstation per month."
"The licensing costs are huge compared to what is normally included in the licensing with other products such as the Microsoft products that we're using. We're paying between $300 and $400 per seat."
"We have some customers on a one-year license and others on a three-year license."
"The pricing is good, very moderate, and the licensing is also good. It gives you more room to install a lot of endpoints and it even gives you the opportunity to install it on your mobile phone without any extra cost."
"There is a yearly license."
"Pricing and licensing for our country is very good. It's not that expensive and the endpoint security is very good. It's not as cheap as some others, but they are not as good."
"It provides a good solution at a good price."
"Its price should be reasonable."
"Pricing and licensing are important to us when choosing a product."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about BigFix?
The most valuable features of the solution are Windows patching and the hardware and software inventory.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for BigFix?
The pricing is competitive, but not the most competitive.
What needs improvement with BigFix?
While performing integration, we face many issues with IBM solution. We need detailed information about those issues that can help users to mitigate them. The problem was related to the hardware co...
Which is better - Cortex XDR or Symantec End-User Endpoint Security?
Aqua Security is easy to use and very manageable. Its main focus is on Kubernetes and Docker. Security is a very valuable feature and their speed of integration is very good. The initial setup was ...
Which offers better endpoint security - Symantec or Microsoft Defender?
We use Symantec because we do not use MS Enterprise products, but in my opinion, Microsoft Defender is a superior solution. Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is a cloud-delivered endpoint security s...
What do you like most about Symantec End-User Endpoint Security?
Symantec have everything – documentation, videos, data sheets.
 

Also Known As

Tivoli Endpoint Manager
Symantec EPP, Symantec Endpoint Protection (SEP)
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

US Foods, Penn State, St Vincent's Health US Foods, Sabadell Bank, SunTrust, Australia Sydney, Stemac, Capgemini, WNS Global Services, Jebsen & Jessen, CenterBeam, Strauss, Christian Hospital Centre, Brit Insurance, Career Education Corporation
Audio Visual Dynamics, Red Deer Advocate, Asia Pacific Telecom Co. Ltd., Kibbutz Ein Gedi, and AMETEK, Inc.
Find out what your peers are saying about BigFix vs. Symantec Endpoint Security and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.