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Cisco Secure Client (including AnyConnect) vs Netskope Private Access comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

iboss
Sponsored
Ranking in ZTNA as a Service
8th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (6th), Internet Security (3rd), Web Content Filtering (1st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (7th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (8th)
Cisco Secure Client (includ...
Ranking in ZTNA as a Service
12th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
78
Ranking in other categories
SSL VPN (3rd), Enterprise Infrastructure VPN (8th), Cisco Security Portfolio (5th)
Netskope Private Access
Ranking in ZTNA as a Service
13th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
17
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the ZTNA as a Service category, the mindshare of iboss is 3.2%, up from 1.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Secure Client (including AnyConnect) is 3.1%, down from 3.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Netskope Private Access is 3.0%, down from 5.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
ZTNA as a Service Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
iboss3.2%
Cisco Secure Client (including AnyConnect)3.1%
Netskope Private Access3.0%
Other90.7%
ZTNA as a Service
 

Featured Reviews

Ashok Ananthula - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Consultant Proxy Engineering at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
Cloud gateway has strengthened remote web security and now needs better Mac and ISP support
The problem our organization had is that iboss failed for the Mac devices. It is not able to give a successful agent for the Mac agents. That is where in 2025, we had to migrate to the Palo Alto-based platform. If your use case is for just Windows laptops,you can consider this platform as an option One issue is the data center resiliency part. In India especially, they are not tied up with the Tier 1 ISPs like Tata or Airtel; they were having Tier 2 ISPs and encountered many issues reaching few major sites that my organization depends on, and they were having problems that they could not fix quickly. They also lack a mechanism to route that traffic within their data center; rather, they ask customers to make a pac file change to route it to Singapore explicitly. It would be better if they route from their backend , i mean even if I send it to India DC, they should be able to route it internally to make that work; however, they fail to do that and ask the customer to route it in the pac file. Another suggestion is that in China, they do not have the proper setup; they used to have numerous problems with slowness and lack of premium circuits in China as well. That leads to multiple sites working slowly with latency-related issues. So the main issue is the ISP-related problems that need to be solved.
AS
Manager - Projects at airtel
Offers work-from-anywhere flexibility but navigates occasional proxy confusion
The analytics I downloaded from your site as a free download did not carry the information that was actually required. I was looking at the market segmentation and market share, along with some USPs which differentiated them from each other. The free download had two issues: many things were repetitive, and it was designed to not release any relevant information. Only headers were present, so I was not able to determine whether the final report would be worthwhile. I have not worked with enterprise tools that I could share feedback on for website publication. I see benefits from using Cisco Secure Client (including AnyConnect). However, I would not recommend it because future adoptions will be towards Zscaler, as SSC is a better model than VPN. On a scale of 1-10, I rate this solution a 7.
Prathamesh Samant - PeerSpot reviewer
Presales Manager at a manufacturing company with 201-500 employees
Has ensured secure remote access through real-time device checks and policy controls
There is a mixed review on the integration part of Netskope Private Access. Wherever they have out-of-the-box support, it is quite easy to integrate. Wherever customization is needed, it depends on the openness of the application being integrated with. If the other application has an open architecture where you have easy API integrations, then it becomes easier. However, in some cases, it is a tedious task to do the integration where the application is not that open or it is not supported out-of-the-box from Netskope. They can introduce the DLP feature for Netskope Private Access. Zscaler has that DLP feature. It is in their roadmap, but currently, they don't have it. If they have data protection or data loss prevention within their NPA, that would be a significant advantage.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Because of iboss, I did not have to assign web filtering tasks to my techs on a daily basis."
"First of all, the security policies are essential. I do not have to rely solely on Active Directory for our users."
"We chose iboss for both zero trust and proxy (SWG) because their SWG was superior."
"Granular setup, which was able to set different levels of filters using the OUs in the AD."
"iboss is pretty scalable. They provide good support. The case managers you work with to coordinate what you need are pretty good."
"The security aspect of the solution, particularly the malware behind it, is excellent."
"This product is solid, fairly easy to use, and reliable."
"From a corporate perspective, I understand that it's important to keep the company data safe."
"It's fairly easy to set up."
"The solution is quite stable."
"Given that we work from home, the value of the solution is the ability to connect to the VPN remotely."
"This solution is stable. There have been no technical issues."
"I like that it is really easy to use, it's a simple product, and it can connect remotely with a secure network."
"Configuration policy, posture assessment, and other things can be done in great detail."
"Configuration policy, posture assessment, and other things can be done in great detail."
"On Cisco's side, the Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) story is quite valuable."
"The base features have been fantastic. The ability to be able to granularly assign application access to end-users has been really good."
"In the VPN scenario, what was happening, the user would get back to the complete source. But in NPA, the application will go to the user. There is an outbound connection. There is no inbound. Storage providers are also not there. It's the best feature because it is the replacement of the VPN."
"There are several valuable features, like advanced security protections, especially the DLP (Data Loss Protection), and there's also browser and web filtering, or content filtering for our users to protect them when accessing certain links or websites, ensuring their security and permission."
"Netskope enables users to securely access private applications remotely without a VPN."
"The most valuable feature is being able to see who is accessing the application, whether it is a managed device or a bring-your-own-device published by Netskope."
"It is a stable solution."
"They do one software or one platform; they are the leading CASBY platform in the world, and what they can do, nobody can do."
"With private access or next-gen VPN, they are able to keep you secure, but they are invisible in terms of how they do it. Anybody working from home and trying to bring up VPN quickly can pretty much get VPN up and running in a matter of minutes because this doesn't require any VPN technology on-prem. All the VPN technologies that you're using to access applications on-premise can be eliminated by using their software. If you're accessing Microsoft 365 or salesforce.com, you can go straight out from your home office or home internet to that application rather than having to come through a VPN. It still has all the policies enforced, and it mitigates any business risks in terms of how that user is accessing that application and what they're doing inside of it. VPN piece is really critical, especially at this time of Covid, and your latency also goes down. Your latency gets better by using the platform because they're intercepting your traffic, routing it through their local data center, and then sending it to whichever SaaS service or whatever you're going to. It does it better, faster, and quicker with all your governance policies enforced, rather than you having to go through your data center. So, all the traffic gets hauls there, and then that traffic has got to route somewhere else, and then it has got to go up to the cloud. Your latency actually goes down. They can guarantee 15 milliseconds or less pretty much across anywhere on the planet for about 95% or 90% of it."
 

Cons

"The dashboards for local use could be better."
"The solution could be stronger on the integration side and offer more cloud applications like G Suite or Oracle."
"The problem our organization had is that iboss failed for the Mac devices; it is not able to give a successful agent for the Mac agents, and that is where in 2025 we had to migrate to the Palo Alto-based platform."
"The area I would like to see improvement in is the ability within the reporter to navigate directly to the content the user is traversing."
"File integrity monitoring would be very advantageous as an additional feature."
"The dashboards for local use could be better."
"Our biggest problem with their service was it did not recognize the device and filtering did not always work correctly."
"Sometimes the agent stops working in iboss, and we have to reinstall the agent."
"In general, it's always a good idea to improve scalability and stability."
"The support could be more proactive in their recommendations. I noticed that the Cisco support agents tend to leave customers to do what they need to do in many ways, and you can choose how you want to do it. However, it would be great if they could proactively be involved in best practices and let other customers know how most people are doing it."
"I think that the addition of single sign-on functionality would be helpful."
"The interface could be a little more modern looking and it would be nice for other users if it had easier integration."
"There are times the WiFi connectivity has disruptions and you have disconnections. It doesn't work with two connections. I have two switches back and forth sometimes. It doesn't have a failback scenario feature. However, on the gateway side, it does, but on the user device, it doesn't have that kind of option. It would be nice to have this feature."
"Sometimes if we're always having some network issues, or maybe the client is having some network issues, we might get disconnected."
"In the next release, Cisco should add a chat feature."
"We'd like the product to be cheaper."
"Netskope Private Access could improve by enhancing visibility of user performance and application performance. It should also integrate wider DLP and inspection engines on private access traffic."
"Netskope Private Access allows mapping only one DNS server. If a user uses a secondary DNS on-premises, Netskope fails to disconnect them. This is an issue that needs to be addressed."
"The major problem that we are facing is if we deploy Netskope on the server level or if we get a new server in the EMEA factor, it will affect all the machines. Recently, this has caused us to fail some reviews."
"The main challenge we are facing across various Trust Network Access (TNA) technologies, including Netskope, is their inability to support broadcast applications or those relying on broadcasting protocols."
"I would like to see them go down the path of including SD-WAN. Currently, they don't do SD-WAN."
"Netskope needs to provide some kind of data protection strategy as well because, currently, if you connect through private access, we don't have any data protection policies or implementation."
"Netskope Private Access only supports TCP and UDP ports and does not support ICMP or ping."
"I would like to see them go down the path of including SD-WAN. Currently, they don't do SD-WAN. If they could somehow natively do that inside of the platform, that would be amazing. I don't know if they're going to do it, but it would be amazing if they do."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is probably in line with other solutions, but I do not deal with the financial side."
"It is expensive compared to one of its competitors."
"We had the cost of purchasing a new appliance along with the implementation and licensing costs. However, the following year, the cost of just licensing was similar to what was paid the previous year for a new appliance along with the implementation and licensing costs."
"The overall pricing for iboss is very competitive and transparent."
"It is not expensive, and it is also not cheap. iboss is priced right in the sweet spot for the number of features it offers."
"We have not priced the solution recently, but they were competitive with other vendors in the past."
"We have yearly licensing and it's very affordable."
"It is not a free solution and the user needs to buy license."
"I would rate the pricing for the license of Cisco AnyConnect Secure Mobility Client around four to five out of ten. It's not the cheapest option, but it's also not overly expensive."
"One thing I've noticed is the price in comparison to other VPNs."
"The price is okay."
"The solution is based on an annual licensing model and is expensive."
"I am using a paid version of Cisco AnyConnect Secure Mobility Client."
"The pricing depends on the requirement, so proper planning and an RF analysis help to properly size the solution and get the best pricing."
"It is not cheap, but the value of the solution is there. It's worth the investment."
"It is significantly cost-effective compared to its contenders."
"There was about 60% ROI, just in terms of savings. We had 40% to 60% reduction in monthly operational costs by using Netskope."
"The pricing of the solution is cheap."
"I believe that the price for Netskope Private Access is included in the features or functionality my company purchased from NetSkope."
"When it comes to pricing, Netskope Private Access is relatively cheap compared to other solutions."
"The tool's price is normal. It is not very cheap but good compared to the competitors."
"It is not the most expensive option, being more affordable than Zscaler, but it's also not the most budget-friendly choice available."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Construction Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Insurance Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business27
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise46
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise9
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with iboss?
The problem our organization had is that iboss failed for the Mac devices. It is not able to give a successful agent ...
What is your primary use case for iboss?
We used iBoss mainly for Internet Access by having an Agent on Windows laptops Primarily because when we try to use i...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for iboss?
I am not involved in pricing, but as per the information I have, during that time, the Blue Coat proxies we were usin...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco AnyConnect Secure Mobility Client?
Cisco Secure Client (including AnyConnect) is somewhat expensive compared to others such as Fortinet or Palo Alto, wh...
What needs improvement with Cisco AnyConnect Secure Mobility Client?
Cisco Secure Client (including AnyConnect) can be made better, as the product for me has not changed in the last year...
What is your primary use case for Cisco AnyConnect Secure Mobility Client?
Cisco Secure Client (including AnyConnect) is used to make a VPN connection to work, specifically for a VPN and inter...
What needs improvement with Netskope Private Access?
There is a mixed review on the integration part of Netskope Private Access. Wherever they have out-of-the-box support...
What is your primary use case for Netskope Private Access?
For secure remote access for people who are working out of the office, remotely, or traveling, my clients mostly use ...
What advice do you have for others considering Netskope Private Access?
I work with a system integrator, and nowadays, we have all these solutions in our portfolio for our customers. At tha...
 

Also Known As

iBoss Cloud Platform
Cisco AnyConnect Secure Mobility Client
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

More than 4,000 global enterprises trust the iboss Cloud Platform to support their modern workforces, including a large number of Fortune 50 companies.
MST, Molina Healthcare, Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers, Arup, New South Wales Rural FireService
Evalueserve, Stroock, Apria, Ather Energy
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Client (including AnyConnect) vs. Netskope Private Access and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
893,244 professionals have used our research since 2012.