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Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) vs Cisco Sourcefire SNORT comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 19, 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

Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS)
Ranking in Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
11th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
69
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Cisco Sourcefire SNORT
Ranking in Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
14th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) category, the mindshare of Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) is 3.5%, up from 2.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Sourcefire SNORT is 3.1%, up from 2.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS)3.5%
Cisco Sourcefire SNORT3.1%
Other93.4%
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer373227 - PeerSpot reviewer
System Engineer at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
Marketing strengths shine but regaining user trust needs significant effort
There are numerous things that could be improved about Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) to get it back on track. Sollution for small branches: when we have to connect a lot very small branches (or sometimes only an ATM) we need something small, with LTE and with reasonable price. Cisco response is SDWAN but it is not always the case. Recently Cisco released some small firewalls but I have not tried them yet. Central management with FMC is a very good idea, but sometimes local management or monitoring is helpfull. With Cisco You have to decide: central or local. You cannot have both. Regarding usability, when you commit configuration on Cisco, it sometimes takes very long. Commits also take some time for the competition, but Cisco is definitely lagging behind the rest in this respect. Last but not least, for me as a professional is lack of CLI. With CLI, I can configure every firewall on the market except Cisco. CLI is very important in professional working, and IMHO it was an unwise decision by Cisco to remove it. Graphical interfaces are very nice, but when you've got thousands of objects in a big installation and have to configure many things, CLI is a much faster way to do it.
reviewer2772102 - PeerSpot reviewer
Cloud Architect at a consultancy with 1-10 employees
Logging and customizable rules have helped improve threat monitoring and detection
The logging is mainly what I consider one of the best features with Cisco Sourcefire SNORT. Being able to log and store it in a file allows you to push it to a centralized repository. The logging and reporting help improve incident response. You should always be logging threats, any sort of misconfiguration, and anything that could be an issue. It's important to at least log and monitor it. The basic rules provide a good baseline in assessing Cisco Sourcefire SNORT's ability in providing real-time analytics for threat detection, but as a professional, you should look to constantly modify that baseline. They provide extensive customizability so you can define your own rules. The customizability allows it to be adaptable in protecting against diverse network threats to the constant change.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"You can do zero-day prevention and detection. It's quite useful."
"In the virtual deployment, you have a couple of choices depending on your needs and how much bandwidth you have that needs to be inspected."
"The IPS functionality is useful if you have offices all over the place. It's nice to have centralized management instead of going to a separate ASA or FirePOWER device."
"I like Firepower's automation, and the security intelligence is a powerful feature."
"I've found the performance and stability to be the most valuable features of Cisco NGIPS. It is scalable as well."
"NGIPS lets you map web requests to a specific user to determine who is downloading files and what they are accessing. You can use it to identify users downloading malware or track time wasters using Facebook or something like that. It gives you visibility into what your users are doing on the Internet."
"We have found the IPS detection to be a very valuable feature of this solution. It is easy to use to stop policy violations."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is its modularity, so whenever you need to upgrade or add another service, you don't need to buy another box."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the filtering."
"It simplifies the configuration process by offering pre-defined base configurations, including security and connectivity settings."
"The whole solution is very good, and stable."
"It has a huge rate of protection. It's has a low level of positives and a huge rate of threat protection. It's easy to deploy and easy to implement. It has an incredible price rate compared to similar solutions."
"The URL filtering is very good and you can create a group for customized URLs."
"The solution is stable."
"In general, the features are all great. However, if I need to take hardware for ASA, because they need to upgrade to Firepower, we want to create rules. For that, most of the time we go to the command line. Right now Firepower is working really hard on the grid. You can apply all those rules to the grid. Even if you want to monitor the logs, for example, the activity will tell you which particular user has been blocked because of that rule. Firepower's monitoring interface is very good, because you can see each and every piece. ASA also had it, but there you needed to type the command and be under the server to see all that stuff. In Firepower you have the possibility to go directly to the firewall. The way the monitoring is displayed is also very nice. The feature I appreciate most in Firepower is actually the grid. The grid has worked very well."
"The tool's most valuable feature is threat detection, which is important because we have multiple layers not only in Cisco."
 

Cons

"There is room for improvement in the policy documentation."
"The price of Cisco NGIPS could improve."
"They could provide one solution to fit all the use cases."
"The onboarding process could be made a little bit better."
"I think that some initiation scripts might be helpful because they would make the configuration easier and more user-friendly for customers."
"The biggest problem with most Cisco products is that the interface is lagging behind the competition. The user interface could be updated and improved."
"The feedback from some of our customers is that they weren't interested in Cisco because it was too complicated to deploy, especially in cloud-related areas."
"In the next release I would like to see better reporting. I also find it's hard to act on the data it gives you."
"We are unhappy with technical support for this solution, and it is not as professional as what we typically expect from Cisco."
"If the price is brought down then everybody will be happy."
"Integration with other components — even Cisco's own products — can be enhanced to improve administrative experience."
"There are problems setting up VPNs for some regions."
"The cloud can be improved."
"The main dashboard of Cisco Sourcefire SNORT could improve."
"I would like to have analytics included in the suite."
"With the next release, I would like to see some PBR, so that you can do the configuration with the features."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"This is a very affordable product."
"The weakness of Cisco Firepower is the cost. Some of the customers see it as very expensive."
"We get cut in price since we use other Cisco products. We have the whole bundle of Cisco solutions."
"The price of the solution is expensive to a degree it cannot be used by small businesses. It is best suited for medium and enterprise businesses."
"There is a license required to use Cisco NGIPS and it can be a one or three-year license."
"It is highly priced but competitive regarding features and support services."
"I would rate the pricing four out of 10."
"The cost of the license depends on the level of support that you have with Cisco."
"If one is an extremely expensive product, and ten is cheap, I rate the tool's price as a five."
"I don't know the exact amount, but most of the time when I go to a company with a proposition, they will say, "This thing that you are selling is good, but it's expensive. Why don't you propose something like FortiGate, Check Point, or Palo Alto?" Cisco device are expensive compared to other devices."
"Licensing for this solution is paid on a yearly basis."
"The cost is per port and can be expensive but it does include training and support for three years."
"We have a three-year license for this solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
University
10%
Educational Organization
9%
Performing Arts
7%
University
13%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business27
Midsize Enterprise16
Large Enterprise27
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise7
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco NGIPS?
The product's initial setup phase was easy.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco NGIPS?
Cisco is one of the top brands known for cost-effectiveness, making it worth the money. It's cheaper to integrate with existing IT security solutions compared to other expensive brands with subscri...
What needs improvement with Cisco NGIPS?
There are numerous things that could be improved about Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) to get it back on track. Sollution for small branches: when we have to connect a lot very small branches (or sometime...
What do you like most about Cisco Sourcefire SNORT?
The product is inexpensive compared to leading brands such as Palo Alto or Fortinet.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Sourcefire SNORT?
If one is an extremely expensive product, and ten is cheap, I rate the tool's price as a five. There are some other tools in the market that are more expensive than Cisco. There are no additional c...
What needs improvement with Cisco Sourcefire SNORT?
I have not had much experience with the community-driven rule set while utilizing Cisco Sourcefire SNORT. I don't have experience with recognizing zero-day vulnerabilities, but based on my knowledg...
 

Also Known As

Sourcefire NGIPS, Firepower NGIPS
Sourcefire SNORT
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

American Electric Power, Huntington Bank, Keycorp, Nationwide, Transunion, Marriott, Inova Health, Ford, Thomson Reuters, Dow Chemical, Equifax, Chevron, Walmart, Coca Cola
CareCore, City of Biel, Dimension Data, LightEdge, Lone Star College System, National Rugby League, Port Aventura, Smart City Networks, Telecom Italia, The Department of Education in Western Australia
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure IPS (NGIPS) vs. Cisco Sourcefire SNORT and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,082 professionals have used our research since 2012.