No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Cisco Secure Workload vs Illumio Segmentation comparison

Why PeerSpot?
Sponsored
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 2026

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

Qualys TotalCloud
Sponsored
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
8th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (11th), Container Security (11th), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (8th), SaaS Security Posture Management (SSPM) (2nd), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (7th)
Cisco Secure Workload
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
18th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
Cloud and Data Center Security (8th), Microsegmentation Software (4th), Cisco Security Portfolio (8th)
Illumio Segmentation
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
11th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
5.7
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
Cloud and Data Center Security (4th), Microsegmentation Software (1st)
 

Featured Reviews

RO
IT Security Expert at Alior Bank S.A.
Unified risk scoring has improved our cloud visibility and simplifies remediation priorities
Qualys TotalCloud provides unified vulnerability and threat assessment across both IAS and SaaS. This solution provides a single prioritized view of risk, which helps reduce the work I would have to do. We are no longer based on CVSS; we are based on Qualys risk scoring, which is based on CVSS plus internal findings made by Qualys, and then assigns its own score. The TruRisk insight feature has found a small number of assets with high vulnerability scores, though I am cautious since some information is classified. Qualys TotalCloud has positively impacted our bank's performance, and we have definitely seen benefits after implementing this solution.
Raj Metkar - PeerSpot reviewer
Director, Head of Networks at MUFG, EMEA
Discover internal application dependencies and create a dependency map
We actively seek improvements in integrating the Infoblox DDI platform with Cisco Secure Workload. This integration allows Cisco Secure Workload to learn about our networks and network tags, providing valuable insights into vulnerabilities related to the operating system and various applications installed on our servers. Recently, Cisco announced a new product called HyperShield, an AI-based autonomous micro-segmentation solution. While Cisco has not stated that HyperShield will replace Cisco Secure Workload, it represents a natural evolution for the company. HyperShield features dynamic policy discovery and enforcement; however, once policies are enforced, they do not change until a discovery occurs, requiring a re-enforcement process. This new platform operates autonomously, minimizing the need for user or security engineer intervention. I would have expected Cisco to incorporate more automatic discovery and enforcement features within the existing Cisco Secure Workload product. Instead of enhancing the current product, they have introduced a new solution. Cisco plans to honor existing Tetration licenses, allowing users to transition to HyperShield without additional costs, reflecting the investment enterprises have already made. From Cisco’s perspective, this represents a natural progression in their product line. While the product name changes, it seems more of a rebranding effort. The enhancements are greater autonomy, improved discovery, and automatic enforcement, which are now being introduced in HyperShield. Cisco Secure Workload offers automatic policy enforcement but cannot adjust policies dynamically as the application needs to change. Having used the platform for the past five years, the recent announcement has been reassuring. Cisco has confirmed that our investment in the platform will not go to waste. They will honor our existing licenses, providing a natural migration path to the new solution without any disruption
Irfan Sharfi - PeerSpot reviewer
Security Professional at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Micro-segmentation has transformed endpoint protection and now isolates internal threats effectively
Illumio can be improved in several areas based on our feedback. Sometimes, the PCE experiences slowness, especially when deploying around 300,000 endpoint devices. When these devices communicate within the network, loading the map or connections can cause latency, which needs improvement for a more user-friendly and faster experience. Regarding improvements to the interface, I believe we can add more features to the graphical user interface, such as proper logs. While the logs currently indicate what was blocked or allowed, clicking on a specific log should provide more information, such as which extra-scope rule is causing a denial, offering better analysis for troubleshooting.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Qualys TotalCloud has saved our time by giving us better asset visibility and risk-based prioritization, as it has reduced the time spent manually reviewing CVEs and deciding what to address first."
"The most valuable feature is the consolidated information that it provides from various platforms."
"The scalability is good as well. I would rate it ten out of ten."
"Qualys TotalCloud fulfills all these needs."
"TruRisk Insights is the most important innovation they've released this year."
"Qualys TotalCloud has improved our security posture."
"One of Qualys' best features is its categorization, which allows us to see the types of assets, their security postures, and the AI-powered version of the tool."
"Generally, Qualys is very good at detections, whether on cloud or on-prem, and the agent allows deployment on both infrastructures, providing continuous monitoring of your assets, which is a key selling point for us."
"By using Tetration insight, we are able to get the latency on our level accounts and we can determine whatever the issue is with the application latency itself."
"The only use case I can see that makes sense is micro-segmentation. I think there are other use cases for it. The main purpose of the product is to do micro-segmentation by collecting IP. That could be done by installing an agent, and then you have all the communication coming in and out. You could also use some flow sensors installed in the network that receive a copy of the traffic and then report that back to the system."
"The most valuable feature is micro-segmentation, which is the most important with respect to visibility."
"The product provides multiple-device integration."
"The scalability of Cisco Tetration is very good."
"Scalability is its most valuable feature."
"This product does everything that you need it to do and more and does a lot to provide visibility in a network environment, save time and money, and make the organization IT operate in a much more streamlined fashion."
"The solution is very user-friendly, which clients appreciate."
"Customer support is excellent."
"Everything is valuable in Illumio."
"One big outcome we saw after implementing Illumio was a notable drop in lateral movement incidents."
"I would recommend Illumio to all sizes of companies."
"The solution helps to maintain logs and monitor activities. It also helps us with access management. The tool helps us to secure organizational data that include files."
"The client is getting more security and is more confident in their network because they now have the micro-segmentation feature in their environment."
"I observe extensive return on investment with Illumio."
"The strongest aspect of Illumio is the visual traffic interface, which allows us to see all traffic that communicates with our servers and allied companies."
 

Cons

"The cost of Qualys TotalCloud is high and could be more competitive."
"Their customer support needs improvement."
"Qualys's ticketing system can be confusing when assigning tasks to individuals, and support could be improved by offering instant call solutions with engineers in addition to ticket replies."
"There is a lack of data segregation according to criticality or inventory."
"There should be improvement from a dashboard perspective when collecting and showcasing data to lead management."
"Qualys TotalCloud's increasing complexity, due to the development and deployment of multiple solutions, is making the GUI difficult to navigate."
"Two areas for improvement in Qualys TotalCloud are the speed of the public cloud platform and vulnerability detection."
"Areas that need improvement in every solution include the remediation part. The remediation steps should be simple enough for everyone to understand."
"The product must be integrated with the cloud."
"It has an uninviting interface."
"Cisco Tetration needs more flags and system alerts that we should get with network capture."
"The scalability of this solution needs to be improved."
"I would have expected Cisco to incorporate more automatic discovery and enforcement features within the existing Cisco Secure Workload product."
"The product should be easy to use, but it is not. Comparing it to other products, it was very complex."
"It is not so easy to use and configure. It needs a bunch of further resources to work, which is mainly the biggest downside of it. The deployment is huge."
"There was a controversy when Cisco reduced the amount of data they kept, and the solution became quite cost-intensive, which made its adoption challenging….Although they have modified it now, I preferred the previous version, and I wish all the functionality were back under the same product."
"One area for improvement regarding Illumio might be making the policy management even more intuitive."
"Illumio can be improved if we have more interactive sessions with the tech team."
"I would appreciate if Illumio Segmentation's interface were better."
"Illumio Adaptive Security Platform could improve by supporting more operating systems. For example, Cisco and Apache appliances."
"I would like to see better data security in the product."
"The solution is very basic and doesn't do anything other than the orchestration of layer four endpoint firewall rules."
"The customer service is lagging a bit. It could be better."
"It requires a low-level re-architecting of the product."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is comparable. It is built into our other product, so I cannot piecemeal it. It is a part of our subscription."
"Its price seems higher compared to other tools, but it is worth it. If they could adjust the pricing and make it comparable with other tools, that would be great."
"While Qualys TotalCloud's pricing is currently acceptable, it is becoming increasingly expensive and may soon be considered overpriced."
"It isn't cheap, but it's reasonable. It helps us to manage things with very few resources."
"I am not sure about the pricing. From what I understand, it is a bit on the higher side, but I do not have the exact numbers."
"Qualys TotalCloud offers good pricing that is affordable and competitive with the market. Our partnership also provides us with additional benefits."
"As a middle management member, I do not have direct pricing knowledge, but based on the knowledge from our meetings, its pricing is competitive."
"Although Qualys TotalCloud is relatively expensive due to its unique automation features, its cost-effectiveness is rated an eight out of ten, with ten being the most costly."
"It is not cheap and pricing may limit scalability."
"The price is outrageous. If you have money to throw at the product, then do it."
"Pricing depends on the scope of the application and the features. Larger installations save more."
"The price is based on how many computers you're going to install it on."
"The pricing is a bit higher than we anticipated."
"The cost for the hardware is around 300k."
"Regarding price, Cisco Secure Workload can be expensive if you don't have a budget. If you're not doing micro-segmentation, every extra security measure or enforcement you're putting on top of your existing environment will be an extra cost. It's not a cheap solution at all. But from my point of view, if you need to do micro-segmentation, this is one of the best tools I've seen for it. I can't compare that to Microsoft's solution because I haven't looked into it. I've looked into VMware and Cisco. Those are the only two that I know of. I didn't know that Microsoft could do micro-segmentation at all. Maybe they can, but I haven't heard anything about it."
"The product's pricing is around 10,000-15,000 USD. The pricing is on a yearly basis."
"There is a subscription needed to use Illumio Adaptive Security Platform and we pay every three years. Overall the solution is expensive."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Cloud and Data Center Security solutions are best for your needs.
912,006 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
16%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Outsourcing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
9%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise32
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise13
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Qualys TotalCloud?
In terms of improvement, remediation still belongs to the cloud team, which is one of the issues we faced with Qualys...
What is your primary use case for Qualys TotalCloud?
My main use case for Qualys TotalCloud is regarding the cloud visibility that we were not having previously. Previous...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Secure Workload?
CloudStrike offers antivirus capabilities and firewall features for servers and VDI but lacks automatic policy discov...
What needs improvement with Cisco Secure Workload?
We actively seek improvements in integrating the Infoblox DDI platform with Cisco Secure Workload. This integration a...
What is your primary use case for Cisco Secure Workload?
When we onboarded Cisco Secure Workload, the usual use case was to discover internal application dependencies and cre...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Illumio Adaptive Security Platform?
It will be the same price as the Akamai price for Guardicore. It's expensive, that's true. But when you compare it to...
What needs improvement with Illumio Adaptive Security Platform?
I would appreciate if Illumio Segmentation's interface were better. It is good enough to manage the operation and get...
What is your primary use case for Illumio Adaptive Security Platform?
My main use case for Illumio Segmentation is security and visibility, as I am able to get a lot of visibility in netw...
 

Also Known As

Qualys TotalCloud with FlexScan
Cisco Tetration
Illumio Adaptive Security Platform, Illumio ASP
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
ADP, University of North Carolina Charlotte (UNCC)
Plantronics, NTT Innovation Institute Inc.
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Workload vs. Illumio Segmentation and other solutions. Updated: July 2026.
912,006 professionals have used our research since 2012.