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Cisco Secure Workload vs VMware NSX comparison

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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

Cisco Secure Workload
Ranking in Cloud and Data Center Security
10th
Ranking in Microsegmentation Software
5th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (23rd), Cisco Security Portfolio (9th)
VMware NSX
Ranking in Cloud and Data Center Security
5th
Ranking in Microsegmentation Software
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
107
Ranking in other categories
Network Virtualization (2nd), Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (7th), Network Detection and Response (NDR) (8th), Network Automation (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Cloud and Data Center Security category, the mindshare of Cisco Secure Workload is 8.5%, down from 12.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware NSX is 9.1%, down from 11.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud and Data Center Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
VMware NSX9.1%
Cisco Secure Workload8.5%
Other82.4%
Cloud and Data Center Security
 

Featured Reviews

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
Mahesh Bhadoriya - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Manager at Allianz Cloud Private Limited
Micro segmentation has strengthened zero trust security and isolates production from test environments
The advantages of VMware NSX include its micro-segmentation for internal security at the firewall and VM levels, which is very powerful and helps us comply with complete Zero Trust security models. We are able to achieve this and configure network level virtualization with no dependency on VLANs. Micro-segmentation helps improve our security significantly. We are not totally dependent upon our physical upfront firewall, and it makes sense to configure everything using VMware NSX, leading to multiple improvements in our organization. We moved from traditional networking such as VLANs from the firewall and switches to VMware NSX segmentation. We achieve one firewall per VLAN and can stop lateral movement such as ransomware control. The Zero Trust model is the main functionality and architecture it offers, allowing application isolation, such as having a separate production and test environment. Consistent networking and security policies across different environments have a major and very positive impact on our business operations, allowing us to achieve the security posture we want with compliance and regulations.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature is micro-segmentation, which is the most important with respect to visibility."
"It's stable."
"The solution is very user-friendly, which clients appreciate."
"A complete and powerful micro-segmentation solution."
"The product offers great visibility into the network so we can enforce security measures."
"Secure Workload's best feature is that it's an end-to-end offering from Cisco."
"Generally speaking, Cisco support is considered one of the best in the networking products and stack."
"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."
"Their technical support is very good. They help us figure out solutions when we have problems."
"I value the ability to dynamically configure our network on the fly using VMware NSX."
"The dashboard is comprehensive and easy to use."
"I can definitely recommend VMware NSX to other users."
"I have found some of the major features of this solution to be its ease of use, flexibility, and reliability."
"The best part is the blueprint creation where I can create their things and then move on to the target environment."
"It has allowed our customers to scale extend their existing IP subnets and spin up new subnets on-demand for new app web DB tiers, increasing overall VM-to-VM security and policy deployments and helping increase operational efficiency from a network management perspective."
"The solution is a very, very good product that is perfect for customers who have good technical support."
 

Cons

"The scalability of this solution needs to be improved."
"The multi-tenancy, redundancy, backup and restore functionalities, as well as the monitoring aspects of the solution, need improvement. The solution offers virtually no enterprise-grade possibility for monitoring."
"There is some overlap between Cisco Tetration and AppDynamics and there are few DC tools, it would be great to have a single pane of glass, rather than have to jump between different tools."
"It has an uninviting interface."
"I'd like to see better documentation for advanced features. The documentation is fairly basic. I would also like to see better integration with other applications."
"The emailed notifications are either hard to find or they are not available. Search capabilities can be improved."
"I would have expected Cisco to incorporate more automatic discovery and enforcement features within the existing Cisco Secure Workload product."
"The problem is that we can only deploy the particular solution where we have the hardware with Cisco."
"One aspect that needs improvement is the need for further automation."
"The initial setup was a bit lengthy in the beginning."
"Sometimes, it can be difficult to get to a higher level engineer if you need to, but it takes some work to make that case."
"It's a good product, but the way that it has got so many multiple levels that need to be purchased makes it expensive and cumbersome."
"If you start with a new or greenfield environment, it is okay to implement. However, if there are other solutions already in place, it can be difficult to implement."
"Any technical product has its own limitations in one place or another."
"Quite a complex solution."
"VMware NSX should be able to scale for different customers, even the big ones. Its scalability needs improvement. Stability for it should also be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is a bit higher than we anticipated."
"Pricing depends on the scope of the application and the features. Larger installations save more."
"The price is outrageous. If you have money to throw at the product, then do it."
"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 price is based on how many computers you're going to install it on."
"It is not cheap and pricing may limit scalability."
"The price is pretty high."
"There is a license required for this solution, we pay annually."
"There is a license required for this solution and there is also a support license available. The price of the solution could be better."
"The licensing is renewed every three years. The cost for implementation and renovation are a huge portion of that price."
"The price of VMware NSX is very good compared to other solutions."
"All the institutions have to pay monthly for the services in the cloud. They have to pay $30,000 every month for this service every three years."
"The price could be better. We pay for the license every three years. The last time I checked, it cost around three million pesos in the Philipines. Most of the expense will go towards implementation and renovation."
"VMware NSX isn't cheap."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
13%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Construction Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business34
Midsize Enterprise23
Large Enterprise70
 

Questions from the Community

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What are the biggest differences between Cisco ACI and VMware NSX?
There are some very major differences between both the Products and to name a few. -Cisco ACI have physical network gear (9K Switches) where the Code runs in ACI Policy Mode & the UCS server wh...
What are the biggest differences between Cisco ACI and VMware NSX?
Once you know your way around the Cisco ecosystem, using Cisco ACI is not so difficult. It is a global product, so when you change one interface, changes are automatically reflected on every switch...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware NSX?
When measuring complexity and costs for our organization, we consider some parameters for effectiveness. In terms of effectiveness in reducing operational complexity, I measure it to be high on the...
 

Also Known As

Cisco Tetration
VMware Nicira, Lastline Defender
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ADP, University of North Carolina Charlotte (UNCC)
City of Avondale, Lumeta, Kroll Ontrack, Heartland Payment Systems, Baystate Heallth, Exostar, Tribune Media, iGATE, NTT Communications, Synergent, California Natural Resources Agency, Bloomington Public Schools, Columbia Sportswear, Join Experience S.A, Schuberg Philis
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Workload vs. VMware NSX and other solutions. Updated: October 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.