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Cisco Sourcefire SNORT vs Fortinet FortiGate comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 29, 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 Sourcefire SNORT
Ranking in Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
12th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Fortinet FortiGate
Ranking in Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
595
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (2nd), Firewalls (1st), Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (2nd), WAN Edge (1st), ZTNA (2nd), Unified Threat Management (UTM) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) category, the mindshare of Cisco Sourcefire SNORT is 2.9%, up from 2.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 7.1%, down from 15.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Fortinet FortiGate7.1%
Cisco Sourcefire SNORT2.9%
Other90.0%
Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS)
 

Featured Reviews

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.
VR
Practice Head at a consultancy with 11-50 employees
Unified security has protected diverse environments and supports consistent policies everywhere
I would say 8 out of 10 regarding the stability of Fortinet FortiGate. It requires a lot of bug fixing and what I understand, Fortinet is fast enough to provide bug fixes and patches, but usually I suggest Fortinet should do thorough testing of their releases and software releases and once probably they can reduce the frequency of new releases but make it stable. That's what my recommendation is. As far as the core objective of Fortinet FortiGate is concerned, I think they are meeting the targets but I guess for rolling out new features and new updates, they are doing a bit of hurry just to cope with the market dynamics. But possibly, I understand that they are compromising on the quality of the software and stability. So over there they have to improve. Rest of the aspects, I guess they are doing pretty good. We are happy. Regarding my experience with Fortinet FortiGate in comparison to maybe some other vendors such as CyberArk, Fortinet is in the top three and they give a lot of competition to their nearest peers in the market. But I guess Fortinet is really struggling in software-defined LAN, Wi-Fi, and FortiSwitches space. So they have to make their products more affordable in Forti-switching and Forti-WiFi space. They are not able to compete effectively with the nearest competitor HP Enterprise and HP Aruba.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is rather easy to use."
"Solid intrusion detection and prevention that scales easily in very large environments."
"The most valuable feature is the visibility that we have across the virtual environment."
"The most valuable feature is reliability, and this solution is better than Check Point."
"It simplifies the configuration process by offering pre-defined base configurations, including security and connectivity settings."
"The solution is stable."
"I would recommend this solution; it's reliable and scalable, with easy installation and integration."
"The tool's most valuable feature is threat detection, which is important because we have multiple layers not only in Cisco."
"We have peace of mind; we do work in a very dangerous environment, the internet, and this device gives us alerts and the opportunity to know what is going on."
"The most helpful features of FortiGate include its firewall policy, specifically the user-based policy, which I find to be quite beneficial in managing our network security effectively."
"The product is easy to use and is stable. The SV1 functionality is a benefit."
"The fact that Fortinet FortiGate IPS can prevent and log malicious intrusions, tries, and attempts is great."
"User identification and application identification are valuable features."
"For application filtration, I really appreciate many features of Fortinet FortiGate because it is more reliable, easy to use, and the reports are easy to read and understand."
"It is a good product. It does what we want it to do so. I didn't find many false-positives or things like that. We mainly use the IPS and URL filtering features, and they are pretty good."
"I have found most of the features to be good with excellent functionality."
 

Cons

"Integration with other components — even Cisco's own products — can be enhanced to improve administrative experience."
"If the price is brought down then everybody will be happy."
"The pricing needs to be improved."
"Performance needs improvement."
"We are unhappy with technical support for this solution, and it is not as professional as what we typically expect from Cisco."
"The solution's approach to managing traffic blocking is confusing and impractical."
"Cisco Sourcefire SNORT can scale, but if you have too much, you could fill up your log files, which I consider when discussing scalability."
"To be frank, the product is not really stable, although they're working on that."
"Stability and technical support are the two major issues I have found with Fortinet."
"One of the features that I would like to have is to do with endpoint production, it should be integrated. For example, the firewall gets notified of any kind of forensic event that needs to be done, such as if there is a ransomware attack and how it originated, all those records have to be available from the firewall, which is not."
"I would rate the technical support of Fortinet a six or seven out of ten. It is not very helpful. I would like to see improvements in their support."
"Whitelisting could be better."
"There are some complex administration tasks in their administration portal. That needs to be improved."
"However, two distinct security policies must be used and nothing of the IPv6 settings are configurable via the GUI."
"Fortigate's hardware capacities could be improved."
"I think Fortinet FortiGate is stable because previously it had a hiccup around a bug within the authentication VPN due to the firmware, but after updating, it's easier to control."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost is per port and can be expensive but it does include training and support for three years."
"If one is an extremely expensive product, and ten is cheap, I rate the tool's price as a five."
"Licensing for this solution is paid on a yearly basis."
"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."
"We have a three-year license for this solution."
"Each feature costs money, so it is important to study your needs."
"It is expensive. You need to pay for the subscription every year, which is very expensive. The subscription includes technical support and hardware exchange in case of failure."
"Its pricing is good. The advantages of Fortinet FortiGate over its competitors include good pricing and meeting our requirements at a lower cost."
"We are on an annual license to use Fortinet FortiGate."
"The cost of Fortinet FortiGate is competitive and not expensive compared to other enterprise- grade solutions. On average, the license cost per year is around seventy percent of the firewall's purchase price."
"If the price of the license in Fortinet FortiGate was less expensive it would be better."
"I rate FortiGate Next Generation Firewall a five out of ten for pricing."
"It's a year based license."
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Comparison Review

it_user216600 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Technical Consultant with 51-200 employees
Jan 3, 2016
Sophos UTM vs. Fortinet FortiGate
I have used both Sophos and Fortinet products in production and I have found the Sophos UTM appliances (hardware and virtual) to be a better fit most of the time -- with a few caveats which I will touch on below. In both instances, the transition from TMG will be mostly straightforward. The main…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
13%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business373
Midsize Enterprise139
Large Enterprise195
 

Questions from the Community

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...
What is your primary use case for Cisco Sourcefire SNORT?
Endpoint protection is the main use case. The main aspect involves specifying different rules, and when network traffic hits these rules, it will try to block the traffic or at least log the traffi...
Which is the better NGFW: Fortinet Fortigate or Cisco Firepower?
When you compare these firewalls you can identify them with different features, advantages, practices and usage at large. In my opinion, Fortinet would be the best option and l use Fortinet too...
What is the biggest difference between Sophos XG and FortiGate?
From my experience regarding both the Sophos and FortiGate firewalls, I personally would rather use FortiGate. I know the firewalls change every 5 to 7 years as stated but you really do need to upg...
What are the biggest technical differences between Sophos UTM and Fortinet FortiGate?
As a solution, Sophos UTM offers a lot of functionality, it scales well, and the stability and performance are quite good. The most valuable features for me are their web and email filtering. I wou...
 

Also Known As

Sourcefire SNORT
Fortinet FortiGate Next-Generation Firewall
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

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
Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Dell, HP, Oracle, Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Vodafone, Orange, BT Group, Telstra, Deutsche Telekom, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, CenturyLink, NTT Communications, Tata Communications, SoftBank, China Mobile, Singtel, Telus, Rogers Communications, Bell Canada, Telkom Indonesia, Telkom South Africa, Telmex, Telia Company, Telkom Kenya
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Sourcefire SNORT vs. Fortinet FortiGate and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.