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Cisco Umbrella vs Menlo Protect comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 28, 2025

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 Umbrella
Ranking in Internet Security
1st
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
122
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (1st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (2nd), Domain Name System (DNS) Security (1st), Cisco Security Portfolio (1st)
Menlo Protect
Ranking in Internet Security
15th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
Email Security (59th), Enterprise Browsers (5th), Remote Browser Isolation (RBI) (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Internet Security category, the mindshare of Cisco Umbrella is 30.4%, down from 37.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Menlo Protect is 3.1%, up from 2.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Internet Security Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Cisco Umbrella30.4%
Menlo Protect3.1%
Other66.5%
Internet Security
 

Featured Reviews

Emilio Montoya - PeerSpot reviewer
CTO at PROA
Ensures internet navigation safety and boosts productivity
The features of Cisco Umbrella I prefer most are DNS protection and traffic redirect. With Cisco Talos's threat intelligence, we reduce the impact of malware traffic in our network, and we currently see the behavior of equipment and choose the correct sites. Cisco Talos has helped us reduce the impact of malware traffic. We can see the behavior and choose the correct sites. We're currently testing secure access with Umbrella in order to secure access to core applications. It's a product that the user doesn't even know is there, even though it is protecting them. It's not hard on the equipment. And, for us, it centralizes everything, which improves productivity. With the Experience Insights feature of Cisco Secure Access, we've seen impacts on the management of user connectivity by allowing us to deliver safe connectivity. We are testing the Secure Access product with Cisco Umbrella to improve our connectivity with our users in order to secure access to the corporate applications. Cisco Umbrella is in the cloud, which is nice.
reviewer1991553 - PeerSpot reviewer
Information Security Specialist at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
Decreased our security alerts without impacting employees' work
I can't say that there is one specific feature that is most valuable. It's the overall platform that is well-suited to our needs. It's something that is different from a lot of other products or platforms in the marketplace. It provides a single console for security policy and management. That is somewhat important because we used to have other products where you would have to log in to individual appliances, devices, or clusters. Having one spot to log in to or one area to go to for doing different tasks and viewing data sources, just makes it easier from a user perspective. Also, the fact that it's invisible to our end-users and doesn't affect their work is very important. Most companies don't want to have added friction or impact on their users. In addition, the combination of user-friendliness for admins, and security for the organization, works well. As a cloud-hosted solution, it provides ease of use.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"One of the most important features is the security posture check which Umbrella offers when a user accesses any website. That is one of the most unique features that it offers."
"We've found it to be stable and good for our customers."
"I think recently with many people working from home, Cisco Umbrella has been very useful. For example, we can manage the device and the network when the employee is not working on the local host. Cisco Umbrella is very valuable for this kind of infrastructure."
"What we like most is security and how easy it is to integrate with other appliances."
"I have found the malware protection feature valuable. It is helpful and deliverable and is able to protect my entire organization from getting compromised. It also prevents us from visiting any malicious sites which are not visible to the users."
"The features of Cisco Umbrella benefit my company by allowing us to do protective DNS instead of URL filtering, which lets us avoid having to backhaul traffic and run it through a firewall in a data center."
"DNS protection, domain blocking, SIP component, and the Cisco Umbrella roaming client are the valuable features of Cisco Umbrella."
"The security and access control features."
"Menlo Security RBI's best feature is its threat isolation engine."
"I can't say that there is one specific feature that is most valuable. It's the overall platform that is well-suited to our needs. It's something that is different from a lot of other products or platforms in the marketplace."
 

Cons

"The firewall capabilities could be better. Cisco is starting to introduce some layer 7 capabilities now, but there's still some room to grow. They should continue with the development of Umbrella so that it is a full-blown cloud-managed firewall solution."
"If the security issues are taken care of it would be better."
"We need to work on integration as it is very complex."
"I don't have an answer for how Cisco Umbrella can be improved, as it has been some time since I've worked with it."
"It had the ability to do a lot of app control. So, every single app that went through that portal was registered, but there is a general issue with the whole app control. As soon as you add a mobile phone to your network, all of the apps get registered through the system, and you can approve, reject, or just let them go through. When I looked at it, it was impossible to manage app control. There was just so much data. I didn't apply that service because I just didn't have the time to manage it. It would be good if there was a way to categorize applications."
"Missing a real data leakage prevention solution."
"I am unsure if Cisco Umbrella offers a Windows option for running the server."
"This solution does not give us full, 360-degree protection."
"Menlo Security RBI could be more cloud-friendly, and its mobility could be improved."
"There are several features, such as supporting web technologies, that the company is working on implementing in the platform. There are a lot of backend web technologies in use on various websites, for example, two-way audio/video and WebGL, for which support may not be fully implemented in the product."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of Cisco Umbrella is a little higher than similar solutions, like Gateway."
"Its value exceeds its pricing."
"We were using the free version, and we implemented the paid version about two months ago. I'm paying a fair price, but everything is negotiable with Cisco. One of the benefits that I got by having Cisco Umbrella is the licensing of the Cisco AnyConnect VPN client."
"It was a little bit expensive on a per seat basis, but the company I was running was only a midsize Australian company, and it was a reasonable budget per computer for that system. It started off being a free product, and then Cisco bought it, and it went to a reasonable price. I was using Cisco AMP as well. So, my per computer cost was reasonably high, but for a small company, it was within an acceptable level."
"As an educational partner, we get better licensing structures. We are very happy with that. It has been very nice that Cisco has partnered with the educational sector to bring that."
"The price could be lower."
"You get what you pay for."
"The solution’s pricing is reasonable."
"Menlo Security RBI can be very costly."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business49
Midsize Enterprise30
Large Enterprise51
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Which is the better security solution - Cisco Umbrella or Zscaler?
Cisco Umbrella and Zscaler Internet Access are two broad-spectrum Internet security solutions that I have tried. Zscaler Internet Access is a good option for carrying out multiple security functi...
Which is the better security solution - Cisco Umbrella or Microsoft Cloud App Security?
Cisco Umbrella is an integral component of the Cisco SASE architecture. It integrates security in a single, cloud-native solution, unifying multiple features like DNS-layer security, threat intelli...
What do you like most about Cisco Umbrella?
Cisco Umbrella is easy to monitor, manage, and deploy.
Ask a question
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Also Known As

OpenDNS
Menlo Security Email Security, Menlo Security Remote Browser Isolation
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Chart Industries, City of Aspen, Eastern Mountain Sports, FLEXcon, George Washington University, Jackson Municipal Airport Authority, Ohio Public Library Information Network, PTC, Richland Community College, Smart Motors, Tulane University, VeriClaim
Macy's, HSBC, Bank of Hawaii
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Umbrella vs. Menlo Protect and other solutions. Updated: January 2026.
881,665 professionals have used our research since 2012.