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Cisco Umbrella vs Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform 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:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
7.2
Cisco Umbrella improves security, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness with cloud access, integrating seamlessly and reducing operational costs and malware.
Sentiment score
4.2
Users experienced improved performance and satisfaction with faster transfers, although cost and financial impacts vary and remain indistinct.
Cisco is a big brand in the networking domain, but in security, they are pushing a lot and improving day by day.
Chief Technology Officer at Binary Global Limited
From my point of view, the biggest return on investment when using the solution is that it makes it a lot easier to delegate some of the tasks that were traditionally used, such as building policies on the firewalls and doing it through Cisco Umbrella.
Network Engineer at a tech consulting company with 501-1,000 employees
The biggest return on investment when using Cisco Umbrella for me is the ease of use of the fact that we've deployed this with our Cisco VPN Secure Client, so every computer has the Umbrella module in it.
Senior Network Engineer at Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
8.0
Cisco Umbrella excels in support efficiency, but purchasing and real-time support integration need improvement despite good documentation.
Sentiment score
6.4
Versa SASE technical support is helpful and knowledgeable, but operational support needs improvement compared to competitors like Cisco.
I would rate customer support ten out of ten due to the excellent assistance throughout the POC process.
Manager Cyber Security Department at Mana
Cisco's support is fantastic, providing assistance when needed, especially during the initial installation process.
Director at Infosonik Systems Ltd
If I don't need to go to support all the time, that means the product is working fine, so I'm very happy with them.
Network Engineer at a tech consulting company with 501-1,000 employees
When we talk about the feasibility of their cloud one integration on the AWS and Azure environment, it took minutes.
Pre Sales Engineer at Konvergenz
I work with a partner, not directly with the OEM, which makes getting technical support on call very challenging.
Assistant Vice President at icici lombard
I would rate Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform's technical support around eight out of ten.
Senior Client Partner at NTT DATA
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
8.2
Cisco Umbrella is scalable, supporting seamless user growth and integration, making it ideal for organizations of any size.
Sentiment score
7.2
Versa SASE Platform efficiently scales for organizations of all sizes, offering easy deployment and flexibility for diverse requirements.
Cisco Umbrella scales incredibly with the growing needs of my organization.
Network Engineer at a construction company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Cisco Umbrella scales really well with the growing needs of my company, bringing the ability to ensure that people are safe and connected.
Senior Network Engineer at Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C.
Cisco Umbrella scales effectively with the growing needs of my company; it's excellent, and I have experienced no issues.
Senior Network Engineer at Boys Town
The scalability from a performance point of view is good, but from a commercial perspective, it is low.
Assistant Vice President at icici lombard
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.3
Cisco Umbrella is highly reliable, offering consistent performance and high uptime with minor glitches easily resolved.
Sentiment score
7.3
Versa Unified SASE Platform is generally stable, excelling with basic setups but facing challenges in complex deployments.
I have not experienced any major stability issues with Cisco Umbrella.
Director at Infosonik Systems Ltd
Cisco Umbrella Secure Access is pretty stable in my mind, and we have not seen many glitches that would have interrupted services at customer locations.
Chief Technology Officer at Binary Global Limited
The stability and reliability of the Cisco Umbrella platform have been great.
Senior Network Engineer at Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C.
 

Room For Improvement

Cisco Umbrella struggles with integration, customization, user interface, and performance, needing improved documentation, security features, and deployment processes.
Versa SASE needs improvements in interface simplicity, security, stability, mobile support, and performance with better user support and cost efficiency.
Making it more flexible and easy to deploy, particularly when integrating with other technologies like Active Directory and proxies, would be beneficial.
Manager Cyber Security Department at Mana
The product can only shield a small area, making it less effective for larger spaces or multiple users.
Director at Infosonik Systems Ltd
I have to write an email to Umbrella support to get assistance, unlike the other products where I can call the Cisco technical assistance center and get an engineer.
CTO at Next Technologies Ltd
It does not make sense to buy a 48-port switch in a very small branch that has five users.
Pre Sales Engineer at Konvergenz
There should be more technical materials and certifications available to improve awareness and skills in the industry.
Assistant Vice President at icici lombard
Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform could possibly be improved if they can integrate it with their own SD-WAN.
Senior Client Partner at NTT DATA
 

Setup Cost

Enterprise buyers appreciate Cisco Umbrella's security but have mixed opinions on its pricing, citing flexibility and potential cost issues.
Versa SASE Platform offers competitive and negotiable pricing, cost-effective subscriptions, and is favorable for long-term use against major competitors.
We've bundled that with our firewall stuff and our VPN, which brings the price down and adds the ability to grow.
Senior Network Engineer at Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C.
The only cost associated is the license cost unless additional solutions need to be integrated with Umbrella, which would incur extra costs.
Director at Infosonik Systems Ltd
The prices need to be lower as the current pricing is exceedingly high.
Network Solutions Architect at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
I would say it has proven to be the most cost-effective product.
Pre Sales Engineer at Konvergenz
The solution is very expensive, costing above one crore Indian rupees for our setup, which spans around twenty five branches.
Assistant Vice President at icici lombard
As a reseller, I see their pricing as competitive.
Senior Client Partner at NTT DATA
 

Valuable Features

Cisco Umbrella features robust security, seamless deployment, granular control, enhancing hybrid work protection and compliance with ease of use.
The Versa Unified SASE Platform offers robust security, scalability, and flexibility, optimizing network performance and integration with third-party vendors.
The DNS layer security provided by Cisco Umbrella is very effective for our security posture, offering us vast improvements in visibility over DNS queries and potential threats.
Manager Cyber Security Department at Mana
The most valuable feature of Cisco Umbrella is its DNS security.
Network Solutions Architect at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
The best possible thing is that it is very easy to deploy, easy to configure, and very fast to get onboarded with a customer because this is a cloud-based service.
Chief Technology Officer at Binary Global Limited
SD-WAN has further enhanced the aspect of security on the open internet link, which has helped my customers in protecting sensitive data.
Senior Client Partner at NTT DATA
Because we deal with very highly sensitive accounts, we have never experienced issues with customers reporting fraudulent activity or data leakage.
Pre Sales Engineer at Konvergenz
The most valuable features of Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) are application prioritization, advanced routing features, and network gateway firewall capabilities.
Assistant Vice President at icici lombard
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Umbrella
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
123
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (1st), Internet Security (1st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (2nd), Domain Name System (DNS) Security (1st), Cisco Security Portfolio (1st)
Versa Unified Secure Access...
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
26
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (9th), WAN Edge (9th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (14th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Enterprise Networking solutions, they serve different purposes. Cisco Umbrella is designed for Domain Name System (DNS) Security and holds a mindshare of 20.8%, down 25.1% compared to last year.
Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform, on the other hand, focuses on Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions, holds 5.2% mindshare, up 5.0% since last year.
Domain Name System (DNS) Security Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Cisco Umbrella20.8%
Infoblox Advanced DNS Protection11.5%
Palo Alto Networks DNS Security7.6%
Other60.1%
Domain Name System (DNS) Security
Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform5.2%
Fortinet FortiGate13.2%
Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN10.5%
Other71.1%
Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
 

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.
EM
Pre Sales Engineer at Konvergenz
Hybrid connectivity has improved secure remote access and simplified visibility across branches
The area for improvement in Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform is on the switching part. Their switching is intelligent, but it comes in different levels and different models. They have very high-performing appliances for switching, but for the different branch offices, smaller appliances would be required. We have already provided feedback to Versa about this, and we should be expecting the first rollout of smaller branch appliances for the switching in Q1. The good thing is that they have intelligent switching, which will bump up some of the things that are lacking in normal switches. For now, it is only switching that could be slightly improved. There is nothing on the performance side; it is just the appliance model. It does not make sense to buy a 48-port switch in a very small branch that has five users.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Domain Name System (DNS) Security solutions are best for your needs.
881,757 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

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

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business50
Midsize Enterprise30
Large Enterprise51
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise10
 

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.
What needs improvement with Versa Titan?
So far, none of my customers have delved into much detail about Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform's threat intelligence capabilities because it's more of a focus on manufactu...
What is your primary use case for Versa Titan?
I'm in sales, so I'm a seller for Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform. I usually recommend Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform for manufacturing and small ...
 

Also Known As

OpenDNS
Versa FlexVNF, FlexVNF, Versa Titan
 

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
CenturyLink, RCN Business, Colt Technology Services
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Umbrella vs. Versa Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Platform and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
881,757 professionals have used our research since 2012.