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Cisco XDR vs IBM Security QRadar comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 25, 2026

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
5.0
Cisco XDR enhances ROI by reducing downtime, swiftly resolving incidents, and simplifying license expansion for small companies.
Sentiment score
6.3
IBM Security QRadar delivers cost-effective, rapid deployment, reducing incident response times and employee needs, enhancing organizational resilience.
Two customers faced a network breach and a bad configuration incident, but unlike in the past where recovery took days, they managed to shut down access points quickly.
Cloud Architect at Pure Storage
The biggest return on investment when using Cisco XDR is the downtime aspect, specifically not having to roll out to sites and not having customers experience downtime.
Core Network Engineer at a comms service provider with 501-1,000 employees
The biggest return on investment when using Cisco XDR is that, being a small company where everybody has multiple roles, the quicker I can mitigate something, the faster I can return to my scheduled tasks for that day.
Network Engineer at BTC Broadband
With SOAR, the workflow takes one minute or less to complete the analysis.
CyberSecurity Architects at VaporVM
AWS gives the chance to implement a solution out of the box with use cases that are already in IBM Security QRadar.
Strategic Account Executive at a computer software company with 51-200 employees
I have seen a return on investment; I can share that it includes time saved, money saved, and fewer employees needed.
cybersecurity Team Leader at EMAK
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.9
Cisco XDR's customer service is generally efficient with good teamwork, but some users report issues with responsiveness and communication.
Sentiment score
6.0
IBM Security QRadar support quality varies, with inconsistent service; knowledgeable agents appreciated but response times and expertise are concerns.
They responded quickly, they were always willing to meet, and they were always willing to work as per my schedule.
SOC Analyst at a educational organization with 501-1,000 employees
the tech support is excellent
Network Engineer at BTC Broadband
I would rate Cisco customer service a ten out of ten.
Core Network Engineer at a comms service provider with 501-1,000 employees
They assist with advanced issues, such as hardware or other problems, that are not part of standard operations.
Network and Security Architect at Deutsche Telekom
Support needs to understand the issue first, then escalate it to the engineering team.
CyberSecurity Architects at VaporVM
The support is really good; for instance, if a critical ticket is submitted, you will get paged right away as it gets logged, and their analyst will look into it, letting you know as soon as possible so you can work on it.
Cyber Security Intern at a retailer with 1,001-5,000 employees
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
5.7
Cisco XDR is highly scalable, rated nine out of ten, supporting extensive operations and accommodating significant growth seamlessly.
Sentiment score
7.3
IBM Security QRadar is highly scalable, easily integrates hardware, and efficiently manages extensive networks for cloud or on-premises deployments.
Cisco XDR is designed to handle significant scaling of endpoints, allowing management of a large scale of environments with thousands of sessions.
Technical Presales at Vcom Technologies
In terms of scalability, I rate it as the best.
Cybersecurity Consultant | Managed Infrastructure Services Head | Business Apps and DevOps Head at Blueberry Tech Solutions India Pvt Ltd
For EPS license, if you increase or exceed the EPS license, you cannot receive events.
CyberSecurity Architects at VaporVM
IBM Security QRadar's scalability is great; you can have a new collector to deploy if you have increased EPS per second.
cybersecurity Team Leader at EMAK
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.5
Cisco XDR is reliable and stable, with early issues resolved, praised for functionality, scalability, and dependable performance.
Sentiment score
7.5
IBM QRadar is seen as reliable, with stability dependent on proper configuration, version updates, and sufficient hardware resources.
Customers have mentioned that the stability and scalability are good compared to competitors.
Director -Digital Transformation at Convergence
Once they got it fixed and figured out the issue with the observables and with the character limit, it's been flawless.
SOC Analyst at a educational organization with 501-1,000 employees
The stability and reliability of Cisco XDR, similar to most Cisco products, are bulletproof.
Network Engineer at BTC Broadband
On cloud, you don't see any disconnections or instability.
SOC Engineer at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees
I think QRadar is stable and currently satisfies my needs.
Architect of Cybersecurity at ASSIST - Software Services
The product has been stable so far.
Information Security Analyst at Banglalink
 

Room For Improvement

Cisco XDR users seek simplified licensing, better pricing, enhanced threat detection, and improvements in performance, features, and multilingual support.
IBM Security QRadar needs UI improvements, better integration, faster support, enhanced features, and competitive pricing to address user concerns.
Competitors offer more visibility without any additional licensing, which is a significant drawback for Cisco.
Director -Digital Transformation at Convergence
If it can capture threats from worldwide new threats and publish them into a particular database linked with an AI-driven system that can immediately alert people, that would be very good for zero-day threats.
Manager IT at NVCL Group
Offering some free XDR licenses for testing features, similar to VPN licenses, could have a significant impact on costs.
Network Security Specialist at General Authority of Customs
We receive logs from different types of devices and need a way to correlate them effectively.
Network and Security Architect at Deutsche Telekom
If AI-related support can suggest rules and integrate with existing security devices like MD, IPS, this SIM can create more relevant rules.
Information Security Analyst at Banglalink
IBM Security QRadar does not support Canvas, so we had to create custom scripts and workarounds to pull logs from Canvas.
CyberSecurity Architects at VaporVM
 

Setup Cost

Cisco's subscription pricing is costly but customizable, with discounts on bundles, yet currency and licensing complexity affect costs.
IBM QRadar is costly but efficient, flexible in licensing, negotiable, and ideal for large enterprises over smaller ones.
This integration and discounting are something we cannot get from competitors, leading to reduced security costs.
Network Security Specialist at General Authority of Customs
Users can customize their use of Cisco XDR significantly from the onset, which has resulted in a lower total cost of ownership.
Cloud Architect at Pure Storage
Overall, the price is a bit expensive compared to local competitors.
Director -Digital Transformation at Convergence
Splunk is more expensive than IBM Security QRadar.
CyberSecurity Architects at VaporVM
It was costly mainly because of the value you can get right now compared to other solutions.
CTO at Sabyk
It depends on how much you want to spend.
Strategic Account Executive at a computer software company with 51-200 employees
 

Valuable Features

Cisco XDR enhances security with integrated threat intelligence, automation, and advanced features, improving response times and operational efficiency.
IBM Security QRadar is scalable and user-friendly, excelling in threat detection, event analysis, and third-party integration for large operations.
Between the clarity, the granularity, and the dashboard, it just works.
Network Engineer at BTC Broadband
The feature I appreciate the most about Cisco XDR is the flexibility for a user to be able to create their own reporting and dashboards.
Cloud Architect at Pure Storage
Cisco XDR helps prevent data loss during ransomware attacks by integrating with multiple levels of security, tying to identity management systems, and allowing placement of blocks at the endpoint level.
Cybersecurity Consultant | Managed Infrastructure Services Head | Business Apps and DevOps Head at Blueberry Tech Solutions India Pvt Ltd
Recently, I faced an incident, a cyber incident, and it was detected in real time.
Information Security Analyst at Banglalink
IBM Security QRadar gives the opportunity to improve the time to market of the releases with a great evaluation of cybersecurity breaches.
Strategic Account Executive at a computer software company with 51-200 employees
Compared to ArcSight, Splunk, or any other SIEM tools where you need their processing language such as structured query language, SPL, and in Sentinel there is KQL query languages, IBM Security QRadar doesn't require reliance on query languages.
SOC Engineer at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco XDR
Ranking in Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
14th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
IBM Security QRadar
Ranking in Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
219
Ranking in other categories
Log Management (7th), Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (3rd), User Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) (2nd), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (15th), Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) (4th), Managed Detection and Response (MDR) (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Extended Detection and Response (XDR) category, the mindshare of Cisco XDR is 1.8%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Security QRadar is 3.2%, up from 2.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Extended Detection and Response (XDR) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
IBM Security QRadar3.2%
Cisco XDR1.8%
Other95.0%
Extended Detection and Response (XDR)
 

Featured Reviews

Joseph Houghes - PeerSpot reviewer
Cloud Architect at Pure Storage
flexible reporting and analytics boost data-driven security responses
The feature I appreciate the most about Cisco XDR is the flexibility for a user to be able to create their own reporting and dashboards. I would say I got to stop beta testing myself. I am testing what can be customized the most with it. Being able to ingest all the analytics and make it something that's either meaningful to them or to their own leadership is a big plus. It's not just what the product is at launch; you have the ability to customize and make it useful to your business to actually get real, purposeful information out of just a swamp of data. The features of Cisco XDR have actually benefited the organization significantly by allowing us to do the outputs of specific data and even filtered subsets of the data. We can do the same reporting but only deliver in either reports or dashboards the information about the systems that a specific team is responsible for, or the larger teams that multiple departments or IT silos roll up into. We're basically able to just modify the filters and have the same reports in the same dashboards where it's all the same; 99% of the work is the same.
HarshBhardiya - PeerSpot reviewer
SOC Engineer at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees
Have managed daily asset and alert monitoring effectively but have encountered limitations with manual processes and interface usability
It's still very manual and doesn't work on its own. It's still in an early stage and not on par where we can consider it a really successful detection system. The accuracy is not there. The UI could be better when compared to Sentinels where we can use flags and tagging. It could be much more user-friendly. IBM Security QRadar has all features and is fully competitive with other SIEM tools, but when it comes to user-friendliness, a new user takes time to get used to it. More intuitive, user-friendly interfaces and more helpful documentation would be beneficial. The query searching and data fetching could be faster. In large to very large organizations with around 5,000 or 6,000 assets or beyond, even with proper configurations and RAM and hardware backing up, the query is fairly slow.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Extended Detection and Response (XDR) solutions are best for your needs.
881,733 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Comparison Review

VS
Manager, Enterprise Risk Consulting at a tech company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Jun 28, 2015
Qradar vs. ArcSight
Continuing with the SIEM posts we have done at Infosecnirvana, this post is a Head to head comparison of the two Industry leading SIEM products in the market – HP ArcSight and IBM QRadar Both the products have consistently been in the Gartner Leaders Quadrant. Both HP and IBM took over niche SIEM…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Government
9%
University
7%
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise2
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business91
Midsize Enterprise39
Large Enterprise105
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco XDR?
My experience with pricing, setup costs, and licensing has been intriguing. I used to work for a Cisco partner, and I still have friends there with whom I discuss comparisons regarding some hardwar...
What needs improvement with Cisco XDR?
Improvements in Cisco XDR revolve around performance. The less performance it utilizes to run at high configuration levels, the better it becomes, so all vendors need to continue working on keeping...
What is your primary use case for Cisco XDR?
As a security consultant, I use multiple SIEM and XDR solutions, so cumulatively, I can say I have used Cisco XDR for around one year.
What are the biggest differences between Securonix UEBA, Exabeam, and IBM QRadar?
It mostly depends on your use-cases and environment. Exabeam and Securonix have a stronger UEBA feature set, friendlier GUI and are not licensed based on capacity (amount of logs and information in...
What SOC product do you recommend?
For tools I’d recommend: -SIEM- LogRhythm -SOAR- Palo Alto XSOAR Doing commercial w/o both (or at least an XDR) is asking to miss details that are critical, and ending up a statistic. Also, rememb...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Security QRadar?
Pricing and the license of EPS were managed by the governance team. I was not responsible for managing those. I was supposed to put up the requirement of the license needed to integrate that amount...
 

Also Known As

No data available
IBM QRadar, QRadar SIEM, QRadar UBA, QRadar on Cloud, IBM QRadar Advisor with Watson
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Clients across multiple industries, such as energy, financial, retail, healthcare, government, communications, and education use QRadar.
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco XDR vs. IBM Security QRadar and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,733 professionals have used our research since 2012.