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Cloudflare One vs Portnox 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

Cloudflare One
Ranking in ZTNA
4th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
Email Security (20th), Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (11th), Data Loss Prevention (DLP) (22nd), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (12th), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (9th), Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (13th), Access Management (11th), Bot Management (3rd), ZTNA as a Service (8th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (10th), Remote Browser Isolation (RBI) (2nd)
Portnox
Ranking in ZTNA
8th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
41
Ranking in other categories
Network Access Control (NAC) (5th), Passwordless Authentication (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the ZTNA category, the mindshare of Cloudflare One is 9.6%, down from 11.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Portnox is 3.2%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
ZTNA Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cloudflare One9.6%
Portnox3.2%
Other87.2%
ZTNA
 

Featured Reviews

CV
Network Architect at IP Dimension
Cloud security has improved remote access and has reduced costs for smaller client sites
I have used Cloudflare One's Identity-Aware Proxy, and it is quite straightforward from what I have seen so far. The app registration on the Azure side integrates fully into Cloudflare, and I am very satisfied with that part because it is easy to set up. The integration of Cloudflare One's Secure Web Gateway and Zero Trust Network Access works without any issues. That part is pretty automatic, and if you complete the rest of the setup, it comes together by itself with no issues from my side. What makes it nice is that we can actually start replacing on-site firewalls at this stage for the smaller clients because it does not matter if they go to a coffee shop or work from home; they are still secured by the same connection. The hops get shorter and you get better latency. We have done testing to see if it is better. One thing that we did notice with our proof of concept with our current client is that they have people connecting from the UK. When they used their previous VPN solution, uploading CAD drawings and other files to the server took a long time. They mentioned that it is much quicker on Cloudflare One's solution. I definitely believe that is part of the improved performance, and I am satisfied with that as well. What is nice about Cloudflare One is that it makes the setup easier and also easier to train technicians to maintain it. Compared to legacy systems, we do not need to get fancy firewalls in place that are costly. That is definitely also a cost-saver with Cloudflare One.
Maurice Mwaura - PeerSpot reviewer
Product Manager at Applied Principles Limited
Unified access control has improved compliance visibility and simplified passwordless access
There is work to be done when it comes to making the solution more seamless. For example, when a user is denied access, they would need a way to maybe self-resolve themselves, perhaps a way to generate a ticket on their own, something around resolutions. When it comes to users using the product, that is where good products are differentiated from products that are a bit of a challenge. Portnox has much to do in terms of their reporting. The generated reports need improvement. Things that other tools would say are normal are usually not present. For example, there is a page called NAS devices or NAS network that is able to show the switches that have been managed. Currently, there is no way of generating an easy report or an easy way of just generating something to tell the customer what they have been able to achieve so far. This is not done yet and is still very manual. I think there is work to be done there. More integrations around the various products being used would be beneficial. So far I have not encountered any major challenge. Where there was a challenge, I think support came in and helped us resolve. In fact, most of the challenges are not with the product; they are with the customer environment. I think that is just to update their documentation where they have come across a new vendor for easier integrations in the future.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Using Cloudflare One makes my work quite easy because for DDoS protection, all I need to do is understand the OSI model and click; it makes it easier than trying to write a command line or use a Linux command."
"The best feature is rate limiting. If I'm expecting 500 visits per hour, Cloudflare will limit the requests if I suddenly get 50,000."
"We mostly use Cloudflare WAF, and gets basic Cloudflaire DDoS, caching as extra bonus . We like the factor these features are all integrated into 1 console, simple to manage."
"The solution has different options that can be used to differentiate DDoS attacks."
"The simplicity of the solution is its valuable features as almost no effort was needed to learn the configurations. It is also one of the cheapest firewalls available in this category."
"Cloudflare DDoS is better than its competitors for its security, deployment, and scalability."
"The tool also offers good scalability, and the dashboard, along with real-time analytics, is very good."
"The capabilities of the software are strong enough for me to do what it's supposed to do. For me, we don't need to do a lot of configuration on our site. We just enable it and monitor it."
"This is a self-sufficient network monitoring and security product that saves time and employee resources."
"The visibility of the product is excellent."
"This product has helped us tremendously during the years in locating all kind of issues that we had on the network, very quickly, and I recommend it."
"Portnox is a winner for me compared to other vendors, especially other NAC vendors, in terms of pricing."
"I surely recommend Portnox to other users because of the price, ease of use, and fast setup."
"If your team is burnt out on managing legacy on-prem network access control or wants to move to a pure cloud model, Portnox should definitely be on your shortlist."
"The minute people have issues on their network, we can see what is happening right away."
"Portnox is a highly effective tool that will significantly lower your incident resolution times, so be prepared to push through a slight learning curve at the beginning."
 

Cons

"I would like them to include a VPN feature to provide a secure connection to the data center."
"There are premium tier live service and lower tier live service, so we opted for the lower tier. But there is no medium tier where we pay a little extra and get a bit more service. So if that can be improved."
"The tool should provide on-premise versions. Currently, all versions are cloud-based."
"When there are any dynamic changes in complex applications, the tool takes a lot of time, making its analytics-related area a major matter of concern where improvements are needed."
"The free plan has limitations. For example, I can only set up three rules, and the application firewall is unavailable."
"Feedback could be enhanced. While I work efficiently with Clover as a partner in Mexico City, sometimes the information and requests are easier to manage with more concrete solutions."
"For the topic of improvement, providing some training material is one of my suggestions."
"The initial onboarding was causing us some confusion."
"Their filtering system tends to lag quite a bit, so when I'm doing filtering at times, it doesn't filter the items properly."
"While Portnox has been very effective overall, there are a few areas where it could be improved."
"I guess the only thing that might really make a difference is a change in the pricing structure."
"There is room for improvement regarding Portnox's pricing strategies."
"While Portnox is solid, there is definitely room for improvement, particularly with the user interface."
"I think while Portnox provides wonderful technology, the support and maintenance agreements are problematic."
"In terms of operational efficiency, things are more complicated now. It takes more time to get devices on the network, but we increased security quite a bit."
"On the performance side, we have occasionally run into some random RADIUS timeouts and weird intermittent Wi-Fi authentication delays."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution's pricing lacks transparency."
"My company has to make yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to the solution. There are no hidden charges apart from the licensing costs of the solution."
"The prices are slightly expensive."
"The price tag is no longer $200,000, but rather $300,000 to $400,000. It's twice."
"The pricing is somewhere in the middle. I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten."
"Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform's pricing is good."
"The pricing of the solution is cheap. The licensing cost is also very low. I rate the cost and pricing a three out of ten."
"The solution is not that expensive."
"The solution is very expensive and I would rate it 10 out of 10."
"The cost of Portnox Clear is reasonable."
"Pricing is not cheap. It is based on licenses per port. After licensing is purchased, you only pay for support."
"The pricing is a bit high, possibly due to the cloud features and running instances across regions like the US, Asia, and Europe."
"It's not cheap. It's not expensive. It's in the middle."
"It is not bad. It is a bit on the high side, but considering the cloud features and how much it costs to run the instance in the cloud, it is not unreasonable. We do have RADIUS servers for the US, Asia, and Europe."
"The licensing module should be reviewed to count the number of devices instead of port numbers of total switches. There is a case for this where not all ports for a switch are used by devices. Unused ports are calculated in the license, then the customer pays for license for those unused ports."
"Portnox CORE's pricing is adequate and cheaper compared to other complex solutions. Its licensing costs are yearly and include support. Cost is calculated per device."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
18%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Construction Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Large Enterprise13
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise15
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform?
In my opinion, Cloudflare One can be improved mainly through compatibility, as the integration should be much simpler because it is currently too closed and too proprietary. Regarding additional fe...
What is your primary use case for Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform?
Cloudflare One's primary use case for my organization is to protect servers and to provide remote access with the VPN, strong authentication, and DDoS protection. The integration of Secure Web Gate...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Portnox Clear?
The pricing and setup cost as well as licensing is a bit high compared to the competition. If it were better, we could also have some pricing specific or special discounts to cater for SMBs.
What needs improvement with Portnox Clear?
If the MSSP offering could be the primary push or primary concern, it would be the best thing that could happen. Based on the Tanzanian market, AI governance is something that is coming through. Fo...
What is your primary use case for Portnox Clear?
Portnox is for the network access control use case. The use case focuses on wired network access, specifically how users are connecting to the network and how we are checking their security posture...
 

Also Known As

Cloudflare Area 1 Email Security, Cloudflare Bot Management, Cloudflare Gateway, Cloudflare Zero Trust Platform, Cloudflare DDoS, Cloudflare SASE & SSE Platform
Access Layers Portnox, Portnox CLEAR
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

23andMe
Sallie Mae, Roku, Vuori, Legal Zoom, Anaplan, Aecon, H.I.G. Capital, McLaren Construction Group, PFCU, UK Mortgage Lending Limited, CCC Intelligent Solutions
Find out what your peers are saying about Cloudflare One vs. Portnox and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
913,683 professionals have used our research since 2012.