No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Fortinet FortiGate-VM vs Sangfor NGAF comparison

Why PeerSpot?
 

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:
 

Categories and Ranking

Fortinet FortiGate-VM
Ranking in Firewalls
11th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
151
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Sangfor NGAF
Ranking in Firewalls
28th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
34
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate-VM is 2.1%, up from 1.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Sangfor NGAF is 1.2%, down from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Firewalls Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Fortinet FortiGate-VM2.1%
Sangfor NGAF1.2%
Other96.7%
Firewalls
 

Featured Reviews

Ehab Ali - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Presales Consultant at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Unified security fabric has simplified multi-country deployments and strengthened threat response
FortiGate VM delivers exceptional performance and security with no degradation of service or protection (same features as the HW option). As part of the Fortinet Security Fabric, it extends across clouds and distributed locations, mitigating blind spots in virtual infrastructures. FortiGate VM can be rapidly deployed, managed through a centralized platform, and offers a range of purchasing options to suit every need. Also, FortiGate VM offers versatile deployment options across both public and private clouds, supporting all major public clouds including AWS, Azure, and Google as well as most hypervisors such as VMware, Hyper-V, and KVM. These deployments enable organizations to create scalable, high-performance firewalls that can be tailored to different virtualized environments and hyper-scale public cloud infrastructures. FortiGate VM integrates seamlessly with various infrastructure as code (IaC) tools such as Jenkins and GitLab, supporting security as code practices.
Zaid Farooqui - PeerSpot reviewer
CIO at Indus Motor Company
Enhanced threat detection with integrated security features and good support
We are using application firewalling, WAF, and SD-WAN. The capabilities are mostly within the box. For example, you will get web application firewall WAF as part and parcel of this. SD-WAN is also bundled. It integrates with their SIEM and SOAR solutions very nicely. Lastly, the pricing point is very cost-efficient as well.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Fortinet FortiGate-VM is very scalable because you can use Fortinet FortiManager."
"The ease of access and user-friendly setup is a valuable feature. Fortinet proves to be particularly straightforward to configure, offering simplicity without complexity. Moreover, visibility is easily attainable due to certain factors. Price, implementation, and budget considerations play a role. When it comes to Cisco implementation, the process tends to be more intricate, which many customers find unfavourable for their business needs."
"Technical support has been super responsive and dedicated to getting any challenges resolved."
"After months configured it's been rock solid, which is good."
"I would say personally I always recommend Fortinet; I will continue to due to the fact that the cost and the integration and the general user-friendliness are all impressive."
"I would recommend Fortinet FortiGate-VM as a very good solution."
"High network throughput while providing leading edge network security technology for a competitive price.​"
"I would recommend a company to use Fortinet, because it is an attractive solution, with no bugs, a very easy installation guide, and also the support and the customer care are very important."
"The VPN connectivity feature is really nice."
"In terms of the most valuable features, the IPS report is quick and updated, and performance is also valuable."
"So far, the performance and reliability of the product have supported our company's critical network traffic."
"The built-in features function as intended, providing exceptional value."
"I think Sangfor NGAF is more valuable than Cisco products because of its simplicity and ease of management. If I compare it with Palo Alto and Cisco, both are quite complex products. And if I compare it with FortiGate firewalls from Fortinet, I have also used all these products. Fortinet and Sangfor NGAF are similar products because the applications behind the application and policy layers are almost identical."
"While the features are not dissimilar to other brands, configuration is much more simple, which works out great for Indonesian people."
"Sangfor serves most of the basic purposes of a firewall, is particularly good in the DPI where we can inspect the inbound and outbound traffic on a very granular level, gives a very good predictive measure as well as the current measure of things going on in our network, and gives us value for money overall."
"I think the tool has the feature to detect and kill ransomware in three seconds."
 

Cons

"Fortinet FortiGate-VM should improve its asset identification, wherein the device can identify assets on the network, like computers."
"When new versions are deployed they tend to be a little buggy, so they should be more fully tested before release."
"The solution is fairly complex."
"One small thing I wish would improve is when I am going through event logs, it defaults to my cloud environment, and I have to switch it over to look at the local disk."
"Not a ten because I think that Cisco is better."
"Areas for improvement would be application control and web filtering."
"The tool does not have a good name in the market, consisting of enterprise-class businesses, making it an area where the product lacks and needs to improve."
"The security offered by the tool has certain shortcomings, making it in area where improvements are required."
"The interface and user experience are horrible."
"Sangfor could improve by providing better real-time reporting, as the current reports don't offer the level of detail we need, especially for runtime insights."
"The support offered by the product has certain shortcomings where improvements are required. The knowledge levels and response time of the support team need improvement."
"The solution should be able to work in a hybrid setup."
"The firewall system needs gradual improvements because there are more threats and challenges in the world every day."
"Sangfor need greater exposer in the market because the market is mainly saturated by Fortinet. The user experience of Fortinet is quite different compared to NGAF. If we want to switch our users from Fortinet to NGAF, we have to convince them that the user experience will be much easier once once they start to use it."
"Our experience with its customer support was quite challenging."
"The user interface isn't user-friendly though."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I rate the product's pricing an eight out of ten."
"The price is similar to Symantec Endpoint, but it's more expensive than Forcepoint solutions. Fortinet is better than Forcepoint."
"There should be a reduction in the setup price and licensing costs."
"Fortinet FortiGate-VM is a very expensive solution."
"For large enterprises, price is not a problem because they need that solution. However, in the Philippine market, many of our clients are still small to medium businesses, so the price can be challenging. The license for Fortinet FortiGate-VM costs 100K to 150K Philippine pesos per year for VM1 or VM2."
"It has a flexible pay-as-you-go pricing model."
"It is an expensive solution if you are migrating from an open source solution."
"The price falls somewhere in the middle; it's neither cheap nor expensive."
"For four to five physical appliances for a licensed firewall, it costs approximately $4,000."
"For over 2000 users, the cost is around 5000 to 6000 USD. If you want a web application firewall, you have to purchase an additional license for it."
"Sangfor NGAF price is reasonable and there is an annual license. However, the maintenance cost can be a bit high."
"The pricing is reasonable."
"The price could be more competitive."
"When it comes to the price of firewall solutions, Sangfor NGAF takes the cake."
"I rate the product price as one on a scale of one to ten, where one is low price and ten is high price."
"It is one of the cheapest tools in the market."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Firewalls solutions are best for your needs.
913,924 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
9%
Construction Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Construction Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business74
Midsize Enterprise35
Large Enterprise43
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business15
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise10
 

Questions from the Community

Features comparison between Palo Alto and Fortinet firewalls
In the best tradition of these questions, Feature-wise both are quite similar, but each has things it's better at, it kind of depends what you value most. PA is good at app control, web filtering a...
Which would you recommend - FortiGate VM or Azure Firewall?
Both of these solutions are excellent options that provide flexible scalability and solid security. Fortinet Fortigate VM integrates well and has excellent centralized reporting. It is very easy to...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiGate-VM?
I am not involved in the pricing and costs associated with Fortinet FortiGate-VM, as those are handled by the CFO. We are in operations, and we just access the product as it is and take care of the...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Sangfor NGAF?
The licensing cost is quite high compared to other available firewalls in the market.
What needs improvement with Sangfor NGAF?
The cost of licensing is very high compared to other firewalls available here. There should be improvements in hardware scalability, allowing for more storage and memory capacity. Making the soluti...
What is your primary use case for Sangfor NGAF?
We are hosting applications over the platform, including websites and NAT traffic from our side. Because it's deployed in our data center, which is fully operational, we have various applications h...
 

Also Known As

FortiGate Virtual Appliance, FortiGate-VM
Sangfor NGAF Firewall Platform
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Security7 Networks, COOPENAE
The Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation (Indonesia), Lawson, Inc. (Philippines), Universiti Sultan Zainal Abidin (Indonesia), TEK Automotive (Italy), etc.
Find out what your peers are saying about Fortinet FortiGate-VM vs. Sangfor NGAF and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
913,924 professionals have used our research since 2012.