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Fortinet FortiMail Cloud vs Symantec Messaging Gateway comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 2024

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 FortiMail Cloud
Ranking in Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
7th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Email (6th)
Symantec Messaging Gateway
Ranking in Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
6th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Secure Email Gateway (SEG) category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiMail Cloud is 4.6%, up from 2.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Messaging Gateway is 2.6%, up from 2.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
 

Featured Reviews

Pravin Mandlik - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides enhanced email security with potential agent compatibility issues
There are definitely features that Fortinet should work on. I'm not the right person to implement those features. For a portable cloud solution, a customer has more affinity towards a solution where endpoint security is already in place. In endpoint security, they are not at the latest quadrant. That is why a customer with existing endpoint security solutions like Trend Micro might prefer a main security solution from that vendor. If we go for FortiMail Cloud and have a separate endpoint security solution, there are two agents that have to sit on a customer endpoint. From that perspective, Fortinet policies add an extra load to the endpoint. Maybe other solutions have an advantage when it comes to Fortinet.
Girish Vijay - PeerSpot reviewer
A stable and reasonably priced solution that performs well and has a very good malware database
Since Symantec merged with Broadcom, they might have lost some good technical engineers. Maybe that’s the reason why the product is performing poorly. When we have a good marketing and sales team, even though our product cannot perform, we will sell it at a high price because of the buzzwords. However, at the end of the day, the product should perform. Most of the products might not perform. Symantec is a very good product, but the services are basic. I rate the technical features of the product a nine out of ten. However, I would rate the services provided by the solution a six out of ten. Overall, I rate the tool an eight out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"If there is a problem somewhere Fortinet can act on it immediately. That is very important."
"The most valuable features are filtering and sandboxing."
"The quarantine feature of FortiMail is the most valuable, as it quarantines emails based on my policies."
"The encryption features are most valuable to us."
"The most valuable features are email ATB and Malware Analysis."
"The most valuable features are the low price and its ability to integrate with other Fortinet products."
"The return on investment for us was achieved since we did not have similar incidents again in our environment."
"The implementation was very professional. There are a lot of features I can get through Fortinet and FortiMail, such as security. FortiGuard is the most reliable and professional mitigation center to handle incidents and risk that I have to face."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway has a good GUI, and it is very powerful in detecting viruses and spam."
"Symantec’s spyware and malware signature database is very good compared to other products."
"Messaging Gateway is stable."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway has a huge knowledge base about phishing, spamming, spoofing, etc."
"The solution is "set and forget". You pay for it and everything is done for you."
"The solution is excellent at blocking spam."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway is stable and scalable. Installation is easy, and the deployment and maintenance can be done by one administrative person."
"It has very good capabilities for managing malware."
 

Cons

"I can't see the feedback to the FortiMail gateway."
"The downside of this solution is that it is difficult to implement policies on FortiMail."
"In endpoint security, they are not at the latest quadrant. That is why a customer with existing endpoint security solutions like Trend Micro might prefer a main security solution from that vendor."
"They could look at strengthening anti-spam with the newly observed domains."
"Fortinet policies add an extra load to the endpoint."
"I would like to see more advanced sandbox features, where you can actually download to a machine where you can test."
"This ease of use and user-friendliness is something we believe could be improved in FortiMail."
"Fortimail Cloud should include more advanced AI features that can analyze every traffic type."
"Messaging Gateway's advanced malware detection could be improved."
"The solution interface is from 2003 and is outdated. Symantec Messaging Gateway needs to update the interface."
"This product would benefit from better integration with Symantec Endpoint Protection."
"We've had issues in the past where the user finds spam, and Symantec does not recognize it as spam."
"What needs to be improved in Symantec Messaging Gateway is its local partner support, as it's not as technical. The support my company gets from the partner isn't good. Vendor support is good, but local partner support isn't. I'm happy with Symantec Messaging Gateway as a solution, but the problem is with its partner support. To me, Symantec Messaging Gateway is a complete solution, but it can be very difficult to search the web for resolutions to issues or problems you experience from it. If this could be improved or resolved in the next release of Symantec Messaging Gateway, then that would be good."
"Sometimes the solution picks up false positive for viruses during scans."
"The false positive submissions must be improved."
"It could be more scalable."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product's price is reasonable."
"The licensing is for three years. In the beginning, we did not pay monthly, it was paid once for three years."
"I see how manageable and flexible the licenses are."
"You only have to purchase one license for multiple participants."
"I rate the price of Fortinet FortiMail Cloud a five on a one to ten scale, where one is the low price, and ten is the high price. It is an averagely priced product."
"A license for our company using FortiMail and FortiCare (filtering and support) was $4000."
"The price of this solution could be more competitive."
"The pricing depends on various factors, including the type of licenses and subscriptions you have procured"
"Symantec Messaging Gateway’s pricing is very cheap."
"The cost of Symantec Messaging Gateway is too expensive in general. However, the appliance also includes the price of the license in the same bundle."
"A subscription for technical support costs extra."
"For 150 users, we pay INR 1,60,000."
"It's a bit expensive compared to its competitor Barracuda Email Security Gateway but cheaper than Sophos Email."
"They're a little costly compared to Microsoft."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
10%
University
7%
Non Profit
6%
Hospitality Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
22%
Computer Software Company
16%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Fortinet FortiMail Cloud?
Content disarming and analysis are essential features in our email security setup
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiMail Cloud?
The price of Fortinet FortiMail Cloud in Egypt is very competitive against other products, including the setup cost and licensing of this solution.
What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiMail Cloud?
The improvement in Fortinet FortiMail Cloud can be made regarding the classification process itself because it has some false positives.
What needs improvement with Symantec Messaging Gateway?
The solution takes up a lot of memory. The system becomes slow. The performance must be improved.
What is your primary use case for Symantec Messaging Gateway?
We use the solution to secure our data and emails.
 

Also Known As

No data available
Symantec.cloud, Symantec Email Security.cloud
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data
Doric, Joblink Plus, Our Lady of Mercy College, Parramatta, PPB Advisory, Slater & Gordon Lawyers, Sydney Adventist Hospital Ltd.
Find out what your peers are saying about Fortinet FortiMail Cloud vs. Symantec Messaging Gateway and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.