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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
23
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 July 2025, in the Secure Email Gateway (SEG) category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiMail Cloud is 4.8%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Messaging Gateway is 2.6%, up from 1.9% 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

"The encryption features are most valuable to us."
"This is a solid email monitoring and security system that learns and maintains a two-way dialog with email system administrators."
"The scanners with FortiMail are valuable."
"Cost-wise, it's a bit expensive, but it's totally worth it."
"FortiMail Cloud is very fast."
"Overall, it is a comprehensive and reliable solution."
"The return on investment for us was achieved since we did not have similar incidents again in our environment."
"The quarantine feature of FortiMail is the most valuable, as it quarantines emails based on my policies."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway is stable and scalable. Installation is easy, and the deployment and maintenance can be done by one administrative person."
"Symantec is a secure product."
"Messaging Gateway is stable."
"The solution is "set and forget". You pay for it and everything is done for you."
"The feature that I like the best is the fingerprinting concept."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is the content filtering policies because the solution offers huge options for configuration, such as hardware manipulation, et cetera, and the dictionaries make the work easier."
"Symantec’s spyware and malware signature database is very good compared to other products."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway has a huge knowledge base about phishing, spamming, spoofing, etc."
 

Cons

"This ease of use and user-friendliness is something we believe could be improved in FortiMail."
"We can't import files into the Fortinet FortiMail Cloud sensors. That's a drawback, as they need to provide a feature to import files."
"The tool's UI can be simple since it's cluttered now and you can't understand where you are going. It's not obvious to find out the menus or things that you are looking to find."
"They could look at strengthening anti-spam with the newly observed domains."
"The price is relatively expensive."
"The URL filtering and handling should be enhanced because it doesn't support all languages. I believe that this would be easy to enhance in the future."
"I can't see the feedback to the FortiMail gateway."
"The customer service and technical support from Fortinet could improve. While they rate between seven and eight, reaching support can sometimes be challenging and time-consuming."
"We've had issues in the past where the user finds spam, and Symantec does not recognize it as spam."
"Sometimes the solution picks up false positive for viruses during scans."
"It will provide Excel reports and PDF reports, but it would be great if they supported the concept of Crystal Reports."
"The product must improve the user dashboards."
"The solution takes up a lot of memory."
"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."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway should include better exclusions and exceptions for better administration."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It should cost around $60,000. We bought it as a bundle, so everything comes together in the license. That is standard."
"When we're talking about pricing, other products have about the same price. That is normal."
"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."
"The pricing depends on various factors, including the type of licenses and subscriptions you have procured"
"You only have to purchase one license for multiple participants."
"The price of this solution could be more competitive."
"A license for our company using FortiMail and FortiCare (filtering and support) was $4000."
"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."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway’s pricing is very cheap."
"A subscription for technical support costs extra."
"For 150 users, we pay INR 1,60,000."
"They're a little costly compared to Microsoft."
"It's a bit expensive compared to its competitor Barracuda Email Security Gateway but cheaper than Sophos Email."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Hospitality Company
6%
Non Profit
6%
Financial Services Firm
23%
Computer Software Company
18%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
5%
 

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 pricing for Fortinet FortiMail Cloud seems a bit high, although it is considered acceptable for the product's value. The solution provides cost-saving and scalable options, especially in a clou...
What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiMail Cloud?
The flexibility of the product is an area that could be improved. It would be beneficial to enhance flexibility for better adaptation to various customer environments.
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: June 2025.
860,592 professionals have used our research since 2012.