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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)
6th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Email (6th)
Symantec Messaging Gateway
Ranking in Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
5th
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 April 2025, in the Secure Email Gateway (SEG) category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiMail Cloud is 6.2%, up from 2.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Messaging Gateway is 5.0%, up from 4.9% 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

"If there is a problem somewhere Fortinet can act on it immediately. That is very important."
"The return on investment for us was achieved since we did not have similar incidents again in our environment."
"It has the best feature for processed mail analysis."
"One of the most beautiful benefits is its integration, as it can seamlessly integrate with any third-party email servers."
"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."
"This solution is easy to install. The deployment takes about forty-five minutes."
"I am impressed with the tool's ability to setup rules and destinations. It also helps to monitor suspicious items."
"This is a solid email monitoring and security system that learns and maintains a two-way dialog with email system administrators."
"Symantec is a secure product."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway has a good GUI, and it is very powerful in detecting viruses and spam."
"The feature that I like the best is the fingerprinting concept."
"The cloud-based interface is very user-friendly."
"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."
"It has very good capabilities for managing malware."
"The solution is highly customizable. You can make rules for domains and configure policies for spam or malware. Messaging Gateway is an on-prem solution, so it's useful for companies without a cloud presence."
"The most valuable features of Symantec Messaging Gateway are advanced content filtering, malware, and antivirus defense."
 

Cons

"There are no specific new features I would suggest at this moment."
"Email sorting is missing from this solution."
"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."
"Fortinet FortiMail Cloud doesn't have AI features, making it an outdated tool for me."
"Fortinet policies add an extra load to the endpoint."
"The product could be improved by extending reporting tools and adding options for notification."
"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."
"The downside of this solution is that it is difficult to implement policies on FortiMail."
"What's lacking when you compare it with Proofpoint and other threat protection solutions is that it does the basic stuff, but we need more advanced threat handling."
"It will provide Excel reports and PDF reports, but it would be great if they supported the concept of Crystal Reports."
"They have updated the version of the Messaging Gateway and the new features they are adding the need to be re-evaluated. They have done some changes on the policy."
"The biggest problem is it's an on-prem product and we're trying to get out of having equipment in data centers."
"The solution interface is from 2003 and is outdated. Symantec Messaging Gateway needs to update the interface."
"Messaging Gateway's advanced malware detection could be improved."
"They really need to create a good package that competes with Microsoft."
"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."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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 product's price is reasonable."
"The pricing depends on various factors, including the type of licenses and subscriptions you have procured"
"I see how manageable and flexible the licenses are."
"The licensing is for three years. In the beginning, we did not pay monthly, it was paid once for three years."
"The price of this solution could be more competitive."
"It's a bit expensive compared to its competitor Barracuda Email Security Gateway but cheaper than Sophos Email."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway’s pricing is very cheap."
"For 150 users, we pay INR 1,60,000."
"They're a little costly compared to Microsoft."
"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."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Hospitality Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Computer Software Company
20%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Government
9%
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?
FortiMail is cost-efficient, however, Symantec Mail Gateway and DLP solutions might be comparable.
What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiMail Cloud?
There are no specific new features I would suggest at this moment. FortiMail needs to develop further, particularly in integrating AI features, to keep up with rapidly advancing technology.
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: March 2025.
845,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.