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Fortinet FortiOS vs Hillstone A-Series comparison

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Executive Summary

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 FortiOS
Ranking in Firewalls
19th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
8.0
Number of Reviews
82
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Hillstone A-Series
Ranking in Firewalls
49th
Average Rating
0.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiOS is 1.1%, down from 1.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Hillstone A-Series is 0.3%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Firewalls Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Fortinet FortiOS1.1%
Hillstone A-Series0.3%
Other98.6%
Firewalls
 

Featured Reviews

MS
Associate Director IT Operations at Procento
Single-pane management has simplified firewall control and has improved risk mitigation
I would not say that Fortinet FortiOS is not very scalable. Generally, what happens is that for enterprises, we hire consultants who do the capacity planning and sizing to determine what kind of firewalls to put in place. At the same time, it is not only the number of users; it also depends on the number of WAN links coming in and everything, because we have been using Fortinet for bandwidth shaping and many other bandwidth-related functions. They should improve their machine learning AI capabilities of Fortinet FortiOS because there is too much competition. Other players are also improving and making a lot of changes in their UI and overall operating system.
Albert-Wang - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Consultant at SiS Technologies
Good performance, responsive support, and an easy setup
We use the product for small and medium-sized businesses. Their scalability is good. They have a lot of choices based on their performance. Even on one unit, they have multiple ports to support customers so that they can connect to different devices. I'd rate the scalability nine 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

"Overall, I would rate FortiOS at least a nine out of ten."
"All networks are security-driven, we get throughputs and security. We feel that the people at Fortinet are easy to deal with from a support standpoint. If they need to jump in and help us, they're very willing to do that. Their email filtering, their data loss prevention, their intrusion prevention, type of products in the newest OSs has been outstanding."
"It efficiently manages large-scale firewall deployments."
"The solution has proven to be stable and reliable."
"Fortinet FortiOS is very effective and easy to use to configure."
"Because the solution is so robust and offers excellent the features we tend to enjoy using FortiOS."
"FortiOS's best features are its function as an internet gateway and how easy it is to manage."
"The user experience is great, and the graphical user interface is also good."
"The antivirus is very good."
 

Cons

"Sometimes, Fortinet FortiOS changes its CLI (command line interface) with new versions, which leads to internal incompatibility. When this happens, you need to update the configuration to match the new format, as the commands aren’t always the same. This can create some confusion and extra work because, unlike other vendors where the CLI commands remain primarily consistent with updates, Fortinet often changes the syntax between versions."
"FortiOS's stability could be better."
"The solution is good but could be improved by supporting an allocation of quota base management regarding user data."
"Some features I have found to be hidden and cannot be accessed through the graphical user interface, you can only access them through the command-line interface (CLI). All the features should be accessible through the graphical user interface."
"Their first-level support is often poorly trained."
"In terms of what needs improvements, the troubleshooting could use improvement. When we work with other products like Cisco ASA, Palo Alto, and Check Point, we see a big difference in the troubleshooting. It's not easy to find a report."
"I would like to see more statistics in the monitoring part."
"They're using a lot of application-specific IC, so that may be causing some performance issues. And whenever a Fortinet adds new features, it can affect performance."
"It would be helpful if they could integrate more with third-party security systems."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We pay an annual license fee. It is rather expensive so I would like to perhaps see a drop in price in the future."
"The cost is around $40,000."
"We had a three-year license to use Fortinet FortiOS and we are going to renew it this year."
"The scalability of Fortinet FortiOS is good. However, central management is intuitive for the end-users. We had a lot of questions about central management, and sometimes they didn't use it and did their firewall management directly on FortiGate instead of using Fortinet FortiOS."
"The solution is quite affordable and I rate the cost a four out of ten."
"It would be better if it were cheaper. We have the firewall in our office, and the license is expiring in 20 to 25 days. We got a quote for almost 80,000 Pakistani Rupees, which is a little costly."
"The solution could have a better licensing model. It's a bit more expensive than other solutions. The annual subscription is very pricy in Fortinet. The cost could be reduced."
"Be sure to choose a licensing plan that leaves a little headroom so performance is not an issue."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
11%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business43
Midsize Enterprise13
Large Enterprise23
No data available
 

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...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiOS?
I rate the pricing for FortiOS as eight or nine out of ten. It is an affordable solution for us.
What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiOS?
I would not say that Fortinet FortiOS is not very scalable. Generally, what happens is that for enterprises, we hire consultants who do the capacity planning and sizing to determine what kind of fi...
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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data
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Find out what your peers are saying about Fortinet, Netgate, Cisco and others in Firewalls. Updated: September 2026.
913,924 professionals have used our research since 2012.