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Hillstone E-Series vs Palo Alto Networks VM-Series comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 16, 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 FortiGate
Sponsored
Ranking in Firewalls
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
581
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (2nd), Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) (1st), Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions (1st), WAN Edge (1st), ZTNA (1st), Unified Threat Management (UTM) (1st)
Hillstone E-Series
Ranking in Firewalls
39th
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
SSL VPN (9th), Enterprise Infrastructure VPN (24th)
Palo Alto Networks VM-Series
Ranking in Firewalls
12th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
66
Ranking in other categories
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (11th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiGate is 18.7%, down from 20.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Hillstone E-Series is 0.4%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Palo Alto Networks VM-Series is 1.5%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Firewalls Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Fortinet FortiGate18.7%
Palo Alto Networks VM-Series1.5%
Hillstone E-Series0.4%
Other79.4%
Firewalls
 

Featured Reviews

Vasu Gala - PeerSpot reviewer
Manager, Information Technology Operation/Presales at TechMonarch
A stable solution with an intuitive interface and quick customer service
I have been working with Fortinet FortiGate, WatchGuard, Sophos, and SonicWall. I'm not as comfortable with SonicWall because of their UI and limitations. I prefer Fortinet above all other options. When it comes to configuration, I am confident in my ability to handle various tasks, including creating policies such as firewall rules, web policies, and application policies. Additionally, I can configure VPNs and implement load balancing, among other tasks. Overall, I feel much more comfortable working with Fortinet. Fortinet has made significant improvements by integrating AI with firewalls for threat analysis and prevention. In the past 2-3 years, they have launched FortiSASE and SIEM, and they also provide SOC services. Both Palo Alto and Fortinet FortiGate are excellent. While Fortinet FortiGate comes at higher prices, the functionality and support justify the cost. They promptly resolve firmware issues and inform all support providers about configuration changes.
TahirMahmood - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Manager at Zubair Feeds
Offers good features like URL filtering, IPS, and IDS to users
We received an update for the tool in July. The update was provided for the tool as there was a problem with the firewall, where too much memory was consumed, and the firewall was hanging a lot. When we updated the tool's features, everything became okay. The tool only had some memory-related problems. It took the tool a month to fix the issues.
AV
Cyber security consultant at L&T Technology Services
Enhance cybersecurity for large enterprises using advanced threat management
An improvement could be the integration of security intelligence with Palo Alto cloud via APIs. This would allow IOCs, domains, and hash values to be automatically entered, reducing manual entry. Integration with CSIRT across all use levels would make it easier for administrators to stay updated on the blocked entities without manual intervention.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Fortinet FortiGate SWG's content is its most valuable feature."
"The firewalls are valuable for threat prevention."
"The web filtering feature and the intrusion protection system are the most valuable. It is a resilient appliance. I never had an issue with it in terms of any security breaches."
"What I appreciate the most about Fortinet FortiGate is that it has a very large integration using Fabric, which they call Fabric Connectors."
"The most important features of Fortinet FortiGate are the Intrusion Prevention System (IPS) and firewall control applications."
"This is an easy solution to deploy."
"With Fortinet FortiGate, we improved security significantly."
"Fortigate's most valuable feature is that it doesn't need a push policy when writing rules."
"Working with the Hillstone E-Series has, from a remote perspective, allowed me to give my clients a secure connectivity."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"The installation is easy, we have not had any complaints from our customers."
"Five out of five ROI."
"The most valuable features of the Hillstone E-Series are its hardware capacity, innovation, and the throughput that the hardware can take."
"I am impressed with the application filtering feature."
"The initial setup was straightforward. It only took a few hours to deploy."
"The most valuable feature of the Hillstone E-Series is its user-friendliness."
"The feature that I have found the most useful is that it meets all our requirements technically."
"It has the ability to create Palo Alto VM-series using software."
"Overall, I give Palo Alto Networks VM-Series a rating of nine out of ten."
"In Palo Alto the most important feature is the App-ID."
"We can monitor the traffic manually and detect threats. Additionally, we can block different IP addresses and URLs."
"Palo Alto Networks VM-Series has everything centralized. You have the VPN solution, firewall, routing, UDR, flexibility, updates, and full visibility of your traffic."
"The most valuable feature is the Posture Assessment."
"With the improved visibility we now have, the traffic is being properly monitored, which means that we are better able to manage it. These are improvements that we saw very quickly."
 

Cons

"The feature which gives us a lot of pain is ASIC architecture."
"We can't identify which users are causing challenges when we have issues."
"Fortinet FortiGate could improve their documentation on forward error correction and failover technologies."
"Support could be improved."
"They could continuously focus their improvements on network perimeter security, as that's what they're best at."
"It needs more available central management."
"FortGate's IPS reporting could be made better by giving more details regarding the source and destination of network traffic when it comes to the overview section. This would allow me to more easily follow the flow of traffic based on IP addresses, without having to integrate the IPS with other products that perform more sophisticated traffic analysis."
"The biggest "gotcha" is that if the client purchases what they call the UTM shared bundle, which has unified threat management on both, it's not as easy to manage if you have more than one firewall."
"The tool needs to improve its price."
"The current usage reporting is very basic."
"Having frequent live webinars on a monthly basis would really help."
"I am not sure if this solution offers active directory integration. Adding that feature will definitely be an advantage."
"The tool provides just a general report. It does not provide a granular report. Hence, the tool should work on its reporting feature."
"Support from Hillstone E-Series has a shortcoming that needs improvement."
"SSL VPN license cost is not cheap."
"The solution doesn't have a web proxy built into the system like Sophos. This is something they should work to change."
"The performance of VM instances has some limitations in terms of threshold and throughput compared to appliances."
"When managing the firewall, it involves a Strata Cloud web browser that requires improvement to enhance deployment ease and call center efficiency."
"There are some delays that I have observed when my company communicates with Palo Alto's support engineers."
"Integrative capabilities with other solutions should be addressed."
"The scalability could be improved further."
"We have run into some issues with scaling and limitations associated with some of the configurations."
"The solution needs to improve its visibility. It's not straightforward to use. Understanding the policies, authorizations, and initializing features requires careful review. The product needs to offer proper training."
"Just sometimes it can be a bit sluggish navigating through pages. That is just purely because of Java.​"
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Compared to other firewall products, it's a little cheaper in terms of pricing."
"It is more affordable than Check Point and Palo Alto. Another thing is that all the features and the OS remain the same irrespective of the size of the device. Pricing-wise, Fortinet typically provides one-year support with the firewall appliance. There is also an option for three years which is how their licensing works."
"The pricing of Fortinet FortiGate is average, not cheap or overly expensive compared to other firewall solutions in the market. It's effective and affordable for customers."
"We are on an annual license to use Fortinet FortiGate."
"Fortinet FortiGate is cost-efficient. Palo Alto is expensive, but Fortinet FortiGate is not."
"In my opinion, the pricing of the product is reasonable."
"Fortinet is the least expensive solution."
"The price of FortiGate is average and I would say that based on the top five products available on the market, it is in the affordable range."
"Hillstone's pricing is economical and neither very high nor very low."
"The tool's pricing is reasonable. It depends on the model. The product's pricing is around 600 USD. You need to buy a software license to activate the features. You need to pay around 150 USD for that."
"The cost per year for licensing, and hardware, is approximately $850 for the basic plan."
"The licensing model is very complex with many subcategories of licenses you can purchase. They could make it more simplified for customers to understand."
"It is an expensive product."
"I rate Palo Alto Networks VM-Series pricing an eight out of ten."
"There is a need to make payments toward a yearly subscription-based model in which you need to add modules that you want to use in your company."
"We used BYOL, because of the cost to own."
"The product's most valuable feature is pricing."
"The price is not bad. They have a yearly renewal fee, and the pricing is exactly where we expect it to be."
"​The licensing is pretty much like everyone else."
"AWS is available as a AMI that you can purchase from the AWS Marketplace. Therefore, you need to purchase the licensing, since it is per AMI. Then, you deploy it on a regular EC2. Then, for on-premise, you can use both Palo Alto's software and hardware."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Comms Service Provider
16%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Educational Organization
7%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
University
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business357
Midsize Enterprise133
Large Enterprise189
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise1
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business29
Midsize Enterprise17
Large Enterprise24
 

Questions from the Community

Which is the better NGFW: Fortinet Fortigate or Cisco Firepower?
When you compare these firewalls you can identify them with different features, advantages, practices and usage a...
What is the biggest difference between Sophos XG and FortiGate?
From my experience regarding both the Sophos and FortiGate firewalls, I personally would rather use FortiGate. I know...
What are the biggest technical differences between Sophos UTM and Fortinet FortiGate?
As a solution, Sophos UTM offers a lot of functionality, it scales well, and the stability and performance are quite ...
What needs improvement with Hillstone E-Series?
We received an update for the tool in July. The update was provided for the tool as there was a problem with the fire...
What is your primary use case for Hillstone E-Series?
I use the solution in my company for site-to-site VPN, SSL VPNs, URL filtering, IPS, IDS and all the other features w...
What advice do you have for others considering Hillstone E-Series?
Our company did not use the tool's micro-segmentation features. There were no issues while integrating the tool. I ha...
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...
How does Azure Firewall compare with Palo Alto Networks VM Series?
Both products are very stable and easily scalable. The setup of Azure Firewall is easy and very user-friendly and the...
 

Also Known As

Fortinet FortiGate Next-Generation Firewall
No data available
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Dell, HP, Oracle, Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Vodafone, Orange, BT Group, Telstra, Deutsche Telekom, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, CenturyLink, NTT Communications, Tata Communications, SoftBank, China Mobile, Singtel, Telus, Rogers Communications, Bell Canada, Telkom Indonesia, Telkom South Africa, Telmex, Telia Company, Telkom Kenya
Bank of China Macao, Instituto Tecnológico Bolivariano, Ministry of Labor in San Salvador, FEDCO
Warren Rogers Associates
Find out what your peers are saying about Hillstone E-Series vs. Palo Alto Networks VM-Series and other solutions. Updated: February 2026.
881,821 professionals have used our research since 2012.