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Hillstone E-Series vs Sophos Firewall comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 19, 2026

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

Hillstone E-Series
Ranking in Firewalls
40th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
SSL VPN (10th), Enterprise Infrastructure VPN (24th)
Sophos Firewall
Ranking in Firewalls
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
304
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Firewalls category, the mindshare of Hillstone E-Series is 0.9%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Sophos Firewall is 5.6%, down from 11.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Firewalls Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Sophos Firewall5.6%
Hillstone E-Series0.9%
Other93.5%
Firewalls
 

Featured Reviews

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.
Ashutosh Jha - PeerSpot reviewer
Project engineer at IT Solution india private limited
Robust protection has blocked external threats and provides clear visibility into user activity
Sophos Firewall offers multiple features, including IPS, IDS, ATP, NDR, XOps, web protection, application protection, web server protection, and many more. Out of all those features, I find web protection and application protection to be very helpful and valuable in my daily work. Sophos Firewall has positively impacted my organization by preventing outside threats, allowing me to easily monitor my users, and configuring any rule for any user regarding what they need to use and what I am restricting for the particular user. I can share that it has improved productivity because if anyone could ransom my network, they could demand money to decrypt the files, thus saving us money, time, and providing reliability.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature of the solution is the ransomware protection that the tool offers."
"The installation is easy, we have not had any complaints from our customers."
"I am impressed with the application filtering feature."
"This solution has two main features that we find very valuable; a threat-intelligence option, and a web/application filtering option. The technical support team are very good and very quick."
"The most valuable features of the Hillstone E-Series are its hardware capacity, innovation, and the throughput that the hardware can take."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"The initial setup was straightforward. It only took a few hours to deploy."
"If an organization is not looking for a web proxy, it's a very, very good product."
"If you have a small amount of money and you want to secure your network, Sophos XG can provide you with network security."
"The solution has saved me a lot of time and enhanced my workflow for my company."
"The most effective feature in enhancing our network security is the threat intelligence capability."
"I give Sophos XG an overall experience rating of nine out of ten."
"Sophos XGS' most valuable features are protection and intrusion prevention detection."
"Overall, everything about the solution works well; we haven't had any issues at all, the features on offer are great, it has pretty much everything we need, and the solution is very user-friendly."
"Sophos XGS that's a good firewall. If you use the endpoint, then you have what Sophos calls synchronized security. That will mean that if one of the endpoints is affected, it will be automatically set in isolation."
"It gives me a very good, stable connection in all tunnels."
 

Cons

"I am not sure if this solution offers active directory integration. Adding that feature will definitely be an advantage."
"Having frequent live webinars on a monthly basis would really help."
"Support from Hillstone E-Series has a shortcoming that needs improvement."
"The room for improvement would be the SSL VPN license cost."
"The solution doesn't have a web proxy built into the system like Sophos. This is something they should work to change."
"The licensing model is very complex with many subcategories of licenses you can purchase. They could make it more simplified for customers to understand."
"The tool provides just a general report. It does not provide a granular report. Hence, the tool should work on its reporting feature."
"SSL VPN license cost is not cheap."
"The SD-WAN feature isn't very good. It's there, but it doesn't work properly."
"It would be nice to have features like the network access control (NAC) that Cisco has for Identity Services Engine. In the next release, I would also like to see an increase in the performance of the processing units."
"The support service level agreement in regard to the amount of time needed to upgrade things is too low. It should be higher."
"It is complicated to get the reports if you are not experienced with Sophos."
"For the moment, managing the Sophos interface is a little bit challenging."
"If you try to implement it into the enterprise, it's absolutely impossible because there are no functionalities required by the enterprise, and it's a nightmare."
"Sophos' technical support has degraded in the last couple of years. They seem to need to ask a lot of questions, even with simple problems, and take a long time to provide solutions."
"Sophos XG does not have the ability to disconnect a user."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The licensing model is very complex with many subcategories of licenses you can purchase. They could make it more simplified for customers to understand."
"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."
"Hillstone's pricing is economical and neither very high nor very low."
"The cost per year for licensing, and hardware, is approximately $850 for the basic plan."
"The price of Sophos XGS is less than competitors worldwide. However, in Turkey the solution is expensive."
"Annual standard licensing fee."
"The solution is not expensive since one pays as he goes."
"The price is cheaper than that of some competing vendors."
"Sophos XG is a reasonably priced solution."
"The price is good for the moment."
"I live in Bolivia and the price of Sophos XGS is high. However, they have adjusted their price a little over the past while but the price could still be less expensive to be affordable."
"There is an annual licensing fee to use Sophos XGS. It is an expensive solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
16%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Construction Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise1
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business210
Midsize Enterprise61
Large Enterprise53
 

Questions from the Community

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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 the firewalls change every 5 to 7 years as stated but you really do need to upg...
Which is better - Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls or Sophos XG?
Palo Alto Networks NG Firewalls have both great features and performance. I like that Palo Alto has regular threat signatures and updates. I also appreciate that I can just import addresses and URL...
What are the main differences in features between Sophos XG and FortiGate 80F?
Hi Arvind P , The Sophos XG firewall has a number of models right from XG86 to XG135w under the 1U Desktop Form Factor. The Sophos XG appliance that offers a direct competition to the Fortigate 80...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Sophos XG, Sophos XGS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Bank of China Macao, Instituto Tecnológico Bolivariano, Ministry of Labor in San Salvador, FEDCO
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Hillstone E-Series vs. Sophos Firewall and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.