No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Hillstone E-Series vs Zscaler Cloud Firewall comparison

Why PeerSpot?
 

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

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)
Zscaler Cloud Firewall
Ranking in Firewalls
34th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
20
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 Zscaler Cloud Firewall is 1.0%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Firewalls Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Zscaler Cloud Firewall1.0%
Hillstone E-Series0.9%
Other98.1%
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.
Farzad Ebrahimi - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Devsecops Cloud Cybersecurity Specialist at CGI
Cloud data protection has improved and automation reduces manual security tasks
The best features that Zscaler Cloud Firewall offers are that it is AI powered and automated. The automation especially reduces manual tasks as we used to have lots of manual activities for such services. Reporting is very powerful regarding the features of Zscaler Cloud Firewall. Zscaler Cloud Firewall has positively impacted my organization by increasing ROI, especially by reducing costs.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Working with the Hillstone E-Series has, from a remote perspective, allowed me to give my clients secure connectivity from a remote location to their offices or their servers."
"The most valuable features of the Hillstone E-Series are its hardware capacity, innovation, and the throughput that the hardware can take."
"With Hillstone, TCO and ROI are very good, it's an easy sale."
"I am impressed with the application filtering feature."
"Very reliable solution with good scalability and straightforward implementation."
"Five out of five ROI."
"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 feature of the solution is the ransomware protection that the tool offers."
"Zscaler has a good foothold in the market and any new competitor will have to be cognizant of the fact that they will have to be affordable and provide all of the features Zscaler has while being good at threat analysis and filtering."
"The initial setup is straightforward."
"The solution offers good sandboxing."
"Zscaler Cloud Firewall has positively impacted my organization by increasing ROI, especially by reducing costs."
"I like the ease of deployment and its flexibility. We don't need to deal with license, quotes, procurement, delivery, and installation. Everything is software-based, and it's very easy to operate."
"We like URL filtering, category filtering, and content filtering."
"I like the advanced tech protection Cloud Sandbox, it's a nice feature."
"Zscaler is still a very good product."
 

Cons

"The tool only had some memory-related problems."
"SSL VPN license cost is not cheap."
"Having frequent live webinars on a monthly basis would really help."
"Support from Hillstone E-Series has a shortcoming that needs improvement."
"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 room for improvement would be the SSL VPN license cost."
"The tool provides just a general report. It does not provide a granular report. Hence, the tool should work on its reporting feature."
"I am not sure if this solution offers active directory integration. Adding that feature will definitely be an advantage."
"Pricing is a challenge."
"There are some areas it could improve when it comes to blocking, we have to block some things manually."
"Apart from the issues associated with the product in areas like the DC performance issues and DC failover, Zscaler Cloud Firewall's IP should not have a proxy IP."
"Its technical support services could be better."
"The needed improvements involve scalability, which is something I wish they would address."
"Certain criteria need to be met if you want to scale this solution."
"Zscaler doesn't do intra site segmentation, therefore, if you want segmentation within a branch office, that kind of traffic flow is not well addressed."
"The issue right now is probably that Zscaler is not providing web browser isolation. Another solution, Menlo, offers this. For one customer, we had to send traffic to Menlo to do the isolation for us. It was requested by the customer so that they could integrate any iframe. Zscaler needs to add this type of feature in their next release."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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 licensing model is very complex with many subcategories of licenses you can purchase. They could make it more simplified for customers to understand."
"The cost per year for licensing, and hardware, is approximately $850 for the basic plan."
"It comes at a significantly reduced cost while ensuring control and effectiveness."
"It is not the most budget-friendly solution, but it's important to consider its overall value."
"There are licensing costs, and I would not say that it's a cheap vendor."
"Zscaler is priced too high compared to the cost of Fortinet."
"It is expensive for small businesses."
"There are different subscription models available."
"The product is a bit expensive compared to the solutions offered by its competitors, like Palo Alto. There is a need to make yearly payments towards the license in charges associated with the product."
"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing an eight out of ten."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Firewalls solutions are best for your needs.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
16%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Construction Company
11%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise1
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise13
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
Which lesser known firewall product has the best chance at unseating the market leaders?
Netscope, Zscaler if they continue route they are on now. FIrewalls needs great deal of automation on each end, datacenter and endpoint. In between you have branch office. So blending EPP and firew...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zscaler Cloud Firewall?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing was fine.
What needs improvement with Zscaler Cloud Firewall?
I think Zscaler Cloud Firewall can be improved by adding more features. The needed improvements involve scalability, which is something I wish they would address.
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Bank of China Macao, Instituto Tecnológico Bolivariano, Ministry of Labor in San Salvador, FEDCO
Zenith Live, Azure, Carlsberg Group
Find out what your peers are saying about Hillstone E-Series vs. Zscaler Cloud Firewall and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.