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Illumio vs Microsoft Defender for Cloud comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 6, 2025

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

SentinelOne Singularity Clo...
Sponsored
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
4th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.9
Number of Reviews
108
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (6th), Cloud and Data Center Security (5th), Container Security (3rd), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (3rd), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (3rd), Compliance Management (2nd)
Illumio
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
12th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
Cloud and Data Center Security (2nd), Microsegmentation Software (3rd)
Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Ranking in Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
2nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
75
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (7th), Container Management (9th), Container Security (4th), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (4th), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (4th), Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (3rd), Microsoft Security Suite (4th), Compliance Management (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) category, the mindshare of SentinelOne Singularity Cloud Security is 2.5%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Illumio is 6.8%, up from 5.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is 13.9%, down from 17.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP)
 

Featured Reviews

Andrew W - PeerSpot reviewer
Tells us about vulnerabilities as well as their impact and helps to focus on real issues
Looking at all the different pieces, it has got everything we need. Some of the pieces we do not even use. For example, we do not have Kubernetes Security. We are not running any K8 clusters, so it is good for us. Overall, we find the solution to be fantastic. There can be additional education components. This may not be truly fair to them because of what the product is going for, but it would be great to see additional education for compliance. It is not a criticism of the tool per se, but anything to help non-development resources understand some of the complexities of the cloud is always appreciated. Any additional educational resources are always helpful for security teams, especially those without a development background.
Alark Singh - PeerSpot reviewer
Visual traffic interface aids in network micro-segmentation while a streamlined update option enhances process efficiency
The strongest aspect of Illumio is the visual traffic interface, which allows us to see all traffic that communicates with our servers and allied companies. We can write rules that can be embedded into the IP table, making it easy to handle. Illumio enables us to see network flows, traffic sources, and destinations. The policy generation and enforcement capabilities are valuable, allowing for selective enforcement. Illumio helps in audit purposes by saving data and showing blocked traffic, ensuring no outside traffic is allowed.
Vibhor Goel - PeerSpot reviewer
A single tool for complete visibility and addressing security gaps
Currently, issues are structured in Microsoft Defender for Cloud at severity levels of high, critical, or warning, but these severity levels are not always right. For example, Microsoft might consider a port being open as critical, but that might not be the case for our company. Similarly, it might suggest closing some management ports, but you might need them to be able to log in, so the severity levels for certain things can be improved. Even though Microsoft Defender for Cloud provides a way to temporarily disable certain alerts or notifications without affecting our security score, it would be better to have more granularized control over these recommendations. Currently, we cannot even disable certain alerts or notifications. There should be an automated mechanism to design Azure policies based on the recommendations, possibly with AI integration. Instead of an engineer having to write a policy to fix security gaps, which is very time-consuming, there should be an inbuilt capability to auto-remediate everything and have proper control in place. Additionally, enabling Defender for Cloud at the resource group level, rather than only at the subscription level, would be beneficial.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The user-friendly dashboard offers both convenience and security by providing quick access to solutions and keeping us informed of potential threats."
"PingSafe's graph explorer is a valuable tool that lets us visualize all connected services."
"The most valuable features of PingSafe are cloud misconfiguration, Kubernetes, and IaC scanning."
"Singularity Cloud Security's most valuable features are its ease of scalability and comprehensive security measures."
"Cloud Native Security helps us discover vulnerabilities in a cloud environment like open ports that allow people to attack our environment. If someone unintentionally opens a port, we are exposed. Cloud Native Security alerts us so we can remediate the problem. We can also automate it so that Cloud Native Security will fix it."
"PingSafe can integrate all your cloud accounts and resources you create in the AWS account, We have set it up to scan the AWS transfer services, EC2, security groups, and GitHub."
"PingSafe released a new security graph tool that helps us identify the root issue. Other tools give you a pass/fail type of profile on all misconfigurations, and those will run into the thousands. PingSafe's graphing algorithm connects various components together and tries to identify what is severe and what is not. It can correlate various vulnerabilities and datasets to test them on the back end to pinpoint the real issue."
"Singularity Cloud Native Security provides us with a platform to scan instances when they are getting created, and the dashboard helps us to identify the critical issues."
"The features that I have found most useful is the ability to centralize all the rules and then distribute them across various locations. However, I've encountered challenges related to tagging policies, which can be complex to devise. It's a matter that requires careful consideration and stakeholder involvement before implementing such policies."
"The tool helps with my company's security posture."
"I would recommend Illumio to all sizes of companies."
"The dependency map is most valuable feature."
"The Explorer allows you to know the traffic between source and destination."
"The flexibility of the solution is its most valuable feature."
"The strongest aspect of Illumio is the visual traffic interface, which allows us to see all traffic that communicates with our servers and allied companies."
"The solution is easy to use."
"The most valuable feature is the regulatory compliance aspect, where we utilize predefined initiatives like NIST. Alert management is another useful feature. Alerts are directly integrated with our email or DevOps board for easy viewing, allowing us to identify problem areas efficiently."
"Defender for Cloud is a plug-and-play solution that provides continuous posture management once enabled."
"Technical support is helpful."
"The most valuable features offer the latest threat detection and response capabilities."
"The solution is quite good and addresses many security gaps."
"The most valuable feature is the regulatory compliance aspect, where we utilize predefined initiatives like NIST."
"The dashboard is very good. It gives our clients a lot of information and allows them to have a complete overview of the system. Everything is visible in one glance."
"Defender for Cloud provides a complete DevOps security package for cloud services."
 

Cons

"Once all components, including the cloud piece and container runtime piece, integrate further and incorporate an AI layer for better comprehension, it will greatly enhance the utility of Singularity Cloud Security."
"Sometimes the Storyline ID is a bit wacky."
"We wanted it to provide us with something like Claroty Hub in AWS for lateral movement. For example, if an EC2 instance or a virtual machine is compromised in a public subnet based on a particular vulnerability, such as Log4j, we want it to not be able to reach some of our databases. This kind of feature is not supported in PingSafe."
"There's room for improvement in the graphic explorer."
"In version 2, a lot of rules have been deployed for Kubernetes security and CDR, which makes a lot of issues of critical severity, whereas they are not critical or of high severity. There is a mismatch of severities."
"I would like PingSafe's detections to be openly available online instead of only accessible through their portal. Other tools have detections that are openly available without going through the tool."
"If I had to pick a complaint, it would be the way the hosts are listed in the tool. You have different columns separated by endpoint name, Cloud Account, and Cloud Instances ID. I wish there was something where we could change the endpoint name and not use just the IP address. We would like to have custom names or our own names for the instances. If I had a complaint, that would be it, but so far, it meets all the needs that we have."
"The cost has the potential for improvement."
"We need more details on areas where there is an error or a traffic blockage. I would like the tool to offer a more detailed view."
"There should be an option to upgrade from the console to the latest version instead of performing manual upgrades. This would be more helpful to streamline processes."
"I would like to see better data security in the product."
"Some of the features that can be improved is offer additional guidance on creating an effective and risk-free tagging policy would be highly beneficial."
"The product’s agents don't work very well in OT environments."
"I have not had the chance to experiment deeply with it."
"The solution is very basic and doesn't do anything other than the orchestration of layer four endpoint firewall rules."
"It requires a low-level re-architecting of the product."
"The solution's portal is very easy to use, but there's one key component that is missing when it comes to managing policies. For example, if I've onboarded my server and I need to specify antivirus policies, there's no option to do that on the portal. I will have to go to Intune to deploy them. That is one main aspect that is missing and it's worrisome."
"Pricing could be improved. There are limited options based on pricing for the government."
"We would like to have better transparency as to how the security score is calculated because as it is now, it is difficult to understand."
"It's hard to reach someone who understands my problems. I haven't had many issues, so I haven't called them."
"Microsoft Defender for Cloud could be improved by adding capabilities for NetApp files and more PaaS resources from other vendors, not just Microsoft."
"There are challenges with the licensing policies, which are quite complicated."
"There should be an automated mechanism to design Azure policies based on the recommendations, possibly with AI integration. Instead of an engineer having to write a policy to fix security gaps, which is very time-consuming, there should be an inbuilt capability to auto-remediate everything and have proper control in place."
"I would like to see more connectors and plugins with other platforms."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's a fair price for what you get. We are happy with the price as it stands."
"It was reasonable pricing for me."
"The pricing is somewhat high compared to other market tools."
"SentinelOne provided competitive pricing compared to other vendors, and we are satisfied with the deal."
"The features included in PingSafe justify its price point."
"While I'm slightly out of touch with pricing, I know SentinelOne is much cheaper than other products."
"Pricing is based on modules, which was ideal for us."
"I wasn't sure what to expect from the pricing, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was a little less than I thought."
"The product's pricing is around 10,000-15,000 USD. The pricing is on a yearly basis."
"There is a subscription needed to use Illumio Adaptive Security Platform and we pay every three years. Overall the solution is expensive."
"I rate Microsoft Defender a three out of ten for affordability. The price could be a little lower."
"The product's pricing policy is generally favorable."
"Our clients complain about the cost of Microsoft Defender for Cloud."
"There is a helpful cost-reducing option that allows you to integrate production subscriptions with non-production subscriptions."
"Pricing is difficult because each license has its own metrics and cost."
"Microsoft Defender for Cloud is pricey, especially for Kubernetes clusters."
"Azure Defender is definitely pricey, but their competitors cost about the same. For example, a Palo Alto solution is the same price per endpoint, but the ground strikes cost a bit more than Azure Defender. Still, it's pricey for a company like ours. Maybe well-established organizations can afford it, but it might be too costly for a startup."
"I am not involved much with the pricing but the bundle offering is good."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
5%
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
15%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about PingSafe?
The dashboard gives me an overview of all the things happening in the product, making it one of the tool's best featu...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for PingSafe?
It is cost-effective compared to other solutions in the market.
What needs improvement with PingSafe?
The documentation could be better. Besides improving the documentation, obtaining a professional or partner specializ...
What do you like most about Illumio Adaptive Security Platform?
The features that I have found most useful is the ability to centralize all the rules and then distribute them across...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Illumio Adaptive Security Platform?
I do not have specific knowledge about pricing details as it is handled by upper management. I know that Illumio is t...
What needs improvement with Illumio Adaptive Security Platform?
There should be an option to upgrade from the console to the latest version instead of performing manual upgrades. Th...
How is Prisma Cloud vs Azure Security Center for security?
Azure Security Center is very easy to use, integrates well, and gives very good visibility on what is happening acros...
What do you like most about Microsoft Defender for Cloud?
The entire Defender Suite is tightly coupled, integrated, and collaborative.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Defender for Cloud?
Initially, the cost was reasonable, but additional services from Microsoft sometimes incur extra expenses that seem h...
 

Also Known As

PingSafe
Illumio Adaptive Security Platform, Illumio ASP
Microsoft Azure Security Center, Azure Security Center, Microsoft ASC, Azure Defender
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Plantronics, NTT Innovation Institute Inc.
Microsoft Defender for Cloud is trusted by companies such as ASOS, Vatenfall, SWC Technology Partners, and more.
Find out what your peers are saying about Illumio vs. Microsoft Defender for Cloud and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,589 professionals have used our research since 2012.