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Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance vs Proofpoint Email Protection comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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

Microsoft Purview Communica...
Ranking in Digital Risk Protection
6th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
GRC (12th), Microsoft Security Suite (32nd)
Proofpoint Email Protection
Ranking in Digital Risk Protection
3rd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
109
Ranking in other categories
Email Security (1st), Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (2nd), Office 365 Protection (1st), Secure Email Gateway (SEG) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Digital Risk Protection category, the mindshare of Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is 5.0%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Proofpoint Email Protection is 2.9%, up from 1.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Digital Risk Protection Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Proofpoint Email Protection2.9%
Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance5.0%
Other92.1%
Digital Risk Protection
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2840445 - PeerSpot reviewer
Data Engineering Senior Specialist at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Data lineage and quality checks have streamlined team-wide collaboration and business context
The biggest friction point or frustration I have encountered with Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is cost-wise it is acceptable, but sometimes unexpected errors will occur, though this happens very rarely. There are features I wish Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance had that it does not provide today. Enterprise-level lineage is one such feature. As of now, if Microsoft were to provide this tool for free when you buy Microsoft Fabric, I feel that would be better. This would also result in lower license costs. I do not have any changes I would make to Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance at this time.
Siva_Prasad - PeerSpot reviewer
Principal Consultant at Infosys
Email defenses have reduced phishing incidents and protect sensitive data across our enterprise
As things are evolving and threats develop in unpredictable ways, Proofpoint must adopt AI solutions and agentic solutions more aggressively and provide them to customers as part of service offerings. Inbuilt AI solutions would add more value and make Proofpoint a more premium choice for customers. With the help of AI solutions, agentic AI, and generative AI capabilities, the product would be more efficient than it currently is. Filtering false positives is highly challenging because it is impossible for humans to identify which emails are genuine and which are spam. Proofpoint should focus more on this area with back-end agents or other tools. Proofpoint should decide which emails are genuine and which are spam so it is not a challenge for end users. When receiving an email, end users should not have to determine whether to respond or not. Proofpoint should not release such spam emails and should strictly block such spam and spoof emails based on connection IPs. Currently, false positives occur in the product, and while this occurs in every product, it is an area where Proofpoint can focus on improving and reducing false positives. One email is enough for an end user to be deceived and lose money, so addressing this area is critical.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The features I appreciate the most in Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance include the ability to build cases, give them dates, and find them based on the notes that I left behind."
"Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance helps with extra collaboration and ensures communication is within the framework."
"Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance has impacted my organization positively; it is a good tool that provides an end-to-end business view for a particular organization."
"The time it saves is very useful."
"Customer support is excellent."
"Proofpoint Email Protection offers an additional layer of protection compared to other brands like Microsoft, Mimecast, and Barracuda. While these major companies excel at detecting malicious attachments, the solution goes further by analyzing the context of emails, allowing for more nuanced decision-making."
"The solution's technical support is good. I rate the technical support a ten out of ten."
"As a cloud-based product, it can scale well."
"The Phish Alarm button allows users to submit questionable emails for review and complete analysis."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to remove bad messages that were delivered, prior to being classified as unwanted."
"A lot of automation is present, and the quarantining of malicious emails and these processes are good and really help us in the investigation as well as the remediation part."
"The most valuable feature of Proofpoint Email Protection is the central location dashboard for viewing all the related information for risk."
"It's very good at identifying threats."
 

Cons

"The biggest friction point or frustration I have encountered with Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is cost-wise it is acceptable, but sometimes unexpected errors will occur, though this happens very rarely."
"Monitoring and compliance for web applications could be improved."
"The product should incorporate more automation with the help of AI."
"Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance can be improved by having more tutorials available for those who aren't used to using this platform."
"The downside is I feel the vendor support is a little lacking and should be more responsive."
"To improve Proofpoint Email Protection, I suggest improving the UI from the pod to align with the new admin.proofpoint.com interface, as the pod is still existing for a reason, but the interface is definitely outdated."
"They do not have an on-demand scan for the internal viruses and internal users, and they don't have a scan for the exchange server against viruses and spam as Symantec does."
"Proofpoint has a lot of false alarms. Even their mail flow rules are not the best thing."
"Proofpoint Email Protection could improve on the training. Every organization is different and to fine-tune it to block everything properly there needs to be better training. Sometimes it can block some of the information it shouldn't."
"As far as visibility goes, it is definitely attainable, but additional appliances must be purchased for Proofpoint. I would rate visibility at approximately 50 to 60 percent."
"The solution should add post-sales training."
"The scalability can be improved, and the solution can be optimized."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"Proofpoint is fairly expensive."
"Annually, it costs us about $92,000. This is pretty much what it costs us. There is no additional cost."
"It is on a yearly basis. Their floor for SMB doesn't matter. The user count is 100 users and below at $2,500 a year. Its cost is higher than other solutions. It is probably about 20% to 30% higher than what you would get with Microsoft. There are no additional costs. All costs are factored in. It can be improved pricing-wise so that it is affordable for the SMB market."
"Proofpoint Email Protection has comparable pricing."
"The licensing cost of Proofpoint Email Protection is a lot higher than other solutions, such as Barracuda."
"Customers pay around $90,000 yearly for a 1,000-user organization, with the subscription license being the main expense, apart from implementation fees."
"They are competitively priced, but I have been forced to get quotes for other solutions now because they haven't been responding to requests to do the work that we would like them to do."
"Proofpoint Email Protection is a reasonably priced product, which means that it is neither too low nor too high in terms of price."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business28
Midsize Enterprise24
Large Enterprise62
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance?
The biggest friction point or frustration I have encountered with Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is cost-wise it is acceptable, but sometimes unexpected errors will occur, though this h...
What advice do you have for others considering Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance?
The scope of Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is a team-wide workflow. The first thing I do when I open Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is check how many workspaces are availab...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance?
Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is a bit expensive, $500 per license, but it is cheaper compared to products like ComplyAd, GeoComply, and ComplyAdvantage.
What needs improvement with Proofpoint Email Protection?
The downside is I feel the vendor support is a little lacking and should be more responsive. The technical support is not up to the mark.
What is your primary use case for Proofpoint Email Protection?
I am leading this security domain, and my L1 and L2s have been using Proofpoint Email Protection and other modules of Proofpoint Email Protection for more than three years.We are currently working ...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Proofpoint Enterprise Protection, Proofpoint Digital Protection
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Blocket, University of Waterloo, Lincoln Memorial University, WellSpan Health, U-Haul, Carestream Health, Westinghouse
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance vs. Proofpoint Email Protection and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
908,834 professionals have used our research since 2012.