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Palo Alto Networks WildFire vs Symantec Advanced Threat Protection comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 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

Palo Alto Networks WildFire
Ranking in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
72
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Symantec Advanced Threat Pr...
Ranking in Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
24th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
16
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) category, the mindshare of Palo Alto Networks WildFire is 6.7%, down from 10.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Advanced Threat Protection is 2.1%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Palo Alto Networks WildFire6.7%
Symantec Advanced Threat Protection2.1%
Other91.2%
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2695164 - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Security Specialist at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
Advanced threat detection has protected critical document workflows and checks suspicious files
I would say the setup and putting together the hierarchy within the devices was not straightforward. There were many reboots and reconfigurations while the optimal setup was established. However, we were happy with the device. The setup process could be easier to establish the cluster. It should be easier to establish the Palo Alto Networks WildFire cluster between the devices. We had some difficulty with it, but it was not catastrophic. The operation and usability itself is what I was happy with.
Dennis O'Reilly - PeerSpot reviewer
Cyber SecOps Principal at Dotcom Security
Provides end-to-end antivirus protection and has good stability
Symantec Endpoint Protection provides end-to-end protection. Along with antivirus protection, it has a lot of key areas, including intrusive prevention, firewall features, and application and device control. It can integrate with other Broadcom solutions, such as Symantec Messaging Gateway and Symantec DLP. If you want to send an email, it gets scanned through endpoint protection and DLP. We get all Symantec functionality in a single pane.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Integrating Palo Alto Networks WildFire with various security protocols similar to a firewall has significantly improved the overall threat detection capabilities in our organization."
"From my perspective, Palo Alto is the best solution in the market."
"It gives a more accurate assessment of a virus in terms of whether it's truly a virus, malware, or a false positive."
"Stability is never a concern."
"The solution handles DSD segregation and monitors the gateways"
"Wildfire has excellent features and offers some of the best security measures available, although it requires a significant budget."
"My primary use case for this solution is for a secure gateway."
"If you're running Palo Alto firewalls there is no reason not to use it at the free level."
"The incident management on the solution is very good. You get a lot of detailed information about an incident. You also get a lot of documentation in connection with the CVI or integration."
"The Application Control code and the easy integration are valuable features."
"They manage to solve detection quite nicely, with rather elaborate detection compared to other providers, and Symantec also provides a useful set of information linked to each of the attacked computers."
"What I like most about Symantec Advanced Threat Protection is its notification capability."
"The technical support services are excellent."
"They have a very simple and easy implementation; they have been around for a long time, and they have been very easy to deploy, support, and manage."
"The great advantage in using this product is it creates multiple services."
"Currently we have 800-plus nodes connected with this solution, without any issues. The solution is scalable."
 

Cons

"There are more specialized solutions that compete with Wildfire. Therefore, they need to work on their machine learning and AI to be more competitive."
"Technical support is alright but we have to wait for a while."
"In terms of what I'd like to see in the next release of Palo Alto Networks WildFire, each release is based on malware that has been identified."
"​The VPN and decryption need improvement."
"The only complaint that we receive from our customers is in regards to the price."
"The price of WildFire should be reduced in order to make it more affordable for our customers."
"Any enhancements should likely be focused on the firewall appliance to further strengthen overall security capabilities, such as refining app and user identity features."
"Many years back an update caused an issue with the firewall. However, Palo Alto not only informed us of said issue, they also sent an update that fixed the issue before I even had time to log in to determine if the issue affected our services."
"Solutions like CrowdStrike, ESET, and SentinelOne have really jumped ahead on behavioral and algorithm-based detection capabilities. Symantec is trying to catch up, but they still have some limitations of being an old-school AV protection program and adding AI and behavioral learning and detection algorithm."
"There are limits with respect to blocking files by hash value or blocking IP addresses, and these limits should be removed."
"The endpoint protection looks old."
"It's a strange situation where the infrastructure of the consumer or customer is behind some kind of firewall and they have always used some kind of customized proxy. In this situation, the ATP has a very tough time to pass the information to the cloud and back. To fix, it requires a more elaborate and complex configuration for that particular case."
"Symantec appliances need improvement. The whole appliance environment is a robust system and it needs a massive amount of storage space. If you have to increase or speed up the background storage it's a pretty complicated process. The scalability and sizing is critical, and if you do it wrong you run into issues pretty quickly."
"One area for improvement could be the pricing model."
"Scalability could be better."
"Entire threat protection is not available for the advanced features."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's not particularly cheap, but it is absolutely worth it."
"I rate the pricing an eight out of ten since it can be pretty expensive."
"It depends on the features. Additional features cost additional money as well."
"The pricing is affordable and fixed."
"The solution is a bit expensive."
"Pricing could be improved."
"I think they should lower the price of this solution"
"The price of Palo Alto Networks WildFire could improve. It is expensive. There is an annual subscription to use the solution."
"Pricing is good. It is nice to have a great product at a fair price."
"The pricing of this solution is inexpensive and affordable."
"The price is quite expensive."
"Symantec Advanced Threat Protection's pricing is comparable."
"Symantec Endpoint Protection has an average price."
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Comparison Review

it_user206346 - PeerSpot reviewer
Security Consultant at Webernetz.net - Network Security Consulting
Mar 11, 2015
Cisco ASA vs. Palo Alto Networks
Cisco ASA vs. Palo Alto: Management Goodies You often have comparisons of both firewalls concerning security components. Of course, a firewall must block attacks, scan for viruses, build VPNs, etc. However, in this post I am discussing the advantages and disadvantages from both vendors concerning…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
10%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Outsourcing Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Marketing Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business38
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise29
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise13
 

Questions from the Community

How does Cisco Firepower NGFW Firewall compare with Palo Alto Networks Wildfire?
The Cisco Firepower NGFW Firewall is a very powerful and very complex piece of anti-viral software. When one considers that fact, it is all the more impressive that the setup is a fairly straightf...
Which is better - Wildfire or FortiGate?
FortiGate has a lot going for it and I consider it to be the best, most user-friendly firewall out there. What I like the most about it is that it has an attractive web dashboard with very easy nav...
How does Cisco ASA Firewall compare with Palo Alto's WildFire?
When looking to change our ASA Firewall, we looked into Palo Alto’s WildFire. It works especially in preventing advanced malware and zero-day exploits with real-time intelligence. The sandbox featu...
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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Novamedia, Nexon Asia Pacific, Lenovo, Samsonite, IOOF, Sinogrid, SanDisk Corporation
ECI
Find out what your peers are saying about Palo Alto Networks WildFire vs. Symantec Advanced Threat Protection and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
914,109 professionals have used our research since 2012.