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Proofpoint Email Protection vs Symantec Messaging Gateway comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 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

Proofpoint Email Protection
Ranking in Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
51
Ranking in other categories
Email Security (2nd), Security Awareness Training (2nd), Digital Risk Protection (3rd), Office 365 Protection (3rd)
Symantec Messaging Gateway
Ranking in Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
6th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Secure Email Gateway (SEG) category, the mindshare of Proofpoint Email Protection is 22.3%, up from 19.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Messaging Gateway is 2.7%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Secure Email Gateway (SEG)
 

Featured Reviews

AhmedRamadan - PeerSpot reviewer
Optimize email security with effective sandboxing and auto Pull for quarantine
Proofpoint is used as an email security gateway for big enterprises, primarily for their on-premises servers. Many customers also use it alongside Office 365 Proofpoint offers a complete solution for email security with features like DLP, email archiving, and encryption. The most valuable…
Girish Vijay - PeerSpot reviewer
A stable and reasonably priced solution that performs well and has a very good malware database
Since Symantec merged with Broadcom, they might have lost some good technical engineers. Maybe that’s the reason why the product is performing poorly. When we have a good marketing and sales team, even though our product cannot perform, we will sell it at a high price because of the buzzwords. However, at the end of the day, the product should perform. Most of the products might not perform. Symantec is a very good product, but the services are basic. I rate the technical features of the product a nine out of ten. However, I would rate the services provided by the solution a six out of ten. Overall, I rate the tool an eight out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution's technical support is good. I rate the technical support a ten out of ten."
"The tool has improved our workflow by ensuring people receive only the emails they need for work rather than being inundated with hundreds or thousands of unnecessary emails daily."
"The solution scales well."
"The anti-spam features are excellent on the email firewalls."
"Its main defense is to stop malicious emails from coming through. There is a sandbox environment where you can open malicious or suspicious emails to make sure that they're not malicious, instead of taking the risk of having your employees do it. This is definitely something that everybody needs nowadays, especially with the rise in cyber attacks."
"It is a very scalable solution."
"The most valuable features are the business email compromise protection and targeted attack prevention."
"The most valuable feature of Proofpoint Email Protection is the dashboards and their visibility, easy configuration, and artificial intelligence. Additionally, the reports are very important and helpful."
"The setup is pretty simple."
"The solution is highly customizable. You can make rules for domains and configure policies for spam or malware. Messaging Gateway is an on-prem solution, so it's useful for companies without a cloud presence."
"Symantec is a secure product."
"The solution is stable and the performance is good."
"The feature that I like the best is the fingerprinting concept."
"It has very good capabilities for managing malware."
"The anti-malware and spam features are valuable."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway is stable and scalable. Installation is easy, and the deployment and maintenance can be done by one administrative person."
 

Cons

"Proofpoint Email Protection could improve the Mail Trace feature and make navigation easier."
"The largest complaint that we hear from our customers is that there is no local support."
"The Secure Mail aspect should have an Outlook add-in, instead of an external dashboard that outside users have to access."
"The false positives are an issue."
"The incident reporting on offer needs to be improved. It's lacking right now. It should be on the platform somewhere."
"The scalability can be improved, and the solution can be optimized."
"You only receive one model in Proofpoint Email Protection and the other ones you have to purchase at a high price. There should be more available with the solution and additional models should be less expensive."
"There is room for improvement in detecting and preventing phishing attacks. While the solution performs well in some aspects, it struggles with phishing threats."
"The solution takes up a lot of memory."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway should include better exclusions and exceptions for better administration."
"Messaging Gateway's advanced malware detection could be improved."
"This product would benefit from better integration with Symantec Endpoint Protection."
"The product must improve the user dashboards."
"The false positive submissions must be improved."
"What's lacking when you compare it with Proofpoint and other threat protection solutions is that it does the basic stuff, but we need more advanced threat handling."
"The biggest problem is it's an on-prem product and we're trying to get out of having equipment in data centers."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is multiple times more expensive, which made it very much less attractive."
"The solution uses a licensing model that is reasonable compared to other products."
"I rate the price of Proofpoint Email Protection a four out of five."
"Annually, it costs us about $92,000. This is pretty much what it costs us. There is no additional cost."
"Proofpoint is fairly expensive."
"The licensing cost of Proofpoint Email Protection is a lot higher than other solutions, such as Barracuda."
"The end customer is buying our solution, which can be for monthly or annual usage depending on our payment and business model."
"In general, the pricing is competitive."
"It's a bit expensive compared to its competitor Barracuda Email Security Gateway but cheaper than Sophos Email."
"The cost of Symantec Messaging Gateway is too expensive in general. However, the appliance also includes the price of the license in the same bundle."
"They're a little costly compared to Microsoft."
"For 150 users, we pay INR 1,60,000."
"A subscription for technical support costs extra."
"Symantec Messaging Gateway’s pricing is very cheap."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
26%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
21%
Computer Software Company
20%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Proofpoint Email Protection?
In terms of pricing, it is okay compared to others. I would say it is normal. Additional costs do come in, but it enhances security.
What needs improvement with Proofpoint Email Protection?
In terms of improvement, the price could be better. Additionally, more security could be implemented.
What needs improvement with Symantec Messaging Gateway?
The solution takes up a lot of memory. The system becomes slow. The performance must be improved.
What is your primary use case for Symantec Messaging Gateway?
We use the solution to secure our data and emails.
 

Also Known As

Proofpoint Enterprise Protection, Cofense PhishMe, Proofpoint Digital Protection
Symantec.cloud, Symantec Email Security.cloud
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Blocket, University of Waterloo, Lincoln Memorial University, WellSpan Health, U-Haul, Carestream Health, Westinghouse
Doric, Joblink Plus, Our Lady of Mercy College, Parramatta, PPB Advisory, Slater & Gordon Lawyers, Sydney Adventist Hospital Ltd.
Find out what your peers are saying about Proofpoint Email Protection vs. Symantec Messaging Gateway and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
851,491 professionals have used our research since 2012.