Areas of FortiSASE that could be improved or enhanced in future releases are related to being more open to supporting third-party integrations. FortiSASE needs to ensure compatibility with other third-party vendors, as the solution is built on top of Fortinet's existing fabric, making it part of the Fortinet ecosystem. If third-party vendors could be integrated and supported, enabling two-way communication, it would greatly enhance the solution compared to competitors such as Netskope and Zscaler.
Head Vice President, Delivery at Gehnax Technologies LLP
Reseller
Top 20
Jun 25, 2025
For other solutions such as FortiAnalyzer and FortiSIEM, integration is easy, but it's not straightforward due to license complexity. As FortiSASE is new in the market in India, if you want to use a Delhi data center, you need a separate license, and if you have a different kind of firewall, you cannot transfer your license from one box to another box. FortiSASE implementation is too complex where other products take two to three months or maximum four months to implement, FortiSASE took more than double that time. The product appears to have been launched without being tested properly in real market conditions. While testing may have been done in lab environments, real-time scenarios seem to be missing from this solution. The SPA licenses are limited to the box UTM, UTM make and model. If someone has a UTM currently and plans to upgrade or downgrade in the coming year after procuring the SPA license for three years, they cannot transfer those licenses to another box, which is a challenge that needs improvement.
Product & Services Integrator at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Reseller
Top 10
Apr 24, 2025
I believe the SASE solution from Fortinet requires improvement by developing a cloud management platform that handles tasks like setting up SD-WAN and automating firmware updates. Additionally, I find the current setup to be more complicated due to the involvement of multiple platforms, unlike the simpler setup provided by Cato. I think Fortinet should offer more self-service options and automation for firmware updates.
They are trying to improve the features of FortiSASE, however, few FortiGate can connect through FortiSASE for LAN to WAN connection while connectivity from outside to inside is OK with SPA(Secure Private Access) feature.
If they had application segmentation, we could give secure access to applications. That is not there. I had security challenges, again, with regard to the Internet connectivity. Sometimes the agent will not install properly. There are some issues at the agent level, and then we have to sign out and sign in. Those basic troubleshooting steps. We have some issues with that at the agent level.
The current high-tech version of FortiSASE is not recommended due to its heavy loading. Additionally, its pricing is not suitable for handling high-scale, complex traffic. Deploying and managing reports still requires significant time and effort. An endpoint solution is required to enable enterprises to configure and manage digital user experiences, especially in the IT department. They aim to monitor every console, department, and user experience and provide a general report. Fortinet offers extensive integration capabilities, which depend on the size and framework of your organization.
The product is new in the market, so I feel that there are a lot of developments to be done in the solution. The GUI and connectivity, along with the support offered, are some of the areas of concern in the product where improvements are required.
Though in our company, we use some endpoint security, the malware still bypasses the firewall, which is something that we should generally have been able to catch with the endpoint security in place. The aforementioned area needs to be considered for improvement. In terms of security, FortiSASE needs to be better. Security and support are two areas with certain shortcomings in the product where improvements are required.
Technology Architect SASE/SD-WAN at a tech consulting company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
May 1, 2023
The security suite is comprehensive, they typically check all boxes when it comes to features and functionalities. However, the high-availability architecture is not as flexible. The company is more of a firewall company, and its SASE product takes a different approach than other products, which are built around SD-WAN with security on top. This results in some drawbacks when it comes to firewall HA. The portal, UI, and management are coming up to speed in terms of maturity in the SASE marketplace, but they still feel more like a firewall portal. There are still some improvements that need to be made. However, with each release, things are getting better. I think that SD-WAN, specifically on the front-end, still has some issues with scaling in a full mesh network. Typically, SD-WAN uses a hub and spoke architecture. However, based on the distributed architecture of SASE, we are seeing enormous environments for large-scale full mesh networks. These networks have issues with scaling, and I understand that there are also some caveats with failover. I think that further development in this area should focus on large-scale networks.
They need to have more concise or precise ways to come up with the return on investment for convincing or presenting this to customers. Most customers think that with the SD1 and the phase solutions, they're going to have optimizations. It's not always like that, at least not in a direct way. You have to come up with a very complex way to make them understand. They need to have a clear, marketed way to present this as an investment that will have a good return for the customers and not only as an optimization of technology. Mobile devices are not covered enough. That's something that I would like to see for the FortiSASE solutions. There are a lot of customers or end users that are reaching their networks through their phones or through their tablets. And that area is not covered widely enough by FortiSASE.
FortiSASE is a comprehensive security solution that combines SD-WAN, security, and Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA) capabilities in a single platform. It provides secure access to applications and data from any device, anywhere, and at any time. FortiSASE offers advanced threat protection, real-time visibility, and control over network traffic, ensuring that organizations can securely connect their users and devices to the cloud and on-premises resources. With FortiSASE, organizations can...
Areas of FortiSASE that could be improved or enhanced in future releases are related to being more open to supporting third-party integrations. FortiSASE needs to ensure compatibility with other third-party vendors, as the solution is built on top of Fortinet's existing fabric, making it part of the Fortinet ecosystem. If third-party vendors could be integrated and supported, enabling two-way communication, it would greatly enhance the solution compared to competitors such as Netskope and Zscaler.
The secured browser of FortiSASE has room for improvement. Palo Alto has a more mature security browser than Fortinet.
For other solutions such as FortiAnalyzer and FortiSIEM, integration is easy, but it's not straightforward due to license complexity. As FortiSASE is new in the market in India, if you want to use a Delhi data center, you need a separate license, and if you have a different kind of firewall, you cannot transfer your license from one box to another box. FortiSASE implementation is too complex where other products take two to three months or maximum four months to implement, FortiSASE took more than double that time. The product appears to have been launched without being tested properly in real market conditions. While testing may have been done in lab environments, real-time scenarios seem to be missing from this solution. The SPA licenses are limited to the box UTM, UTM make and model. If someone has a UTM currently and plans to upgrade or downgrade in the coming year after procuring the SPA license for three years, they cannot transfer those licenses to another box, which is a challenge that needs improvement.
I believe the SASE solution from Fortinet requires improvement by developing a cloud management platform that handles tasks like setting up SD-WAN and automating firmware updates. Additionally, I find the current setup to be more complicated due to the involvement of multiple platforms, unlike the simpler setup provided by Cato. I think Fortinet should offer more self-service options and automation for firmware updates.
Improvements should focus on security. Although FortiCASB performs well in many areas, I believe its security aspects could be enhanced further.
In any scenario, there is usually room for development. Some enhancement would be beneficial.
They are trying to improve the features of FortiSASE, however, few FortiGate can connect through FortiSASE for LAN to WAN connection while connectivity from outside to inside is OK with SPA(Secure Private Access) feature.
If they had application segmentation, we could give secure access to applications. That is not there. I had security challenges, again, with regard to the Internet connectivity. Sometimes the agent will not install properly. There are some issues at the agent level, and then we have to sign out and sign in. Those basic troubleshooting steps. We have some issues with that at the agent level.
The current high-tech version of FortiSASE is not recommended due to its heavy loading. Additionally, its pricing is not suitable for handling high-scale, complex traffic. Deploying and managing reports still requires significant time and effort. An endpoint solution is required to enable enterprises to configure and manage digital user experiences, especially in the IT department. They aim to monitor every console, department, and user experience and provide a general report. Fortinet offers extensive integration capabilities, which depend on the size and framework of your organization.
The main concern is that if the client is using another firewall, they cannot establish a private channel with the Cisco cloud.
The product is new in the market, so I feel that there are a lot of developments to be done in the solution. The GUI and connectivity, along with the support offered, are some of the areas of concern in the product where improvements are required.
Some of the solution's back-end connectivity and visibility are not robust and could be improved.
Though in our company, we use some endpoint security, the malware still bypasses the firewall, which is something that we should generally have been able to catch with the endpoint security in place. The aforementioned area needs to be considered for improvement. In terms of security, FortiSASE needs to be better. Security and support are two areas with certain shortcomings in the product where improvements are required.
The security suite is comprehensive, they typically check all boxes when it comes to features and functionalities. However, the high-availability architecture is not as flexible. The company is more of a firewall company, and its SASE product takes a different approach than other products, which are built around SD-WAN with security on top. This results in some drawbacks when it comes to firewall HA. The portal, UI, and management are coming up to speed in terms of maturity in the SASE marketplace, but they still feel more like a firewall portal. There are still some improvements that need to be made. However, with each release, things are getting better. I think that SD-WAN, specifically on the front-end, still has some issues with scaling in a full mesh network. Typically, SD-WAN uses a hub and spoke architecture. However, based on the distributed architecture of SASE, we are seeing enormous environments for large-scale full mesh networks. These networks have issues with scaling, and I understand that there are also some caveats with failover. I think that further development in this area should focus on large-scale networks.
They need to have more concise or precise ways to come up with the return on investment for convincing or presenting this to customers. Most customers think that with the SD1 and the phase solutions, they're going to have optimizations. It's not always like that, at least not in a direct way. You have to come up with a very complex way to make them understand. They need to have a clear, marketed way to present this as an investment that will have a good return for the customers and not only as an optimization of technology. Mobile devices are not covered enough. That's something that I would like to see for the FortiSASE solutions. There are a lot of customers or end users that are reaching their networks through their phones or through their tablets. And that area is not covered widely enough by FortiSASE.