Sophos UTM Reviews
24 reviews7 discussions
Abhijit Mukherji
IT Head at Dee Development
Very user friendly and simple to implement; easy to separate rules
"Efficient and effective - it's easy to separate rules."
"The classification segregation of applications lacks sufficient definition."
What is our primary use case?
I'm IT head at our company in India and we are customers of Sophos UTM.
What is most valuable?
The solution has many good features. There was a steep learning curve moving to version 18 but we're now at a point where the solution is more efficient and effective. When talking about VLANs the solution makes it easy to separate rules for everything. The solution is easy to use with simple implementation.
What needs improvement?
The application server needs to be improved because currently, the classification segregation of applications needs to be more defined. Also, we used to be able to open the firewall using LAN IPS but that's no longer possible and needs to be solved. I'd like to see an improvement in central categorizing. These days with all the applications and threats, getting everything filtered down needs to be a finer, more granular process. There are times when you find that a website seems to be legit, but there is a code running behind it that can act as a proxy or some kind of a bot. The sites are always logged on, but at times we have to open for a few clients or a few sites and in that time they're open to attack.
For how long have I used the solution?
We've been using this solution for at least six years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
This solution is absolutely stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The solution is scalable; we jumped from 135 to 230 users without any problems at all.
How are customer service and support?
Technical support used to be good but it's lagging a bit now. Support staff was better trained and more efficient than they are now. It could be because of Covid but it's a bit of a challenge at the moment.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We worked with SonicWall many years ago. We then switched to Cyberoam and then we primarily used Cisco Firepower. There were support issues with Cisco and it wasn't easy to find the KB articles and training was lacking. Even the training personnel had problems when we had issues with implementation. The same thing happened when we used Palo Alto with the support being the biggest problem. It was so unstructured and I hope that has changed in the last 12 months. When it comes to firewalls we are happy with two products; Fortinet is our preference but when you take cost into account, we prefer Sophos.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was relatively straightforward.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The licensing costs for Sophos are reasonable. It's clear to me that there are no full solutions, you can't win it all, and the cost is always an issue. We're on the winning side with Sophos in that respect. We renew our license every three years.
What other advice do I have?
I rate the solution eight out of 10.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Collins Amaife
System Analyst at Abbey Mortgage Bank
Good protection, scalable, easy to setup, and it has good local vendor support
"The most valuable feature is ransomware protection."
"I think that additional metrics features are needed to be able to monitor other areas or to monitor as much as you can, at a fine-grain resolution."
I use this solution for my severs.
How has it helped my organization?
At some point in time, it seemed to be ravaging organizations around us and we couldn't definitely outrightly isolate ourselves from it. While we were attacked, I want to believe that it was solely because there was that in addition to the fact that there are triggers.
We also know very well that Sophos is proactive in monitoring and protecting against malware and brute-force attacks.
It's one of the things that it is quite good for.
The most valuable feature is ransomware protection. It is known for ransomware protection.
In terms of additional features, I'm still getting to understand more about how it works.
I'm still exploring the features and I haven't used them in totality.
I think that additional metrics features are needed to be able to monitor other areas or to monitor as much as you can, at a fine-grain resolution. This would be good. Somewhat similar to what Darktrace can do.
Proactively understand and using AI intelligence to monitor and see activities that are away from the norm and then proactively see how they can either isolate the quarantine system and inject it back into the system upon validation.
They could explore most of the products in Symantec's and Fresh Services and run from the same file to see what additional feature one is offering.
I would also like it if they could work on the price because it is expensive.
I have been using Sophos UTM for approximately three years.
I understand that it's had a couple of releases too frequently but I want to believe that it's relatively stable.
I still believe that in terms of stability, Symantec is better, so this can be improved.
Sophos UTM is quite scalable.
How are customer service and technical support?
I haven't had any reason to contact support directly because I have MacBytes, which happens to be a local vendor that we have been using. It's been pretty good.
They are very good at supporting us technically when the need arises.
I am currently using Symantec for my own workstations and I use Sophos for my server Endpoint protection.
The initial setup is relatively straightforward.
The prices can be better, they could make it a lot cheaper.
You are on the right track with Sophos UTM, but you should keep up with the trends as they become available.
I would rate Sophos UTM a nine out of ten.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: partner
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Director with 11-50 employees
Secure and stable with an easy initial setup
"With Sophos, we have not had any incidents this year. The security provided has been good. It has proven to be okay for our needs."
"The solution needs to do better at covering mobile devices, although they may have an integrated solution for that purpose."
During the pandemic, telework grew, however, so did attacks. There was a higher degree of ransomware and so on. With Sophos, we have not had any incidents this year. The security provided has been good. It has proven to be okay for our needs.
The initial setup is very simple.
The solution is stable.
the scalability is good.
The solution needs to do better at covering mobile devices, although they may have an integrated solution for that purpose.
I don't really know how it behaves when it comes to web server protection. We have no web servers of our own. I don't know how it behaves if we open our servers to the outside. My sense is that the degree of protection must be higher.
We haven't used the solution for very long. We've been using it for less than a year at this point.
The stability has been good. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. It's reliable.
The scalability on offer is quite good. If a company needs to expand, it can do so.
We are not a big company. We have about 70 or so people.
Technical support is okay. It is provided by a local company, not Sophos directly.
Previously we did not have any integrated solutions. We had an antivirus of one kind, and a firewall of another. It was a good step for us to integrate all these features into one solution.
The initial setup was simple and straightforward. The deployment was fast. It only took about a week or so, maybe less.
The pricing is reasonable. Of course, the customer would always like it to be lower, however, the quality to price ratio is positive.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
I'm also aware of Fortinet options, however, they are more expensive if you look at Fortinet vs Sophos.
We are customers and end-users. We came into the pandemic situation needing a VPN and the one offered by the Sophos behaves quite well. From the point of view of our users, it has been a positive experience.
I don't quite know by heart the version of the solution, however, it's quite recent. It's not the newest one. I saw that the brand new one which came out this year and we don't have that.
I'd rate the solution at an eight out of ten.
Nikoloz Kratsashvili
IT Manager at Cartlis
Stable with an easy initial implementation and a very nice user interface
"The stability, overall, is excellent. I haven't had a problem in the last two years."
"It would be nice if it had basic features, such as DLP (Data Loss Prevention)."
The solution's user interface is very user-friendly. It's very easy to navigate.
They have an all-in-one product for small businesses. Basically, I do not want to manage the firewall for four products. I'll take it all in one. It makes everything easier to manage.
It's really good and it's been working really well over the last few years.
The initial setup has been very simple and straightforward.
The stability, overall, is excellent. I haven't had a problem in the last two years.
It is a fine product, however, I need more endpoint protection.
They should release a license for more than 50 IPs. As of now I have had some discussion about with management, and we need to do some planning and around that to see if we can change things.
The pricing is too high. There are other options that are less expensive, such as Bitdefender. In fact, Bitdefender is very good, aside from lacking a firewall such as this. Beyond that, it's a very good product with central management on-premises.
It would be nice if it had basic features, such as DLP (Data Loss Prevention).
I've only been using the solution for about two years or so at this point.
The stability has been excellent. It doesn't crash or freeze. There are no bugs or glitches. It's very good and very reliable.
This solution is perfect for small businesses.
I don't have too much experience with technical support. I only recall one case where I had to contact them directly. I recall them being very helpful and responsive. I had a good experience and was satisfied with their level of service.
The solution is being discontinued. Hopefully, whatever they replace it with will be very good for small businesses as well.
The initial setup was not complex. It was very simple and very straightforward. It was not difficult at all. A company shouldn't have any trouble with the process. Specifically, if you have experience in IT, you will find it very easy to deploy these products.
I am a Sophos customer.
I'm using UTM for home use only. It's only four 50 IPS.
I'd rate the solution at a ten out of ten. Overall, it's worked really really well. Everything from the updates to the signatures has been very helpful for our business.
I would recommend this product to other users and other organizations.
Javier Medina
Project Manager regional at Grupo Vision
Has good quality and functionality
"The most valuable feature is the price. I've been requesting prices all over these years between different solutions like Fortinet, Palo Alto, and Check Point and Sophos has been the cheapest and the best of all of them that I have tried. I have been working with Fortinet, it's a fact that the price is surprisingly better."
"Sophos should improve its ability to check something like bandwidth consumption for users or something more real-time."
Our primary use cases include:
Remote SSL connection
Web-filtering
Web server protection
WAF application.
Firewall rules
We have securely deploy systems accesible only behind encrypted ssl vpn and all user can access without the risk of data exposure.
The most valuable feature is the price. I've been requesting prices all over these years between different solutions like Fortinet, Palo Alto, and Check Point and Sophos has been the cheapest and the best of all of them that I have tried. I have been working with Fortinet, it's a fact that the sophos price is surprisingly better.
I have also worked with Check Point and it's not far enough from what Sophos can do. In terms of quality and functionality, Sophos is very useful and better than the competition.
Sophos should improve its ability to check something like bandwidth consumption for users or something more real-time.
real time trafic graph most show specific info from user, ip and bandwith, in my personal opinion i have seen better traffic graphs in open source firewalls.
I have been using Sophos UTM for six years.
It's very stable. In all the time I have been using it, I haven't seen it fail or gets stuck.
Scalability is not a complex issue and is something you can do within 20 minutes. I've been managing three UTMs, one with 50 users, another one with around 150, and the biggest one has 3,000 users.
i used PFSense, the capabilities of UTM sophos y very much higher and powerfull.
The initial setup was straightforward. It depends on the rules, but a basic setup can take up to seven to 15 minutes max.
What about the implementation team?
What was our ROI?
Based on cost compare with other vendor who bill per license and OTP users, the ROI have been set as far as 6 moths.
SOphos is the best alternative in features, specifications and lower price.
yes i did, Fortinet, Checkpoint, Palo Alto, Meraki.
It's a good solution, I would say to go for it.
Chief Information Security Officer and Founder at a insurance company with 201-500 employees
Top 5Leaderboard
Stable with great technical support and an easy initial setup process
"Technical support is very responsive."
"The integration capabilities could be better."
We implemented the solution into our infrastructure here in the insurance company, to protect the flow between the company and its partner.
The solution is quite stable.
The scalability has been great.
The initial setup is straightforward.
Technical support is very responsive.
The integration capabilities could be better.
I originally implemented the solution when it was Cyberoam. After that, we migrated to Sophos UTM. I've used the solution since 2011.
The solution is stable and reliable. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze.
The scalability is great. If a company needs to expand it, it can do so. It's not a problem.
We currently have 800 people using the solution.
We do pay for Sophos' support and we find them to be quite helpful and responsive. We're satisfied with the level of assistance we receive.
We have used other solutions. We have various levels of firewalls.
The implementation process is straightforward. It's not overly difficult. A company shouldn't have any issues with the process.
It's a good idea if you are migrating from another solution, to do a review of security policy. That way, you can better optimize for security when you set everything up.
We have a team of six that can handle implementation and maintenance duties. We have two managers. One covers organizational security and the other cover operational security.
We do pay extra for Sophos support services.
The license is easy to acquire and implement.
I'm currently performing a benchmarking of the other solutions against Sophos.
We're a custoer and an end-user.
When Cyberoam was acquired by Sophos, we migrated to the new hardware and new solution in Sophos.
We've been very happy with its capabilities. We would rate the solution at a nine out of ten.
I'd recommend, if a company sincerely wants to try out Sophos, that they test everything before implementation. It will help them understand what the solution can do and how to implement it into their infrastructure.
Last updated: Aug 4, 2021
Sandro Issufo
General manager at DotCom, Lda.
It's a complete firewall covering all layers of protection
"The three most important features for us are web protection, web server protection, and network protection."
"Sophos UTM sometimes falls short in high-availability environments. They used to launch firmware that didn't work very well in a high-availability environment."
Sophos UTM is a complete firewall we use to protect from internet threats and check traffic from our network to the internet. It's a firewall covering all layers of protection.
Sophos has some plugins that run on the cloud, but it's transparent to the end-user. For example, there is something to identify threats on an email system called SenseStorm, which is connected to the Sophos Cloud and identifies new threats then spreads the same pattern to all Sophos installations in real-time. I can say that almost 100 percent of our customer companies who have a file solution use Sophos.
The three most important features for us are web protection, web server protection, and network protection.
Sophos UTM sometimes falls short in high-availability environments. They used to launch firmware that didn't work very well in a high-availability environment.
I've been using Sophos UTM for the last five years, but we started using Astaro Security Gateway, the predecessor to Sophos UTM, in 2002.
Sophos UTM is a strong solution. I give it a 10 out of 10 for stability.
Sophos UTM is scalable.
The initial setup is somewhat tricky. You need to understand networking concepts well, and the company must have good policies for internet access. However, it's not that complicated. I would say it's an intermediate difficulty, but I also have a lot of experience with this solution. It might be challenging for a new technician. We do all the deployment in-house, and it takes about three business days. Our team consists of two technicians and me, the manager.
Sophos UTM isn't cheap. It's in the middle, so not the cheapest, but not the most expensive. It's average. If you buy the full suite, you don't need to pay for add-ons, but if you buy some partial products, you have to pay to deploy more features.
I rate Sophos UTM 10 out of 10. It's the most reliable solution in the firewall market. Considering the price and quality of the product, Sophos UTM is the best solution.
Adam Hammonds
Network Security Engineer at Texarkana IT
You can lock networks down tight with this if you know what you're doing
"The intrusion prevention is great, and I like dual virus scanning on the network layer because we scan it through Avira and Sophos. Web filtering is also a fantastic option for clients who want to really lock down internet access."
"When we call support, we get put on hold for a long time."
We use Sophos UTM as an on-premise firewall.
All of Sophos UTM's features are valuable. The intrusion prevention is great, and I like dual virus scanning on the network layer because we scan it through Avira and Sophos. Web filtering is also a fantastic option for clients who want to really lock down internet access. And of course, it has the basic firewall features like port blocking and all of the stuff that most standard firewalls include.
I've been using Sophos UTM for over 12 years. I started using the solution before it became Sophos. It was originally called the Astaro Security Gateway, and then Sophos acquired Astaro and renamed it Sophos UTM.
Very stable. Very good.
I have Sophos UTM deployed for all my IT clients. There are 40 of them in the field serving about 500 users total.
We get put on hold for a long time. Otherwise, I'm not unhappy with their support at all.
If you have a networking background and understand how to configure it, it's very straightforward. Somebody off the street can't just come in and do it, but yeah, it's pretty straightforward.
I would rate Sophos UTM a strong eight. I'm not giving it a ten because they're putting all their efforts into the XG model, so the UTM model will probably be phased out before long. I love the security of the XG. It's better with artificial intelligence and all of this type of stuff, and you can manage it from the Sophos Central Cloud. But Astaro ASG, now Sophos UTM, was the first unified threat management system and everybody else was copycatted it. I think its web filtering's great. If there are any security vulnerabilities, it's the fault of the administrator configuring the product, not the solution itself. You can lock networks down tight with this if you know what you're doing.
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