Firewalls reviews from Reddit
Summary
We analyzed 319 Reddit reviews across 9 subreddits and 15 posts to rank the best Firewalls brands recommended by redditors, including communities like r/sysadmin, r/msp, r/networking, r/archlinux, r/selfhosted. Top-rated brands include Fortinet (3.8/5), Palo Alto (4.2/5), Sophos (4.0/5).
Stats
Reviews319
Subreddits9
Posts15
Brands48
Products37
319 reviews from
and
By Brand
/By Product
#1
Fortinet
3.8
(72)
"The usability and intuitiveness of a FortiGate, in my opinion, is unmatched."
"I deployed my first Fortigate a month ago and love it."
"Fortigates are amazing. Rolled out 5 of them; replacing our ASA’s"
"Almost done migrating ~60 firewalls to fortigate and managed with fortimanager. Couldn't be easier and fairly secure"
"Fortigate 60 series are an absurd deal for your average 100-150 person office"
"Top: PaloAlto and Fortinet"
"Fortigates all the way. Price, Performance, and Features can not be beat."
"Forti customer here. Nothing but positive to say about them."
"I use a pair of HA 81Fs in my OT environment. Been up since May of last year without problem. Highly recommend."
"Switch to Fortigate' Rugged models, you'll love the central control and single pane of glass for management."
#2
Palo Alto
4.2
(49)
"1. Palo if you can afford it."
"Palo is really not that much more expensive that Fortigte the big difference is that the Palos really do the speed they advertise with everything turned on."
"PA 400 series. Great product. Love mine."
"Palo Alto, Cisco, Fortinet would be my top choices."
"Swapped them out for Palo which has been nothing but flawless."
"If you are after a L7 firewall there are only 2 real options. Palo Alto and Fortinet."
"Go for palo alto since in my use cases they've been the best when it comes to performance, reliability and feature pack"
"Get Palo if your budget can afford it."
"If it is large Palo alto."
"Palo Alto if it's in budget"
#3
Sophos
4.0
(28)
"Sophos is excellent, their central management system is amazing."
"I love Sophos and the ssl VPN works pretty damn well in later versions finally"
"We have been using Sophos for years and the we have it as a firewall and the endpoint. No issues."
"+1 for Sophos. It is a great product line and easy enough to configure and get running."
"Sophos is probably the way to go based on features, reliability, cost."
"Sophos, don't need licensing to do those things, GREAT FREE cloud management, affordable licensing based on consumption."
"Sophos xg or opnsense I run sophos,"
"Sophos is great. I'm running it on a heavily upgraded Watchguard M370 I got for free from work."
"I'm messing around a bit with Sophos, and it seems like it does have the features I mentioned."
"Sophos XGS"
#4
WatchGuard
3.9
(27)
"Been running different Watchguards for the last 20+ years without a hitch"
"Watchguard 100% never seen hardware fail before it's expected lifetime, support is good, and management tools are solid"
"Another vote for Watchguard. I've been running them in my shop for over twenty years and found them to be reliable and easy to use."
"Happy to second WatchGuard. We deploy these as an MSP for small to large scale clients."
"Been running WatchGuard for years. Been absolutely solid."
"Watchguard all the way"
"We have been using Watchguard since the XTM days. The price is right and a solid firewall."
"Long time watchguard shop. Stable, great support and training is pretty good."
"We have 150 people and we use WatchGuard. Easy to use."
"Glad Watchguard turned that product around because they have been at it for a long time."
#5
SonicWall
3.2
(17)
"I’ve a special place for SonicWall. Ran them for over a decade and was able to achieve a lot of very interesting and robust routing, nat, and firewall situations."
"Another vote for SonicWall"
"Sonicwall, Cisco switches, or Unifi Switches, for wireless Aruba or Unifi."
"Recommend SonicWALL, TZ80 or TZ370 upwards."
"Sonicwall were my first firewalls. Easy enough to learn and dell/sonicwall has extensive online help and resources."
"We use SonicWALL. They can cover just about any size business."
"Switched from sonicwall when they got bought by dell and never looked back."
"I'd run the Sonicwall or the Forti's, as long as you're familiar with the Forti firmware bugs and crappy situation there."
"Sonicwall with AGSS or Fortigate at the minimal with the equivalent protection."
"Sonicwall is better than watchguard"
#6
Cisco
3.5
(15)
"I like Meraki myself."
"I've had no issues with asa, fortinet, Palo, cisco asr."
"Firepower 2110 chassis with ASA image."
"Meraki or Fortigate"
"We use Cisco Meraki org wide. Yes, it requires annual licensing. But, Cisco's support more than makes up for it."
"We're using Meraki and happy with it."
"Our shop uses Meraki with one client but SonicWall with everyone else."
"We switched from sonic wall to meraki and have been living it so far."
"Not wild about their APs but love their firewalls"
"I wish they got into the switching game, have not tried their APs, but the firewalls and support have been solid."
#7
FortiGate
4.1
(11)
"Been using FortiGate for 10 years and also have one at home (60F), feature-wise and GUI/CLI are very intuitive and clear IMHO once you get to know it a little."
"Fortigate is best bang for your buck. you get so many features and bells and whistles for an excellent price."
"Fortigate is top tier for this size."
"For less then 100 people, a Fortigate 60F will easily handle an average office for 500$ and 400$ a year for licensing and peace of mind."
"FortiGate is what we run and they are fine."
"You probably won't go wrong with either Palo or Fortigate assuming that its the sole device."
"Fortinet is a solid choice."
"My favorite Fortigate GUI friendly easy adaptation"
"Renewed our FortiGate last year. I do think it offers the same but much cheaper."
"For SME my go-to is fortigate, but it's a step or two above the Watchguard which are ok boxes."
#8
OPNsense
4.3
(10)
"Both are great. You can’t go wrong with either pfSense or OPNsense."
"I have been running OPNSense for a year now and I can't think of a single instance of my network or VPN going down bc of it."
"PfSense or OpnSense Hardware Security Appliance. Can make it yourself, for free I you have a spar PC or laptop available."
"If you don't want to spend a single penny, OPNSense is your best bet."
"Buy a server with whatever network ports you need and install OPNSense on it."
"When my last home firewall appliance died, I decided to try OpnSense this time around and while it's good, I'm much more comfortable with pf's interface."
"Opnsense makes more sense to my brain, I don't know why."
"I would choose OPNSense over PfSense 100% of the time because it actually gets updates"
"3. OPNsense if you either don't mind open-source or are on a pauper budget (it's very solid for what it is)."
"Out of those, portmaster otherwise OPNsense"
#9
Ubiquiti
3.5
(11)
"Ubiquiti gateway Pro. For $500 you get a decent firewall with a starting point of all the features you would see on a fortigate or watchguard WITHOUT the yearly maintenance fee."
"For your size you really should consider Ubiquiti, their proofpoint cyberSecure offering is also reasonably priced."
"I will also consider UniFi Fortress Gateway, for the simplicity of management and cost."
"Switched from sonic wall to a ubiquiti set up, been great for me."
"For a company that size I would go Ubiquiti"
"I love uniquiti for my SOHO. It's fantastic and makes great for running multi-player servers out of my house."
"I own an 8 person MSP and we use Unifi for everything."
"Mikrotik and Ubiquiti also have a high end firewalls..."
"The UnIFi firewalls also now support SIEM and Blumira (which we use) does support UniFi ingestion."
"I will not use their firewalls because I was very burned by the whole reliance on the cloud key."
#10
Netgate
3.8
(8)
"I have settled on Netgate/pfSense because they do what I need and they’re affordable."
"You need a small netgate running pfsense so affordable and so many bells and whistles."
"I don’t understand the pfsense hate. It’s reliable and functionality rich."
"If you don't need crazy features just go with PFSense or a derivative."
"We have been running all our ipsec tunnels over pfsense the last 10 years, it's been fine."
"We use pfsense, love it or hate it i find it pretty awesome to work with."
"PfSense is OK for small shops and homes but lack of central management can be annoying."
"Avoid Netgate devices there is a huge surge of them that die prematurely."
#11
Check Point
3.2
(9)
"Check Point if you can afford it."
"Considering the zero days Fortigate has had the past few weeks, I don’t understand the hate against Check Point."
"+1 to Check Point"
"We have replaced Sonicwalls with Checkpoint and have been really happy."
"I'd look at Palo Alto or Checkpoint."
"Check Point- if you want the best security but OKish performance."
"Checkpoint"
"Moved from palo to checkpoint due to cost. We regret it every single day."
"Checkpoint sux, it's buggy and rushed software that sometimes requires dev/qa engineers to ssh in to tweak."
#12
pfSense
4.7
(6)
"Both are great. You can’t go wrong with either pfSense or OPNsense."
"PfSense is what I've used for about a decade now for both enterprise and home."
"PfSense or OpnSense Hardware Security Appliance. Can make it yourself, for free I you have a spar PC or laptop available."
"Pfsense. Don't look anywhere else."
"The reason for currently using pfsense is we do a lot of web filtering and proxy isn't up to that task anymore"
"It can do, use pfblocker for DNS blocking."
#13
Cisco Meraki
4.0
(6)
"Cisco Meraki. Solid stuff, well maintained, and easily setup."
"Meraki (Cisco’s lite cloud-managed offering) is quite nice for a SME."
"Keep your life easy, meraki."
"We also sell Meraki firewalls with advanced security to protect the customer's network perimeter."
"We make our clients use our Meraki stack."
"For a single person shop, easy management of many devices is important so I would recommend Meraki."
#14
ufw
4.0
(6)
"Ufw or firewalld"
"Ufw..but just installed fedora in vm..my first rpm distro..to install freeipa. Firewalld is default and it's pretty good."
"Ufw if you prefer the cli. Firewalld if you prefer a simple gui."
"I've always just used ufw."
"I use ufw, and I'd at least have it installed and available... but I just leave it on all the time just so I don't have to think about it"
"I just use ufw/gufw"
#15
firewalld
4.0
(3)
"My vote for firewalld"
"I use Firewalld. It integrates with NetworkManager nicely."
"I use firewalld personally, but I've also heard good things about ufw"
#16
Barracuda
3.7
(3)
"If you manage a lot of Barracuda’s you need to use their Control Center, very powerful and they have a nice MSP program."
"I use Barracuda. I loath its interface but it is rock solid."
"I was a fan of barracuda but they have a lot of…quirks"
#17
Cato
4.5
(2)
"I've been a customer of Cato for years and have been absolutely thrilled with it and the support I get"
"Almost done replacing almost 200 checkpoint firewalls with CATO. And man, its so much more managable."
#18
Simplewall
4.0
(2)
"Simplewall is the best for simplicity IMO. Postmaster is bloated garbage. Never tried glasswire."
"I liked simplewall when i still was using windows"
#19
Mikrotik
4.0
(2)
"No one mention mikrotik? They have very nice network hardware"
"Mikrotik and Ubiquiti also have a high end firewalls..."
#20
Vyatta
4.0
(2)
"Vyatta/VyOS is a very solid product."
"We used to run Vyatta in production as firewall and site-to-site VPN box, and it ran like a top once configured."
#21
Portmaster
3.5
(2)
"I use portmaster, it has a very good ui to see which programs want to establish what connections and you can block them with rules"
"Out of those, portmaster otherwise OPNsense"
#22
Zenarmor
3.5
(2)
"You may try Zenarmor which offers next-generation firewall capabilities, like app contol and web filtering, for free."
"And zenarmor"
#23
Protectli
5.0
(1)
"I recommend the Firewalla Purple or the Protectli Vault (with OPNsense or pfSense). Both are affordable, without WiFi, ideal for individual/family users and available in Europe."
#24
Cisco, Palo Alto
5.0
(1)
"The Cisco Catalyst 8500 series is fantastic for IPSec aggregation. If you need an actual firewall, Palo Alto also works very well for IPSec."
#25
Firewalla
5.0
(1)
"I recommend the Firewalla Purple or the Protectli Vault (with OPNsense or pfSense). Both are affordable, without WiFi, ideal for individual/family users and available in Europe."
#26
Clavister
5.0
(1)
"We have been unbelievably impressed with Clavister firewalls. They are VERY low on resources and very inexpensive."
#27
Gen6/7 SW
4.0
(1)
"We're using a mix of Gen6/7 SW and don't get any real issues."
#28
OpenBSD
4.0
(1)
"Also check out pf from OpenBSD."
#29
Arista
4.0
(1)
"Arista, formerly Untangle is a solid choice."
#30
Windows
4.0
(1)
"For home use? Windows Firewall. For business, Palo Alto"
#31
Windows Firewall Control
4.0
(1)
"Windows Firewall Control was always a great app IMO."
#32
GlassWire
4.0
(1)
"I really like the UI of Glasswire..."
#33
Juniper, SonicWall, PFSense, Ubiquiti, Fortinet
4.0
(1)
"I've used juniper, SonicWall, pfsense, UBiquiti and fortinet to do ipsec with the same brands but had a few challenges."
#34
Palo Alto, Fortinet, Juniper SRX
4.0
(1)
"Easiest to configure: Palo Alto, Fortinet, Juniper SRX."
#35
Fortinet, WatchGuard
4.0
(1)
"I’m using fortigate and watchguards, no issues"
#36
Palo Alto, Cisco ASA
4.0
(1)
"I like Palo for this. I know ASAs do route-based VPNs now though but I haven't managed VPN-Enables ASAs in a few years now."
#37
ASA, Palo Alto, Fortinet, Checkpoint
4.0
(1)
"Most of the vendors i've used will work fine with others, ASA, palo, fortinet, checkpoint etc"
#38
Juniper SRX, Cisco ASA/Firepower
4.0
(1)
"This is the Juniper SRX's bread and butter. Route-based VPNs + traffic selectors for any policy-based VPN interoperability (see also: Cisco ASA/Firepower)."
#39
nftables
4.0
(1)
"Nftables"
#40
Opensnitch
4.0
(1)
"Opensnitch"
#41
pf
4.0
(1)
"Pf. If you want to make it complicated install OpenBSD in a VM and use its pf."
#42
Forcepoint
4.0
(1)
"Forcepoint seems like it would be a good fit if you need "secure af" and your throughput is normal for a 60-100 user environment."
#43
Shorewall
3.0
(1)
"Funny noone's mentioning Shorewall."
#44
Axs Guard
3.0
(1)
"Currently on fortigate but switching to new solution. It goes between watchguard, axsguard or cisco meraki"
#45
SmoothWall
3.0
(1)
"I would recommend SmoothWall. It worked great on an old penrium 200 MHz(with MMX)"
#46
Asus
3.0
(1)
"If this is just for your house and you are on a budget, really any basic Asus for a couple hundred bucks will do"
#47
Arista / Untangle
3.0
(1)
"Going against the grain: Arista / Untangle."
#48
Stormshield
1.0
(1)
"STAY AWAY from Stormshield"
Discover your audience
GummySearch is an audience research toolkit for 130,000 unique communities on Reddit.
If you are looking for startup problems to solve, want to validate your idea or find your customers online, GummySearch is for you.
Sign up for free, get community insights in minutes.
Tell me more
Get started
