Pfsense Vs Sonicwall – Which is the better firewall solution

When it comes to choosing a firewall, it is important to not only get the best quality software available, but the one that will comfortably suit all your individual needs. Is that firewall software Pfsense or Sonicwall?

Sonicwall and Pfsense are trend setters and leaders in the firewall software market, making them widely used across almost all industries. Sonicwall is mostly used by mid-sized to small business operations while pfsense has a wider range, being used not only by larger businesses but also home router builders. Adding to this, Sonicwall can be scaled rather efficiently to meet the needs of a larger organisation, though it requires advanced technological know-how to achieve. Here, we want to compare these two software as firewalls so that you can pin point which one ticks all your boxes.

What are the differences between Pfsense and Sonicwall?

Pfsense Vs Sonicwall – How do they compare?

• Pricing

Both Pfsense and Sonicwall are free to download on the internet, together with the documentation required for the two projects. However, Sonicwall has a paid version that can be downloaded from their official website. The difference between the free and paid version is that the paid version comes with high quality firmware and beta releases.

This makes the pricing model for Sonicwall more preferable because it already has user support and you can pay for additional features without having to out-source them.

• Features

As far as firewall features go, these two pieces of software are practically identical; they both have many of the same features which include rules to block both HTTP and HTTPS web traffic as well as output in graphs that make reports on usage easy to understand. They also lack the same features like, customizable signatures and site to site VPN client support.

However, Pfsense comes out with quite the array of additional features and capabilities that may not necessarily be firewall related, like its usage as a WI-FI hotspot or a DNS server.

• Usage

In most market comparisons, pfsense shows as the rather difficult software to use. However, when put against Sonicwall, its messy board appears very easy to use. The difficulty in using Sonicwall is greatly aided by the availability of a lot of documentation for the software online as well as the presence of 24 hour customer care support from the manufacturer.

This makes Sonicwall unfavourable to use, especially for a new programmer, despite their customer care support and discussion boards.

Pfsense Vs Sonicwall – A comparison review

Pfsense

Pfsense is a free and open source solution for both firewall and routing needs, making it well suited for use as a firewall for practically all sized organisations. It also has a wide array of documentation freely available on the internet, which is not only vital when dealing with an open source software but also makes the process of installing, navigating and effectively utilizing the software rather simple. It has quite the number of additional features both firewall and non-firewall related which include policy creation that is rule based for administrators, normal users and guests, DHCP server capabilities, and bandwidth allocation.

Pros

• It is free and open source
• It uses Graphic User Interface (GUI) which is fairly easy to use
• It has a lot of additional features.

Cons

• It may be incompatible with certain network cards

Sonicwall

Sonicwall is an extremely well suited solution for mid-sized and small companies, making it widely deployed at remote sites, retail, small businesses and branch offices. There is a lot of documentation for it, which is openly available on the internet and it has good solutions for VPN tunnels between networks and VPN configurations for different levels of employees. It is rather effective because it combines efficient application control with malware blocking, high performance intrusion protection, while allowing necessary access and content filtering.

It may be rather difficult to wire and configure for a user who is not tech-savvy, but once it is set up, the solution is very stable and practically unbreakable. It has great monitoring features that allow the administrator to monitor not only web traffic, but also bandwidth allocation and it presents this data in easy to understand graphs. As mentioned, it is very secure and this is largely because of its brute force attack and intrusion prevention feature.

Pros

• It has a free version
• The paid version comes with good quality firmware and is considered to be rather affordable compared to its competitors in the market
• Great customization of NAT policies and access rules
• 24 hour product support directly from the manufacturer

Cons

• It is rather difficult to navigate for a user who has minimal technological know-how.

Conclusion

Sonicwall and Pfsense are fairly similar when it comes to their overall features and functionality. I would say the biggest difference is that Sonicwall is best suited for small to medium sized organizations while Pfsense is flexible for almost any size organization.

Verdict- So which is better, Pfsense or Sonicwall?

Both Pfsense and Sonicwall are great and very efficient firewall software. However, in an overall rating, I would definitely go for Pfsense.

FAQs

Is Sonicwall free?

Sonicwall firewall is both free and paid. This is because it has a free to download from the internet version and a paid version that includes beta releases and system firmware. The free version can be downloaded from the website and comes with the correct documentation, which is very important when dealing with open source software. The paid version can also be purchased from the same website where it even shows the firmware that comes with a specific package.

What is Pfsense used for?

Pfsense was designed to help users build their own routers while acting as a firewall. Therefore, it would be safe to say that Pfsense is used in the market as a router and/or a firewall solution. It comes with amazing firewall features that perform content filtering, bandwidth control and intrusion detection and prevention tasks. It can also be configured as a WI-FI access point, a DHCP server, a VPN server and a DNS server, all running comfortably and efficiently from a single firmware.

Does Sonicwall Email security have the capability to block spam?

Yes it does. The Email Security Solution on Sonicwall uses the hosted Email Security Service that blocks virus attacks, spam and phishing with above 96% efficiency and effectiveness. It is able to do this by making use of multiple tested, proven and patented techniques which facilitate web reputation checks for not only the sender’s IP but also the reputation of its images, links, attachments, content and images in a given email.