# Sophos Firewall vs Cisco Secure Firewall: which do AI models recommend for firewalls, October 2026

IT AI Recommendation Index, October 2026 Edition, Next-generation firewalls. One of fourteen models named Sophos Firewall first on the direct prompt; zero named Cisco Secure Firewall. Page: https://it-ai-index.com/network/next-generation-firewalls/sophos-firewall-vs-cisco-secure-firewall/

| | First-choice share | Rank | Negative rate | Labels | Models naming it |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sophos Firewall | 4% | #2 of 8 | 3% | 35 | 14 of 14 |
| Cisco Secure Firewall | 2% | #4 of 8 | 25% | 40 | 14 of 14 |

## The direct prompt, model by model

- GLM 4.7 FlashX: sophos firewall first (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate, Sophos Firewall)
- GPT-5.4 mini: neither first, one named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Check Point Quantum, Cisco Secure Firewall, Palo Alto Networks NGFW)
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: neither first, one named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Check Point Quantum, Palo Alto Networks NGFW, Sophos Firewall)
- Perplexity Sonar: neither first, one named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Palo Alto Networks PA-Series, Sophos Firewall)
- Grok 4.1 Fast: neither first, one named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Sophos Firewall, WatchGuard Firebox)
- Mistral Small: neither first, one named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Palo Alto Networks NGFW, Sophos Firewall)
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: neither first, one named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Sophos Firewall)
- MiniMax M2.5: neither first, one named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Palo Alto Networks NGFW, Sophos Firewall)
- Muse Glimmer 30B: neither first, one named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Palo Alto Networks PA-Series, SonicWall Gen 7, Sophos Firewall)
- Claude Haiku 4.5: neither named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Check Point Quantum, Palo Alto Networks PA-Series)
- Llama 4 Maverick: neither named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Cisco Secure Firewalls, Palo Alto Networks' PA-Series)
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: neither named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Check Point Harmony Edge / Infinity, Palo Alto Networks PA-Series)
- Kimi K2: neither named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Cisco Meraki MX, Palo Alto Networks PA-Series, SonicWall NSa Series, Sophos XG, WatchGuard Firebox)
- GPT-6 Luna: neither named (first choices: Fortinet FortiGate) (alternatives: Check Point Quantum, Palo Alto Networks NGFW)

## What the models said about Sophos Firewall

- "Avoid SMB UTMs (Sophos, Barracuda) if you have a high-throughput environment" (Gemini 3.5 Flash, negative prompt, hard negative)
- "The best next-generation firewall for a company with a limited budget is Untangle NG Firewall (Arista) or Sophos Firewall." (Llama 4 Maverick, budget prompt, first choice)
- "Most mid-market B2B companies will find Fortinet FortiGate or Sophos Firewall to be the best fit" (GLM 4.7 FlashX, direct prompt, first choice)
- "consolidates IPS, web filtering, application control, VPN, and sandboxing into a single appliance, suitable for mid-sized organizations and SMBs" (Llama 4 Maverick, paraphrase prompt, alternative)

## What the models said about Cisco Secure Firewall

- "Cisco failed one critical TCP-segmentation evasion, reducing its exploit-evasion resistance to 40 percent" (Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt, hard negative)
- "Avoid Cisco if you do not have a dedicated, highly trained Cisco administrator on staff." (Gemini 3.5 Flash, negative prompt, hard negative)
- "Cisco Secure Firewall shows performance degradation when multiple security features are simultaneously enabled and typically falls below Fortinet and Palo Alto at equivalent price points" (Claude Haiku 4.5, negative prompt, soft negative)
- "Consider vendors like Fortinet, Palo Alto Networks, or Cisco that have proven mid-market solutions" (GLM 4.7 FlashX, scale prompt, first choice)
- "If your organization's infrastructure is already built entirely on Cisco switches, routers, and identity services, choose Cisco" (Gemini 3.5 Flash, comparative prompt, alternative)
- "Choose Cisco if you already rely heavily on Cisco infrastructure and want advanced traffic-analysis features." (Perplexity Sonar, comparative prompt, alternative)

Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts over all fourteen models, for a mid-market B2B company; rank is within the category. Comparisons are drawn for the top eight products in each category. Published under CC BY 4.0; the output is the models' output, and nothing here is a recommendation by the index.