IT AI Index

Index › Products › Palo Alto Networks VM-Series · October 2026 Edition

Palo Alto Networks · 1 category · Named, not ranked

Palo Alto Networks VM-Series

13Judge labels

3First choices

1Negative labels

7 / 14Models named it

1Category

October 2026 Edition. Every number here is derived from the raw labels under vendor table v2026-10.8, every buyer segment counted.

Standing

4 labels, too few to rank

A product needs 10 labels in a category before a share or quadrant is stated. Palo Alto Networks VM-Series was named 4 times in Firewalls, where Fortinet FortiGate led with 73%. The labels and the evidence are below, counted exactly.

By buyer segmentRead the same way at every buyer size.

Small business21 of 99

under the label threshold

Mid-market20 of 83

under the label threshold

Enterprise3 of 88

under the label threshold

In firewalls · each standing computed within its segment · bars are 0 to 100 · the accent bar is the product's own best reading

Standing by category

Every category where a model named Palo Alto Networks VM-Series for a mid-market B2B company. Share is first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts; rank is within every product named in that category.

Category	Function	Share	Rank	Negative rate	Labels	Quadrant	Since September 2026
Next-generation firewalls	Network and edge	0%	20 of 83	0%	4	under 10 labels · led by Fortinet FortiGate at 73%	=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.

Movement

Since September 2026, Palo Alto Networks VM-Series held within the floor in its one category: no change cleared 11 points.

Best category · Firewalls · by segment

Small business=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.

0%from 0% in September 2026

Inside the floor by 11 pointsRank 49 → 17 of 87

Mid-market=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.

0%from 0% in September 2026

Inside the floor by 11 pointsRank 20 → 17 of 73

Enterprise▲+4Since September 2026: 2% → 6%, +4 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.

6%from 2% in September 2026

Inside the floor by 7 pointsRank 7 → 3 of 70

All categories · Mid-market

Category	September 2026	Now	Change	Reading	Rank
Firewalls	0%	0%	=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.	Within noise	Rank 20 of 83, unchanged

Shares here are read over the models both editions asked, so they can differ by a point or two from the standing above, which counts every model in this edition.

The floor is 11 points of share, measured: how far the models move a leader on their own when the same questions are asked twice with nothing changed. A larger change is movement; a smaller one is noise, and both are shown. Movement is read over the twelve models both editions asked; GPT-6 Luna, Muse Glimmer 30B joined this edition and are in the standing but not yet in the comparison. How the floor is measured · The editions

By model

How each model treated Palo Alto Networks VM-Series across every prompt where it was named for a mid-market B2B company. Fourteen models, six prompts per category.

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Model	Alternative	Mention	Labels
Claude Haiku 4.5	0	0	0
GPT-5.4 mini	0	0	0
Gemini 3.5 Flash	0	0	0
Perplexity Sonar	0	0	0
Grok 4.20	0	0	0
Mistral Small	0	0	0
DeepSeek V4 Flash	1	0	1
Llama 4 Maverick	1	1	2
Qwen 3.7 Flash	0	0	0
Kimi K2	1	0	1
GLM 4.7 FlashX	0	0	0
MiniMax M2.5	0	0	0
GPT-6 Luna	0	0	0
Muse Glimmer 30B	0	0	0

By framing

Which of the six questions produced the naming. By model says how often; this says asked what. The first-choice count on the right carries the marks of the models that produced it.

FramingLabels by classFirst choices

Direct0 labelsNone

Paraphrase12 labels3

Comparative0 labelsNone

Budget-constrained0 labelsNone

Scale-constrained0 labelsNone

Negative1 labelNone

First choiceAlternativeMentionNegative13 labels in all, every segment counted; 3 of the 3 first choices count toward share, since the comparative and negative framings do not. The bar is one segment per label class, to scale within the framing.

What the models said for it

Verbatim evidence the judge attached to positive labels.

“A virtual NGFW that brings the same security capabilities as physical Palo Alto appliances into virtualized and cloud environments.” Llama 4 Maverick · Firewalls · paraphrase prompt · alternative

“🥈 Strong Alternative: Palo Alto Networks VM-Series (Virtual) or PA-400 Series (Appliance)” Kimi K2 · Firewalls · paraphrase prompt · alternative

“Best Virtual for Compliance/Enterprise-Grade” DeepSeek V4 Flash · Firewalls · paraphrase prompt · alternative

And against it

Verbatim evidence attached to negative labels. A warning on a product with few labels is a warning; on a product with many, it is one voice among them.

No model argued against it.

Named alongside

The products named in the same answers as Palo Alto Networks VM-Series, over the 13 answers that named it. Took the first choice instead counts the answers where the other product was the first choice and Palo Alto Networks VM-Series was named but was not.

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ProductSame answerTook the first choice insteadHead to head

Fortinet FortiGate8 of 135Not among the top eight

Sophos Firewall8 of 132Not among the top eight

WatchGuard Firebox6 of 132Not among the top eight

Cisco Secure Firewall3 of 130Not among the top eight

FortiGate VM3 of 130Not among the top eight

Check Point Quantum2 of 130Not among the top eight

FortiGate-VM NGFW2 of 130Not among the top eight

Fortinet FortiGate-VM2 of 130Not among the top eight

Palo Alto Networks PA-Series2 of 130Not among the top eight

Fortinet FortiGate 80F1 of 131Not among the top eight

A head-to-head page exists where both products are among a category's top eight. The other rows are the same fact without a page behind them, so they link to the product instead.

What carried it into the answer

The sites and pages cited by the answers that named Palo Alto Networks VM-Series. A fact about retrieval, not a lever on the model.

Citations exist only for the models that return a source list, five of the fourteen in this edition, so these counts come from 13 of the 13 answers that named Palo Alto Networks VM-Series and are not a share of its labels.

Domains cited

learn.g2.com10

cyberpress.org8

expertinsights.com8

comparitech.com7

d.meter.com6

fortinet.com6

atera.com4

cybersecuritynews.com4

firewalls.com4

it-ai-index.com4

Sixty-one of the sixty-one domain citations in answers naming Palo Alto Networks VM-Series came from somebody else's page.

Pages cited

learn.g2.com/best-firewall-software10

cyberpress.org/best-next-generation-firewall-ngfw-solutions-for-every-business-size8

expertinsights.com/network-security/the-top-network-firewalls8

d.meter.com/resources/enterprise-firewalls6

atera.com/blog/best-firewall-appliances4

comparitech.com/net-admin/next-gen-firewalls4

cybersecuritynews.com/best-next-generation-firewall4

comparitech.com/net-admin/best-small-business-firewalls3

Pages are listed as the models cited them.

Search and answers

Where Palo Alto Networks VM-Series stands in Google search beside where it stands in the models' answers.

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In search

Google, US estimates

Searches for its name, Google: 110 a month (“palo alto networks vm-series”)
AI search demand for its name, est.: 0 a month
Its own site: It sits on Palo Alto Networks's site (paloaltonetworks.com), so there are no site figures for it alone

In answers

This edition

Share of first choices

rank 20 of 83 in firewalls

Segment leader

73%

Fortinet FortiGate

First choices: 3 across its categories
Named in: 13 answers
Its own site cited: in 13 of the answers that named it

Search figures are US estimates from DataForSEO, read September 28, 2026; AI search demand is its modeled, directional estimate, not a count of queries to any assistant. The answers are this edition's. Two measurements side by side: neither is read as the cause of the other.

Follow Palo Alto Networks VM-Series

An email the morning each edition publishes: where this product moved, where it held, and by how much against the noise floor. One address, confirmed by a click; a stop link in every email.

Already following? Everything you follow, with a stop for each.

The company

Palo Alto Networks is the company behind Palo Alto Networks VM-Series.

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On record

Company records

Also from Palo Alto Networks: Palo Alto Networks Cortex Cloud, Palo Alto Networks Cortex XDR, Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSIAM, Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR, Palo Alto Networks DLP, Palo Alto Networks DNS Security, Palo Alto Networks Enterprise DLP, Palo Alto Networks GlobalProtect and 21 more

In its own words

Stated by the vendor, not checked

Positioning: VM-Series is the virtualized form factor of the Palo Alto Networks next-generation firewall.
docs.paloaltonetworks.com/vm-series
For: Organizations needing inline security across diverse cloud and virtualization use cases.
docs.paloaltonetworks.com/vm-series
Price stated: Try VM-Series with a 30-day free trial. paloaltonetworks.com/network-security/vm-series-free-trials
Free plan or trial: Try VM-Series Free for 30 days paloaltonetworks.com/vm-series-trial
Customers named: PlantasjenSumitovant BiopharmaUS SignalTIDLORKCDTurkcell Global BilgiNew York City Department of Environmental Protection's Business Information Technology groupNgern Tid Lor Public Company Limited
Not stated on the pages read: Starting price, integrations, certifications, hosting

What Palo Alto Networks VM-Series's own pages state, read October 5, 2026: docs.paloaltonetworks.com/vm-series, paloaltonetworks.com/vm-series-trial, unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/author/palo-alto-networks-staff, paloaltonetworks.com/network-security/vm-series-free-trials, paloaltonetworks.com/network-security/vm-series-for-public-clouds. A claimed page can correct any of them.

Is this your product?

Claim this page

Claiming is free and changes nothing in the data. A claimed page shows a verified contact who is told when each edition publishes and when Palo Alto Networks VM-Series's standing changes by more than the noise floor; the right to propose corrections to the vendor table, meaning names the judge wrote that should or should not read as Palo Alto Networks VM-Series, applied by version and listed in the change log; and a one-line description supplied by the vendor and marked as such.

What a new claim receivesHide what a new claim receives

A new claim receives the current edition's vendor brief for Palo Alto Networks VM-Series by email, built from the raw record of the edition. It shows:

where Palo Alto Networks VM-Series is named, by buyer and by framing, and which cells hold its first choices;
the claims the models make when they name it, ranked, with the strongest and the weakest quoted;
its vocabulary against the segment leader's, and the pages the models cited;
who was chosen in the answers that did not name Palo Alto Networks VM-Series, and every reason the record gives;
a battlecard for each top rival: the head-to-head split, why they win, and the reservation quoted against them;
one page of published figures cleared to show a buyer.