Magic Quadrant for Email Security Platforms

Email Security Platforms Vendor Product Comparisons 2024

Key features and pros and cons of top Email Security Platforms products:

Abnormal - Leader

Pros:

Market responsiveness: Abnormal Security's market responsiveness is bolstered by strong customer feedback loops and feature developments aligned with customer and market demands.
Innovation: Abnormal innovates through rapid introduction of new features, internal processes and support structures.
Sales strategy: Abnormal's sales strategy prioritizes long-term deals and scores above average compared with other vendors in this Magic Quadrant.

Cons:

Overall viability: Abnormal lacks the depth of experience and history found in other vendors in this Magic Quadrant.
Geographic strategy: Despite broad language support for detection, Abnormal does not have a significant global presence and offers limited resources for organizations with geographic and regulatory requirements.
Operations: Abnormal has a less established global sales capability, employs fewer analytic support personnel and has fewer certifications compared with other Leaders in this Magic Quadrant.

Barracuda - Visionary

Pros:

Market understanding: Barracuda shows a strong awareness of emerging attack vectors and how to address the challenges that MSPs and small and midsize businesses (SMBs) face.
Overall viability: Barracuda maintains strong revenue and continues to add to its employee count.
Product strategy: Barracuda's roadmap is geared toward improving usability for MSPs and SMBs.

Cons:

Product: Barracuda's product offers limited analytic depth in advanced detection techniques.
Customer experience: Barracuda's customer relationship management and customer feedback lag behind other vendors in this research.
Innovation: Barracuda is unlikely to shape the market based on its current focus and capabilities.

Check Point - Leader

Pros:

Sales execution/pricing: Check Point provides simple and reasonably organized packages at lower prices than other vendors in this Magic Quadrant.
Market understanding: Check Point has a good understanding of the email security market's evolving threat landscape and its own competitive advantage in the market.
Product: Check Point's threat detection capabilities are strong compared with other vendors in this Magic Quadrant.

Cons:

Sales strategy: Check Point lacks strong competitive displacement programs and strong incentives for long-term contracts.
Customer experience: Check Point's customer relationship management practices lag behind other vendors in this research.
Operations: Check Point has a smaller team dedicated to email security products than other vendors in this research.

Cisco - Niche Player

Pros:

Sales strategy: Cisco offers bundling options across its Breach Protection and User Protection suites, an expanded sales structure and a broad network of value-added resellers (VARs).
Operations: Cisco boasts a broad geographic footprint, as well as depth of experience in product management and workforce distribution.
Overall viability: Cisco has a long history in the email security space and continues to invest in its future via targeted acquisitions that address evolving BEC and social engineering threats.

Cons:

Customer experience: Cisco's customer relationship management and customer feedback lag behind other vendors in this research.
Product: Cisco's ESP relies on two distinct products to deliver SEG and ICES implementations. Cisco facilitates certain workflows through its XDR platform, introducing complexity across multiple interfaces.
Market responsiveness: Cisco's roadmap focuses on the continued development of its most recent email security platform, with less emphasis on its gateway-specific product.

Cloudflare - Niche Player

Pros:

Market understanding: Cloudflare understands the holistic needs of the email security market.
Geographic strategy: Cloudflare's large and growing global footprint supports client localization requirements across multiple regions.
Overall viability: The growth of Cloudflare's email security team and its strategic position within Cloudflare's overall roadmap support its long-term viability.

Cons:

Operations: Cloudflare's operations score is impacted by broad leadership changes in several areas, introducing the potential for uncertainty around the future direction of email-specific initiatives.
Sales execution: Cloudflare's email security bundling is better suited to single-vendor SASE customers than email security customers due to the composition of its product packages.
Innovation: Email security is underrepresented in Cloudflare's corporate vision and commitment to innovation.

Darktrace - Challenger

Pros:

Operations: Darktrace has a broad geographic presence and larger-than-average sales and customer support teams.
Overall viability: Darktrace has grown its email security business at a faster rate than other vendors in this research.
Sales execution: Darktrace performs well with first-time email security buyers and has strong renewal rates.

Cons:

Product: Darktrace lacks certain features and integrations that are present in other ESPs in this Magic Quadrant.
Vertical/industry strategy: Darktrace's focus on a highly usable but lightly configurable interface limits its suitability for verticals with more advanced technical specifications.
Innovation: Darktrace is unlikely to reshape the market with its innovations based on its modest commitments to R&D infrastructure.

Egress, a KnowBe4 company - Leader

Pros:

Product strategy: Egress' product roadmap aligns well with customer requirements in the areas of DLP and core email protection.
Sales execution/pricing: Egress' product bundles are simple, logically grouped and aligned with customer requirements.
Overall viability: Egress' expansion of its workforce and acquisition by KnowBe4 improves its long-term viability.

Cons:

Product: Egress lacks the depth of features and configurability available from other vendors in this research.
Geographic strategy: Egress lacks a significant footprint outside of Europe and North America, and its administrative console is in English only.
Marketing strategy: Egress' focus on user education could limit its attractiveness to email security customers with a broader focus.

Hornetsecurity - Niche Player

Pros:

Sales execution: Hornetsecurity provides consistent year-to-year pricing and no-cost support.
Sales strategy: Ad hoc contract renewals provide customers with a level of flexibility that is uncommon in the market.
Operations: Hornetsecurity's acquisition of Vade early in 2024 contributed to the addition of key personnel in both leadership and functional areas.

Cons:

Product: Hornetsecurity's ESP lags behind other evaluated vendors' platforms in detection and administrative capabilities, as well as in end-user experience functions.
Customer experience: Hornetsecurity's customer relationship management lags behind other vendors in this research.
Product strategy: Hornetsecurity's roadmap does not fully address current and future market requirements.

IRONSCALES - Visionary

Pros:

Customer experience: IRONSCALES has strong customer relationship management processes and positive customer feedback.
Market responsiveness: IRONSCALES demonstrates an ability to adapt to emerging needs, as evidenced by its delivery of an end-user-facing chat assistant and improvements to graymail handling.
Innovation: IRONSCALES has strong internal processes around R&D that support innovation and enable the delivery of new-to-market features ahead of other vendors in this research.

Cons:

Operations: IRONSCALES' operations are staffed to support primarily midsize enterprises. Larger organizations should validate IRONSCALES' ability to support their requirements.
Vertical/industry strategy: IRONSCALES lacks strategic initiatives targeting specific verticals or industries.
Product: IRONSCALES lacks common options for deployment and configuration, as well as common infrastructure support features.

Microsoft - Challenger

Pros:

Overall viability: Microsoft controls a significant portion of email infrastructure and security market share, and commands a stronger corporate position than other vendors in this Magic Quadrant.
Geographic strategy: Microsoft provides broad geographic support for its products.
Market understanding: Microsoft has a particularly strong understanding of the email security market due to its position as a major email infrastructure provider.

Cons:

Customer experience: Microsoft's customer relationship management lags behind other vendors in this research and customer feedback indicates variable service and support.
Sales strategy: Microsoft's sales strategy bundles email security with non-email security products to a higher degree than other vendors in this Magic Quadrant.
Innovation: Microsoft's innovations generally rely on developments in adjacent security areas, such as XDR and Copilot for Security, instead of the direct development of email security capabilities.

Mimecast - Leader

Pros:

Operations: Mimecast is well-staffed to support its global operations with above-average personnel counts for technical customer support, product management and analytic roles.
Sales strategy: Mimecast's sales strategy benefits from packaging reconfigurations that align well with customer requirements and improved VAR partnering strategies.
Geographic strategy: Mimecast offers broad language support and above-average, regionally aligned support infrastructure.

Cons:

Product: Mimecast's implementation of language analysis is underdeveloped compared with other vendors in this research.
Sales execution/pricing: Mimecast's discount programs and vertical-specific pricing are poorly defined.
Market understanding: Mimecast's vision for the future of email security diverges from other vendors in this research through its focus on human risk mitigation.

Perception Point - Visionary

Pros:

Market understanding: Perception Point shows strong awareness of the needs of SMBs, especially those affected by skills gaps and workforce shortages.
Customer experience: Perception Point has strong customer relationship management processes.
Sales strategy: Perception Point offers flexibility in contract length and simple bundling options that are well-suited to smaller organizations.

Cons:

Overall viability: Slower-than-average growth and limited availability of financial information about Perception Point create uncertainty regarding the company's long-term viability.
Operations: Perception Point has a smaller employee base than other vendors in this research, and larger enterprises should confirm Perception Point's ability to support their requirements.
Geographic strategy: Perception Point's geographic strategy is mostly limited to North America and Europe.

Proofpoint - Leader

Pros:

Product: Proofpoint offers a broad set of platform tools and strong detection capabilities.
Market responsiveness/record: Proofpoint's feature expansions, such as the introduction of misdirected mail protection, align with emerging threats and customer requirements.
Sales strategy: Proofpoint's packaging aligns with security buyers' focus on comprehensive inbox security, and the vendor continues to add sales channels such as AWS Marketplace.

Cons:

Market understanding: Proofpoint underestimates the strength of its ICES competition and the market demand for the flexibility provided by API-integrated vendors.
Product strategy: Proofpoint's integration of Tessian emphasizes a need for customer experience roadmap items, such as a unified dashboard, which may impact the delivery of new functionality.
Sales execution/pricing: Proofpoint's pricing is higher than that of other vendors in this research.

Trend Micro - Leader

Pros:

Product: Trend Micro offers versatile implementation, architecture design and administrative capabilities while maintaining a high degree of usability.
Market responsiveness: Trend Micro has a strong process for collecting and channeling customer feedback to feature improvements.
Sales strategy: Trend Micro's competitive displacement programs and cross-sell identification strategy are among the most aggressive in this Magic Quadrant.

Cons:

Innovation: Trend Micro's R&D focus operates globally, but some feature deliveries are slightly lagging those of other vendors in this research.
Overall viability: Trend Micro's email security business has grown at a slower rate than that of other vendors in this research.
Vertical/industry strategy: Trend Micro lacks strategic initiatives targeting specific verticals or industries.

FAQs

Q: Which vendors are Leaders in 2024?

A: Abnormal, Check Point, Egress, a KnowBe4 company, Mimecast, Proofpoint, Trend Micro

Q: What does "Leader" mean in MQ terms?

A: Leaders have a strong vision for the future of ESPs, balanced with the Ability to Execute on those visions. While Leaders may vary in product efficacy or functionality, their services offered are consumable by broad swathes of the email market and have strong commitments to customer success. Leaders are early to identify new attack trends and move quickly to fill gaps created by an evolving threat landscape, either by innovation or acquisition. Leaders excel with technical capabilities, infrastructure that supports progressive product strategies, and an emphasis on customer success.

Q: How do I interpret a Gartner Magic Quadrant?

A: https://www.gartner.com/en/research/methodologies/magic-quadrants-research

Report:

Top Vendor Products for Email Security Platforms in 2024

Email Security Platforms Vendor Product Comparisons 2024

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

Pros:

Cons:

FAQs

Q: Which vendors are Leaders in 2024?

Q: What does "Leader" mean in MQ terms?

Q: How do I interpret a Gartner Magic Quadrant?

Reference