# Next-generation firewalls: what AI models recommend, October 2026

Gane Index, October 2026 Edition. Asked as "next-generation firewall" and as "enterprise firewall appliance or virtual firewall", six framings each, to fourteen models with search on, on behalf of a mid-market B2B company. Page: https://www.gane.ai/index/it/network/next-generation-firewalls/2026-10

This is the permanent record of the October 2026 Edition, published October 1, 2026 and superseded since. The current standing: https://www.gane.ai/index/it/network/next-generation-firewalls/index.md

**Standing:** Fortinet FortiGate leads with 73% of first choices; verdict clear leader. 52 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| Rank | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | [Fortinet FortiGate](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/fortinet-fortigate/index.md) | 73% | 10% | 68 |
| 2 | [Sophos Firewall](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/sophos-firewall/index.md) | 4% | 3% | 35 |
| 3 | [Palo Alto Networks NGFW](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/palo-alto-networks-ngfw/index.md) | 2% | 18% | 56 |
| 4 | [Cisco Secure Firewall](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/cisco-secure-firewall/index.md) | 2% | 25% | 40 |
| 15 | [Check Point Quantum](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/check-point-quantum/index.md) | 0% | 6% | 34 |
| 16 | [WatchGuard Firebox](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/watchguard-firebox/index.md) | 0% | 0% | 11 |
| 77 | [SonicWall](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/sonicwall/index.md) | 0% | 50% | 10 |

Rank is by share of first choices among all 80 products named; products with the same share are tied, and the order among them carries no meaning. The table lists those with at least 10 labels.

## Each model's first choice on the direct prompt

- Claude Haiku 4.5: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Check Point Quantum, Palo Alto Networks NGFW
- GPT-5.4 mini: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Check Point Quantum, Cisco Secure Firewall, Palo Alto Networks NGFW
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Check Point Quantum, Palo Alto Networks NGFW, Sophos Firewall
- Perplexity Sonar: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Palo Alto Networks NGFW, Sophos Firewall
- Grok 4.20: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Sophos Firewall, WatchGuard Firebox
- Mistral Small: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Palo Alto Networks NGFW, Sophos Firewall
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Sophos Firewall
- Llama 4 Maverick: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Cisco Secure Firewalls, Palo Alto Networks' PA-Series
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Check Point Harmony Edge / Infinity, Palo Alto Networks NGFW
- Kimi K2: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Cisco Meraki MX, Palo Alto Networks NGFW, SonicWall NSa Series, Sophos XG
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Fortinet FortiGate, Sophos Firewall
- MiniMax M2.5: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Palo Alto Networks NGFW, Sophos Firewall
- GPT-6 Luna: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Check Point Quantum, Palo Alto Networks NGFW
- Muse Glimmer 30B: Fortinet FortiGate; alternatives Palo Alto Networks NGFW, SonicWall Gen 7, Sophos Firewall

## Sources the answers cite

76 of 84 answers came back with a source list, from 14 of 14 models. Sites named in the most answers:

- fortinet.com: 41 answers, 73 citations
- comparitech.com: 40 answers, 50 citations
- checkpoint.com: 33 answers, 45 citations
- cybersecuritynews.com: 30 answers, 37 citations
- cyberpress.org: 30 answers, 32 citations
- learn.g2.com: 26 answers, 26 citations
- paloaltonetworks.com: 23 answers, 34 citations
- cisco.com: 18 answers, 29 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://comparitech.com/net-admin/next-gen-firewalls (36 answers)
- https://cybersecuritynews.com/best-next-generation-firewall (29 answers)
- https://cyberpress.org/best-next-generation-firewall-ngfw-solutions-for-every-business-size (28 answers)
- https://learn.g2.com/best-firewall-software (26 answers)
- https://fortinet.com/products/next-generation-firewall (15 answers)
- https://checkpoint.com/comparison/top-4-ngfw-compared (13 answers)
- https://gane.ai/index/it/network/next-generation-firewalls (12 answers)
- https://gbhackers.com/ngfw-solutions-compared-features-pricing (11 answers)
- https://cdw.com/content/cdw/en/articles/security/next-generation-firewalls-complete-ngfw-guide-evaluation.html (10 answers)
- https://expertinsights.com/network-security/the-top-network-firewalls (10 answers)

## Warned against

- Cisco Secure Firewall: 10 of 40 labels negative. "Cisco failed one critical TCP-segmentation evasion, reducing its exploit-evasion resistance to 40 percent" (Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt)
- Fortinet FortiGate: 7 of 68 labels negative. ""20+ CVEs on CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog — among the highest for any firewall vendor"; Caution rating" (Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt)
- Palo Alto Networks NGFW: 10 of 56 labels negative. "Palo Alto Networks failed both network and transport-layer categories" (Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt)
- SonicWall: 5 of 10 labels negative. "Earned "Caution" in NSS Labs 2025 (lowest security effectiveness at 46.37%, failed critical network/transport-layer evasions)" (Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt)

## Movement since September 2026

Floor: 11 points of share, measured on the calibration repeat.
Same leader: Fortinet FortiGate at 74%.

- WatchGuard Firebox: 4% to 0%, −4. Inside the floor by 7 points · rank 2 → 13 of 71.
- Sophos Firewall: 2% to 5%, +3. Inside the floor by 8 points · rank 5 → 2 of 71.
- Cisco Secure Firewall: 0% to 2%, +2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 12 → 4 of 71.
- Check Point Quantum: 2% to 0%, −2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 6 → 12 of 71.
- SonicWall: 2% to 0%, −2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 11 → 71 of 71.
- Fortinet FortiGate: 74% to 74%, ±0. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 1 of 71, unchanged.
- Palo Alto Networks NGFW: 2% to 2%, ±0. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 4 → 3 of 71.

## Record

- Method: https://www.gane.ai/index/it/methodology
- License: CC BY 4.0. Cite as Gane Index, October 2026 Edition, www.gane.ai/index/it.