My favorite firewall to protect small businesses in 2025 is the FortiGate 60F. It is unique in its ability to not just perform in the face of inspection but also its capability to enforce quality of service policies that maintain the smooth operation of crucial services. One use case that demonstrated its value was at a wellness retreat site that did all of its therapy and consultation sessions over video calls. Prior to the installation of the new firewall calls would drop or lag while staff uploaded reports or synced files with the cloud. By using the traffic-shaping capabilities of FortiGate I set up rules to give priority to real time applications such as VoIP and video conferencing over large background transfers. The IPS and web filtering would continue running but bandwidth would be intelligently allocated according to business priorities. Firewall logs reported those devices that used the bandwidth and remote workers were using SSL VPN with MFA. Within days the user experience changed entirely - sessions could be held without issue and the uploading of administrative files could be done at off-peak times without disruption. And the lesson of that was simple, that you don't only need firewalls to keep bad things out, you also need firewalls to control what flows in and out in a fashion that's consistent with the goals of the organization. For small business where communication is the key, the capability that FortiGate has in handling performance as well as security, I would say that it's the best investment I've seen.
Sophos XGS 107 is the type of multi-layered defense that healthcare companies rely on for compliance and patient safety. I personally experienced how powerful it is when I implemented safe telehealth for my small practice. Physicians required direct access to electronic health records, while administrative staff required only scheduling and billing platforms. The issue was how to maintain the security of these processes while not allowing for any blockages or confusion. Sophos' SSL VPN with MFA is used to enforce a role-based granular access. Physicians were logged into a subset of the EHR applications, whereas support staff had access only to non-clinical applications. TLS inspection was enabled across the board, but skipped domains of any EHR vendors, to avoid certificate conflicts. Each log recorded each login and each attempt to access data, which provided us with an auditable trail for HIPPA purposes. The firewall morphed into more than just an impediment, it became a means for demonstrating accountability. Most importantly I was blown away by the user experience. The staff could login from home office, or mini office with very little training; compliance officers had enough visibility to sleep at night. The Sophos XGS walked that line between clinical efficiency and regulatory discipline, and for this reason I continue to recommend it to small healthcare teams.
I approach cybersecurity from a completely different angle than most IT consultants - through the lens of trauma therapy and family systems. Working with teens and families for years taught me that the biggest security vulnerabilities come from human behavior, not just technical gaps. **Cisco Meraki MX68** is my top pick because it addresses the psychological side of cybersecurity. When I helped a local family therapy practice upgrade last year, their biggest issue wasn't sophisticated attacks - it was staff clicking malicious links during stressful sessions with difficult cases. The Meraki's advanced malware protection and automatic updates removed the human error factor completely. The key insight from my therapy background: small businesses need "set it and forget it" solutions because owners are already overwhelmed. I've seen too many practices get breached because they couldn't keep up with manual security updates while managing client crises. Meraki's cloud management means security happens automatically in the background. Most importantly, the detailed reporting helped that practice show HIPAA compliance during their audit. The visual dashboard was simple enough that even non-tech staff could understand what threats were being blocked, which reduced their anxiety about potential breaches significantly.
Through building Security Camera King into a $20M+ e-commerce business, I've dealt with constant cyber threats targeting online retailers. We tried several enterprise solutions but settled on **SonicWall TZ470** after it stopped three major DDoS attacks that were crippling our checkout process during peak sales periods. What sold me on SonicWall was their real-time visualization dashboard - I can literally watch traffic patterns and spot attacks as they happen. When we were processing $50K+ in daily orders last Black Friday, their intrusion prevention system blocked over 2,000 malicious connection attempts without slowing down legitimate customer transactions. The TZ470 costs around $400 but pays for itself quickly. After implementing it, our website downtime dropped by 80% and we eliminated the revenue losses from security incidents. For small businesses doing any online sales, that reliability difference is massive - one successful attack can wipe out months of profits. I've recommended this same setup to dozens of our web design clients, especially those in e-commerce. The businesses that invested in proper firewall protection saw zero security-related downtime, while those who went cheap often came back to us after dealing with breaches that cost them thousands in lost sales and recovery time.
Running Divine Home & Office, I've dealt with network security across multiple locations - our main Denver office, client sites, and coordinating with contractors who access our project management systems. After getting hit by a ransomware attempt that targeted our design files last year, I switched to **Watchguard Firebox T45** and it's been bulletproof. What sold me on Watchguard was the network visibility - I can see exactly which devices our contractors and team members connect with when they're on-site at client properties. Last month, it blocked a compromised tablet that one of our furniture delivery partners brought to a $180k remodel project in Cherry Hills. That could've been catastrophic for client trust. The geo-blocking feature is crucial for design firms like ours. We had constant probing attempts from overseas trying to access our client portfolios and 3D renderings. Since implementing Watchguard's threat detection, those attempts dropped to zero, and I can actually see real-time reports of what's being blocked. For small businesses juggling multiple contractors and client data like we do, the T45 costs around $350 but saves thousands in potential data breaches. The mobile app lets me monitor security even when I'm at the ranch in Evergreen, which beats constantly worrying about whether our client files are protected.
So far, in 2025, the best all rounded small business firewall I have worked with is the Sophos XGS 107. Perhaps most importantly, it is better equipped for handling "deep packet inspection" without incurring the performance costs of doing that inspection, a key requirement in a world where almost all processes are reliant on encrypted connections. I came around to seeing the value in it, the first time I was deployed to a small digital agency which had developers routinely spinning up test servers and staging sites. The difficult part was keeping these experimental environments from leaking sensitive client data. To counteract this I run all staging hosts in their own VLAN, which has no business talking to the production network. This allowed full visibility into all outbound traffic, and would expose any malware without disrupting anything on the developers side. Exceptions were also documented, in the case of vendor platforms that required certificate pinning. Using the dashboard, for example, I could see which device was using the most data at any given time and allocate more bandwidth to my computers to avoid bottlenecks when on a creative spree. The outcome was a distributed environment that allowed innovators to innovate without engaging in the exploitation of weakness. The clarity of Sophos XGS is one of the key attributes to distinguishing it from other solutions. Small teams don't have hours to waste chasing false positives or waiting for a slow VPN. This firewall provided me strong barriers that did not distract the creative staff by making inspections synonymous with usability. For small business owners today I think that blend of performance, transparency and some measure of control is why I would suggest it.
I particularly noted the performance of the Sophos XGS 107 in my work with it in regards to handling BYOD situations. At one clinic there was a high rate of staff or clients bringing in their personal laptops and smart phones, and thus the actual potential for malware to seep through those devices into sensitive clinical systems was a tangible risk. Most firewalls can restrict traffic, but without the granularity of viewing the applications you cannot maintain that type of policy over time. I've also built a separeted VLAN for unmanaged devices using Sophos Central. Those BYOD connections were limited on bandwidth , and filtered on high risk categories, while clinical workstations existed in a shielded segment with no intrusion prevention and fully TLS inspection. The most egregious was a situation in which a personal phone tried to access a malicious domain. Due to the firewall, the attack was immediately isolated within the BYOD VLAN and none of the clinical systems were affected. It was hardly even noticeable by staff, but another log was clear evidence of preventing risk. What I like about this one is the sustainability of the solution. Rather than trying to block personal devices, which is difficult to do in practice, we provided a secure tunnel that came in to protect the organization. This is the type of practical design that makes Sophos XGS 107 ideal for small businesses managing disparate device environments.
In my opinion, the FortiGate 60F is the top firewall for small businesses in 2025. The key is that it provides the advanced security capabilities including intrusion prevention, application control, and VPN, that will remain fully functional without impacting the user experience. There are simply too many small businesses purchasing equipment that looks good on paper but buckles under load when you turn on inspection. But, FortiGate addresses this concern with the SOC4 platform and hardware acceleration. The way it is setup by me starts with VLAN segmentation based on role. Administrative, clinical, and guest traffic are all zoned off and do not communicate between each VLAN unless necessary. IPS, and reputation-based filtering are used on outbound policies while remote users connect via SSL VPN with MFA. Businesses with redundant internet connections can use SD-WAN to ensure voice and conferencing are prioritized while the transfer of large files is offloaded to the secondary connection. Logs are piped to a central location to comply with retention policies, as well as helping to investigate incidents. The advantage is better manifested on a daily basis. Videoconferencing is consistent, cloud-based applications are engaging and employees don't need to disable filters for speed. This latter has the added value that because of their stability security policies are left for a long period of time without hardly any infringements or breaches that lead to issues of compliance. The FortiGate 60F is the firewall that deploys and provides continual protection without creating operational overhead for small organizations who cannot afford to be down or have security / compliance gaps.
The Sophos XGS 107 is my small business choice for 2025. On the management side, the focus is on strong security without adding complexity or sunk operational costs. The XGS line accomplishes this via efficient TLS inspection, good logging, and centralized management that can be efficiently handled by small teams. In a standard deployment I start by running strict VLAN segmentation across departments. All office and guest traffic is prevented from traversing the financial system to provide isolation. Outbound traffic flows through IPS and web filtering, and TLS is selectively decrypted with exceptions made for banking, vendor portals, etc. SSL VPN access to systems off of the network allows MFA to further provide secure remote access and reduces risk of compromise due to stolen credentials. Logs are continuously exported to be audited and to be able to respond to incidents. The point is also meant to show one of the practical benefits which is that of accountability. From a financial standpoint, central control provides financial executives with clear oversight and reporting into network behavior and also ensures consistent security policies across their enterprise. Amongst them, Sophos XGS that allows small-business security-conscious financials to gain both visibility and a layer of security without creating time consuming responsibilities for their team.
Founder, Real estate expert and investor, Business owner. at Eaglecashbuyers
Answered a month ago
After testing several firewalls, my most preferred choice is the Fortinet FortiGate 40F. This firewall stood out to me as one of the most reliable solutions for small businesses seeking enterprise security without the complexities because it combines the most advanced intrusion prevention with web filtering and immense threat detection. Its SD-WAN capability is another great feature because it provides secure connectivity even across multiple sites. If you include the built-in VPN support, it is the best firewall I have used by a mile. What I like the most about Fortinet is the fact that I get one of the (if not the) best security without being a tech genius and I was never overwhelmed. Even when I had to install and set it up, it only took a morning, that's how straightforward it was. The intuitive dashboard made it easy to manage remote access and set up VPNs without additional IT help. I saw results immediately because I saw phishing attempts blocked in real time. The VPNs ran smoothly with minimal latency as well. If you're a small business owner, FortiGate delivers peace of mind with consistent, real-time protection. I also admire the SonicWall TZ series because it offers powerful protection with features like cloud-based management and Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA). Compact yet scalable, it is very ideal for small businesses and since I started using it, it has maintained a very strong performance and remained completely reliable. Different owners will have different preferences, naturally. So my advice is this; choose a firewall that protects without complicating your day.
Founder at Ikon Recovery Center & Managing Partner at Precious Cosmetics at Ikon Recovery
Answered a month ago
In 2025 I recommend Cisco Meraki MX68 with Advanced Security licensing especially for small businesses in the more vulnerable sectors. Its distinguishing factor being simplicity. For many organizations this makes the configuration and maintenance of a firewall difficult, as many companies don't have dedicated IT personnel and, if a firewall is too complex it will often be left in offline, or misconfigured. Meraki offers a dashboard that comes in a format that makes sense to executives and employees while still offering powerful features such as Snort-based IDS, Talos-based filtering and AutoVPN. I roll out the MX68 specifically by running it with administrator, operations, and guest network VLANS. To reduce lateral movement, there are no firewall rules in place allowing for Inter-VLAN traffic. IDS is set to balanced mode, carefully selected content categories minimize risk without significant productivity sacrifice. The connection is via a client VPN with MFA, making the connection secure without a need for complex configuration. It is easy for multiple sites to connect via AutoVPN, and a log of changes in the dashboard means that one is accountable and gives leadership the ability to scrutinize your policy changes. The effect is cultural as well as technical. It's predictable to the staff, and outages are minimal and to no surprise the leaders can see the security posture clearly in the dashboard. Meraki MX68 is the firewall that will keep you secure, visibly, and in an easy to use way on a budget and resource strain for the small businesses out there that need to have solid security.
Sophos XGS 107 is what I recommend for community-focused organizations. The mix of selective TLS inspection, good logging, and easy policy management can be implemented in smaller teams. By 2025 almost all traffic is encrypted so safe, performant inspection is a must. The design of Sophos makes that posible while also providing excellent exception handling for site that can not be decrypted. The process I follow begins with unsegmenting. Workstations, servers, and guest traffic are on different VLANS, inter-VLAN communication is denied unless well documented. IPS and reputation- based filtering occur at the egress point. It is possible to enable the use of TLS inspection and have an exemption list for specific sensitive services such as websites for accesing banking or healthcare services. Remote access via SSL VPN with MFA and all logs exported for long term retention and auditing. There is a cut off guide for staff to know when to escalate and not to start working unsafe workarounds. It's sort of a middle-ground between FortiGate and Meraki. FortiGate has excellent performance but is a "tweaker", where as Meraki is simpler to manage at the cost of limited control of decryption. For nearly all small organizations the XGS series is a good compromise between protection and ability to operate.
The trick with cisco is the costs can mount quickly that being said in my experience the most useful and easiest to manage firewall for organizations with multiple locations has been the Cisco Meraki MX68. One of the recovery programs I was involved with has three residential homes but grapples with connecting them due to unstable internet. Their staff wasn't able to manage these systems on a day-to-day basis and when the systems went down it equated to a block of clinic time. I then went to the various locations, set up a Meraki MX68 unit on site and by simply turning on AutoVPN was able to create a secured mesh network in under an hour. In addition to the robustness and ease of use, the dashboard would show at a glance the overall health of each connection - if nothing else this was very easy for non-tech people to very quickly look and see if a hom had issues with their ISP rather than guessing. Snort- based IDS and Talos threat updates ran silently in the back ground, providing needed security without the need to continually monitor the facility. The uniformity of the rules across all sites also made training staff easier, and presumably also allowed leadership to know that every site had the same protections. The highlight was the transparency. Each policy change was recorded and visible; this improved trust between leadership and staff. For customers that need everything to work consistently the MX68 pieced together these fragmented systems into one seamless, redundant system. This would be my number one pick for primarily multi- site small businesses.
The one I recommend for most small businesses is the Meraki MX68 with Advanced Security. The main advantage is that it is simple. As is typical with many smaller teams but, there is not a full time IT administrator which necessitated the firewall software be user-friendly but robust. Meraki also brings Snort-based IDS, Talos-backed content filtering, and AutoVPN for fast multi-site connections . When I do use them, I create VLANs for admin, staff, and guest traffic with very stringent lateral movement rules. IDS is in monitor mode, filtering categories are limited to protect the work, blocks by country protect against the most obvious risks. Remote access is client VPN secured with MFA. The dashboard also allows for reviewed and clear documentation of version history. As they grow, AutoVPN templates allow new offices to be brought online and secured rapidly. The downside of deploying a Citrix here is the higher inflexibility of TLS inspection, and the fact that under heavy inspection it doesn't perform as well as a sophos let alone Fortigate. But, for companies most focused on clarity, and usability Meraki makes certain the firewall cannot be an afterthought overlooked. MX68 only works in actual small business because of that sustainability - features remaining on, logs being kept .
I think the FortiGate 60F is the best firewall option for small business in 2025. Where it stands apart is in its capacity to maintain secure acceleration capabilities such as IPS, application control and VPN while utilizing these features without any performance impact. When working with international teams video calls and cloud are a must, so keeping up velocity while inspecting traffic is not an option. For me, FortiGate deployments are meant to be thoroughly segmented, more than somewhat segmented; finance, operations, and guest networks all in seperate VLANs. The policies have default-deny rules in place, and the ability to enforce IPS and web filtering for outbound traffic. Remote workers take advantage of SSL VPN with MFA, while the branch offices are connected by IPsec tunnels. I have them set up on SD-WAN where I tweak the system to give priority to low latency applications like conferences in order to have round-the-clock global co-governance. Logs are sent to the center to be ready for auditing at all times. And the reason I keep using FortiGate, is its reliability. Because performance is consistent, Features are left running, which removes a source of pressure on employees to eliminate inspection. For finance-driven groups this means they can plan their costs, it means less hours spent problem solving. This is the firewall that provides the best amount of protection for the money for small businesses.
Partner - Southeast Addiction Center, Southeast Detox & Southeast Addiction Center Nashville Director of Medical Billing at Remedial Pro at Southeast Addiction Center
Answered a month ago
I have concluded that the FortiGate 60F is the best small business option in 2025. What matters is that they don't "make concessions" with security capabilities. A lot of second class firewalls use as an advertising slogan such almost all the functionalities of an IPS or application control, but when they are enabled performance decreases massively. These protections can remain in place via hardware acceleration on the FortiGate and without impacts to crucial business needs. In practice, I use departmental VLAN mapping, deny inter-vlan by default, and turn on IPs and filtering in out bound rules. Teleworkers use SSL VPN with MFA, and all branch sites connect with IPsec. Dual ISPs are utilized in combination with SD- WAN so that Voice calls and cloud applications always have priority. The logs are sent to a central location for compliance and problem solving. Meraki MX is the easiest, and Sophos XGS is the best at decrypting but both have tradeoffs in raw throughput, or licensing flexibility of some sort. With no inspection throttling services down and less time spent troubleshooting, FortiGate is a no brainer. For small teams in need of that combination of resilience and efficiency, the 60F is the solution.
I prefer the Cisco Meraki MX68, especially for small organizations that are attempting to scale at various sites. It is powerful in the sense that it is easy to operate. The system uses Snort based IDS, content filtering, and AutoVPN, which ensures that those who are not IT experts can protect themselves. This is important because complexity can be a precursor to neglect, which is more dangerous than sparse features. I start by deploying VLANs for staff, admin and guest, and lock down unnecessary lateral movement. IDS is placed in balanced mode, filtering will be looking at common threat categories, and geo-blocks eliminate obvious external risks. It is accessible remotely via VPN with MFA. In terms of growth, new sites come online quickly due to the AutoVPN templates and the change log in the dashboard keeps leadership up-to-date to changes. The major issue is that. On the other hand, FortiGate still can't be beaten for sheer inspection power and TLS decryption is not as advanced as it is in Sophos. But, for organizations that seek stability, clearity, and rapid deployment, Meraki does provide a "longterm" security position . Well-used security tools that work effectively are better than feature-heavy security systems that lay unused.
Overall, I continue to think the FortiGate 60F is the best small business firewall of 2025. The benefit is obvious: it means that progressive security structures can operate without affecting business operations. The one that particularly stood out was a small property management firm that essentially utilized cloud file synchronization to onboard new tenants. Because of the skyrocketing bandwidth costs, and lower productivity whenever massive syncs were overtaking video meetings or VoIP. I was able to set rules to slow down large file transfers while in office hours and to prioritize conferencing and voice; through FortiGate's SD-WAN and application control . The recurring costs for a second internet connection were no longer needed, cutting costs substantially. Control logs also facilitated auditing processes by third parties. I could document with great precision what intrusion prevention and access restrictions I had in place for purposes of my insurance and also to keep my funders happy but I didn't need these expensive tools. What worked was not just the security function; it was the efficiency of it. FortiGate allowed us to drive network activity to be in support of our business objectives and not only that consume it more wisely. Small businesses live and die by their pennies and for these shops the fusion of protection and cost containment found in the 60F is just what the firewall doctor ordered.
If your educational institution is small I recommend the best school firewall in 2025 to be the Cisco Meraki MX68. The difference is in usability. Regularly, schools and tutoring companies don't have IT departments, and when a firewall is high maintenance like opendns's has the potential to be, it will quickly be forgotten. Meraki handles this with an easy-to-use cloud-managed dashboard that is, but, secure, including Snort- based IDS/IPS and Talos threat intelligence. When I am configuring them I partition VLANs for student traffic, staff traffic, and admin traffic. Inter-VLAN limitations prevent unnecessary east-west movement. IDS is pullet in balanced mode and content filtering needs to only be selected correctly to support our need for protection from inappropriate sites, while also not interfering with the needed academic resources . The integrated VPN with MFA allows for a secure connection into internal systems with an available internet connection. It is also easy for administrators to monitor because of the change history in the dashboard, which is important in an educational setting. The real value in this is the sustainability. AutoVPN allows for easy connection between multi-site locations and automatically updates. The Meraki MX68, is a great solution for smaller educational organizations that can not trade safety for the simplicity of an easier to manage appliance, and provides a stable, secure environment for educators to focus on their job.
I recommend the Cisco Meraki MX68 as the best firewall for small transparent and accountablefocused organizations in 2025. It has the benefit of being quite clear. It also provides administrator's with a cloud based dashboard so that don't need to pull too much hair out trying to understand or use the system. This also means centralized policy enforcement even from small groups, Here is also at the same time means that leadership must be kept in the know about any changes. They are deployed from a straightforward deployment pattern. I create VLANs that keep administrative, operational and guest networks on separate segments. Inter-VLAN traffic is limited to reduce the attack surface. IDS is set to balanced and content filtering categorizations are used selectively to block threats while minimizing intereferencecy and encouraging productivity. There is also some use of MFA and VPN for remote support staff. The logs and the built in change history are the audit trail needed for decisions to be documented and transparent. "From a cultural level there is the biggest value". It was designed to be user friendly which means security is not buried in some black box. Leadership can be able to understand and verify that policies are being even followed encouraging the sense of accountability. Meraki MX68 is the security and the visibility, for small, trusting organizations.