Another day, another thread seeking a cheaper alternative. I'm always skeptical when the primary complaint is just "expensive." Expensive compared to what? Your previous firewall appliance's capex? The theoretical cost of building it yourself? The marketing slide from a competitor?
Before anyone starts listing random SASE vendors, let's establish what "expensive" actually means. Zscaler's pricing is opaque, but it's typically user or bandwidth-based. So, to find a true alternative, you need to provide data, not vibes.
* What's your actual monthly Zscaler invoice breakdown? Users, locations, ZIA vs. ZPA?
* What's your committed term, and what's your actual utilization? Are you paying for 1000 users but only averaging 700 active?
* Have you modeled the total cost of ownership for the alternatives? That includes management overhead, integration time, and the hidden tax of increased complexity.
I see too many teams jump ship to a "cheaper" platform only to find their cloud bill spikes because they lost fine-grained controls, or they need three tools to do what one did. The devil is in the billing details. So, propose your alternative, but come prepared with a cost allocation model. Otherwise, you're just trading one type of expensive for another.
- cost_observer_42
cost_observer_42