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Cybersecurity · head to head

Fortinet FortiGate vs Soketi

Fortinet FortiGate logo

Fortinet FortiGate

Cybersecurity

Next-generation firewall with AI-powered threat protection

From
$500/year
Free plan
No
Full reviewWebsite
Soketi logo

Soketi

Developer Tools

Self-hosted, Pusher-compatible WebSockets server with a stalled maintenance record

From
Free
Free plan
Yes
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Soketi has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Fortinet FortiGate security services are sold as separate FortiGuard subscription bundles, so ATP, UTP and ENT determine which protections are actually active; Soketi maintenance has effectively stalled: the maintainer has said time is severely limited, releases are infrequent, and the community has been discussing whether the project is abandoned, which means security fixes may not arrive.
  • They diverge on capability: Fortinet FortiGate covers Next-generation firewall, Soketi covers Pusher protocol compatibility.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Fortinet FortiGate and Soketi actually diverge.

Attributes where Fortinet FortiGate and Soketi differ
AttributeFortinet FortiGateSoketi
Starting price$500/yearFree
Pricing modelsubscriptionOpen source, no licence fee
Free tierNoYes
PlatformsHardware, Virtual, CloudLinux, macOS, Windows
CategoryCybersecurityDeveloper Tools
Founded2000Unknown

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Fortinet FortiGate

  • Next-generation firewall
  • Intrusion prevention
  • SSL/TLS inspection
  • Application control
  • Web filtering
  • SD-WAN
  • Zero-trust network access
  • AI-powered threat detection

Only in Soketi

  • Pusher protocol compatibility
  • Presence and private channels
  • Horizontal scaling
  • App management backends
  • Webhooks
  • Prometheus metrics

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Fortinet FortiGate

  • Next-generation firewalling at data centre, campus and branch scalenot Soketi
  • Secure SD-WAN across distributed sitesnot Soketi
  • Zero trust network access to internal applicationsnot Soketi
  • Virtual firewalls in AWS, Azure, Google Cloud and Oraclenot Soketi
  • Ruggedised deployments in industrial environmentsnot Soketi

Soketi

  • A Laravel application that already uses Echo and wants to stop paying a hosted realtime providernot Fortinet FortiGate
  • Realtime notifications or presence indicators where data must not leave your own infrastructure for compliance reasonsnot Fortinet FortiGate
  • A local or CI environment that needs a Pusher-compatible server without hitting a paid accountnot Fortinet FortiGate
  • A high-connection-count application where hosted per-connection pricing has become the largest line in the infrastructure billnot Fortinet FortiGate

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Fortinet FortiGate

  • Security services are sold as separate FortiGuard subscription bundles, so ATP, UTP and ENT determine which protections are actually active
  • Throughput is tied to the appliance model, from 500 Mbps on the FortiGate 30G to 520 Gbps on the 7121F, so capacity planning is a hardware purchase
  • Pricing is not published and goes through partners

Soketi

  • Maintenance has effectively stalled: the maintainer has said time is severely limited, releases are infrequent, and the community has been discussing whether the project is abandoned, which means security fixes may not arrive.
  • Dependency drift on Node and uWebSockets.js will eventually force you to fork or migrate, and that cost is unbudgeted at the point you adopt it.
  • There is no commercial support to buy, so a production incident at three in the morning is entirely your problem with no escalation path.
  • Scaling beyond a single node needs Redis and careful configuration, and getting presence channels correct across nodes is a genuine source of subtle bugs.
  • It implements the Pusher protocol rather than tracking it, so any protocol feature Pusher adds later will not appear, and the compatibility guarantee slowly decays.

Pricing, plan by plan

Fortinet FortiGate

$500/year
  • FortiGate Entry$500/year
    • Basic firewall
    • VPN support
    • Threat protection
  • FortiGate Enterprise$2500/year
    • Advanced threat protection
    • SSL inspection
    • Application control
  • FortiGate Ultimate$10000/year
    • All Enterprise features
    • Zero-trust access
    • AI-powered analytics

Soketi

Free
  • SoketiFree
    • MIT licensed
    • Unlimited connections subject to your own hardware
    • No vendor billing

Which should you pick?

Choose Fortinet FortiGate if

  • You need next-generation firewall.
  • You work on Hardware, Virtual, Cloud.
  • You also want intrusion prevention.
Fortinet FortiGate review

Choose Soketi if

  • You need pusher protocol compatibility.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, macOS, Windows.
  • You also want presence and private channels.
Soketi review

Questions people ask

Is Fortinet FortiGate or Soketi better?
Neither clearly leads. Fortinet FortiGate starts at $500/year and Soketi at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Fortinet FortiGate or Soketi?
Soketi has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at $500/year for Fortinet FortiGate and Free for Soketi.
Does Fortinet FortiGate or Soketi run on more platforms?
Fortinet FortiGate runs on Hardware, Virtual, Cloud. Soketi runs on Linux, macOS, Windows.
Can I use Soketi for free?
Yes. Soketi has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Fortinet FortiGate starts at $500/year.
What is Fortinet FortiGate best used for?
Fortinet FortiGate is most often used for next-generation firewalling at data centre, campus and branch scale, secure sd-wan across distributed sites, zero trust network access to internal applications, virtual firewalls in aws, azure, google cloud and oracle. Of those, next-generation firewalling at data centre, campus and branch scale and secure sd-wan across distributed sites are not what Soketi is typically brought in for.
What can Fortinet FortiGate do that Soketi cannot?
Fortinet FortiGate covers Next-generation firewall, Intrusion prevention, SSL/TLS inspection, Application control. Soketi covers Pusher protocol compatibility, Presence and private channels, Horizontal scaling, App management backends.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Fortinet FortiGate: What are the FortiGate security bundle options?

Fortinet offers three FortiGuard AI-Powered Security Services bundles: ENT Bundle (ultimate security for networks, web, file, SaaS, data, and devices), UTP Bundle (advanced web and network protection), and ATP Bundle (protection against network intrusions and malware with IPS, antivirus, and application control).

Source
Soketi: Is Soketi still maintained?

Barely. The maintainer has stated that available time is very limited and releases have been sparse; treat it as community-maintained.

Fortinet FortiGate: How do I get pricing for FortiGate?

Pricing is not published on the product page. To obtain a quote, you can request a free product demo or connect with a security expert through the contact options on the site.

Source
Soketi: Do I need to change my client code?

No. Pusher client SDKs and Laravel Echo work by changing the host, port and credentials.

Fortinet FortiGate: Is there a free trial for FortiGate?

The product page does not mention a free trial. However, Fortinet offers a free product demo that allows you to evaluate the solution before committing to a purchase.

Source
Soketi: What does it cost?

Nothing in licence fees. It is MIT licensed; you pay for the server it runs on.

Soketi: What are people moving to?

Laravel Reverb for Laravel applications, and Sockudo, a Rust reimplementation, for others.

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