Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

pfSense VS Wireshark

Compare pfSense VS Wireshark and see what are their differences

pfSense logo pfSense

pfSense is a free and open source firewall and router that also features unified threat management, load balancing, multi WAN, and more

Wireshark logo Wireshark

Wireshark is a network protocol analyzer for Unix and Windows. It lets you capture and interactively browse the traffic running on a computer network.
  • pfSense Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-09-20
  • Wireshark Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-10-11

pfSense videos

pfsense Firewall Setup and Features in Depth Version 2.4

More videos:

  • Review - Pfsense: 5 Reasons to Use It
  • Review - Netgate SG-3100 Teardown / Speedtest / Review of this powerful pfsense packet pusher!

Wireshark videos

Wireshark Tutorial for Beginners

More videos:

  • Review - Monitor Network Traffic with Wireshark - Review
  • Review - Wireshark 101: CloudShark Review - HakTip 144

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to pfSense and Wireshark)
Cyber Security
100 100%
0% 0
Monitoring Tools
33 33%
67% 67
Perimeter Security And Firewalls
Log Management
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare pfSense and Wireshark

pfSense Reviews

The top 10 alternatives to OpenVPN
Netgate offers secure networking solutions, including pfSense Plus and TNSR software, which provide firewall, router, and VPN functionalities. These solutions cater to personal users, professional users, and organizations seeking secure and reliable internet connectivity.
Best pfSense Software Alternatives and Competitors
pfSense Software firewall is a robust, open-source security solution that is compatible with any hardware and can be tailored to meet your specific needs. It is a widely used technology, and many individuals seek dependable, popular software solutions with multi-device support, multiple concurrent connections, and protocol selections. Despite its usefulness, pfSense has...
The Best Open Source Router OS Software for Large or Small Networks
pfSense is a free and open-source router and firewall operating system based on the FreeBSD operating system. It is designed to be used on standard x86 hardware and can be deployed as a virtual machine or on dedicated hardware. pfSense offers advanced features and capabilities that are typically found in commercial routers and firewalls, making it an ideal solution for small...
Best free Linux router and firewall distributions of 2023
pfSense is one of the most popular operating systems today. It's a BSD-based system, similar to OPNSense, but with a longer history. pfSense started in 2004, and since then, it has grown to be the most well-known open-source platform in the industry. Although it gradually loses users to OPNsense, it's still an excellent system for new users because it has the most extensive...
Source: teklager.se
11 Best pfsense Alternatives To Secure Your Network
Unlike those of other available pfSense competitors, its capabilities allow it to be compared to commercial firewalls. You can also customize the pfSense firewall to match your needs based on the level of security and protection you want, as well as your specialist knowledge.

Wireshark Reviews

9 Best Angry IP Scanner Alternatives Reviewed 2021 (Free & Paid)
The beauty in Wireshark is that your network scans can be as broad or as granular as you make them. With a few clicks, you can begin capturing a snapshot of all packet traffic across your local area network. It can be overwhelming at first to see every single packet across a network, but Wireshark makes isolating specific events simple with its color coding and filtering...
10 Best WireShark Alternatives for Android Devices in 2021
If you are well enough into network communication, you must know about WireShark. WireShark is the most popular network analyzer for PC. You can use WireShark to see anything on your network that’s not encrypted. Unfortunately, it doesn’t have an Android app, however, you can still track, monitor, or capture network packets on your Android devices using our best list of...
Source: techreen.com
11 Best Wireshark Alternatives in 2020
Wireshark is a widely used network monitoring and WiFi troubleshooting tool. However, with Wireshark tool is that you can only gather information from the network but cannot send this information.
Source: www.guru99.com
5 Best Wireshark alternative packet sniffers
Wireshark & Alternative tools FAQs ⭐Can Wireshark do deep packet inspection or do I need something else?⭐Is Wireshark a vulnerability scanner?⭐Is Wireshark good at port scanning?⭐Which tool is a command line alternative to Wireshark?
Comparing Charles Proxy, Fiddler, Wireshark, and Requestly
Although thousands of developers around the globe use Wireshark and Charles Proxy, they fail to occupy the top side in the design aspect. Wireshark’s interface is robust and detailed but can be intimidating for beginners. While Charles Proxy has a more approachable interface compared to Wireshark, it might seem cluttered to some users. Fiddler’s UI is information-rich and...
Source: dev.to

Social recommendations and mentions

Wireshark might be a bit more popular than pfSense. We know about 11 links to it since March 2021 and only 10 links to pfSense. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

pfSense mentions (10)

  • Need some help on setting up home network
    Https://pfsense.org (netgate hardware is used in businesses). Source: about 1 year ago
  • Is pfsense.org down, or is it just me?
    I am having trouble seeing available packages, updating pkg, or getting a response from pfsense.org. Is anyone else seeing this or am I going to spend the rest of my day chasing bugs? Source: over 1 year ago
  • Help with VLAN
    From the PIA Client to pfsense.org PING pfsense.org (208.123.73.69) from 10.6.112.128: 56 data bytes 64 bytes from 208.123.73.69: icmp_seq=0 ttl=49 time=49.455 ms 64 bytes from 208.123.73.69: icmp_seq=1 ttl=49 time=51.927 ms 64 bytes from 208.123.73.69: icmp_seq=2 ttl=49 time=49.333 ms 64 bytes from 208.123.73.69: icmp_seq=3 ttl=49 time=49.133 ms 64 bytes from 208.123.73.69: icmp_seq=4 ttl=49 time=49.027 ms ... Source: over 1 year ago
  • Can Surveillance Station record offsite cameras ?
    The above setup is critical to a reliable system. I'd use enterprise quality routers for a store and home connection. I personally use https://pfsense.org but there are many to choose from and several open source. Source: over 1 year ago
  • Exposing Synology to web: best/practical practices?
    What I would do is put that thing in DMZ and install a good router behind it like https://www.pfsense.org. No affiliation, just been my router for many years. There's also it's sibling https://opnsense.org. There are many, just get a enterprise quality router. Source: over 1 year ago
View more

Wireshark mentions (11)

  • Wifi problematic, wired connections seem okay. Help?
    Https://wireshark.org, opening that, go to edit preferences and enable "IP network" in the name resolution area, to show website names instead of only IP addresses. Source: about 1 year ago
  • Eeros in bridge mode with wired home
    To prove this, download wireshark Https://wireshark.org/. Source: about 1 year ago
  • Lose internet when downloading large files
    Give that a try and I'll re-recommend for a second time, to run and watch Wireshark: Https://wireshark.org. Source: about 1 year ago
  • Performance scores for Google Lighthouse/Insights seem to be very inaccurate
    Https://www.gap.com/ returned a performance score of 10/100, with a time to interactive score of 36.1 seconds! Https://www.patreon.com/ returned a score of 18 Https://wireshark.org/ returned a score of 28, with "unused javascript" taking 14.9 seconds to load. Source: over 1 year ago
  • Is there a way to programatically turn off Downtime on a child device?
    I tried using Wireshark to figure out which URL is being called but my knowledge here is VERY limited and I couldn’t figure it out. Source: about 2 years ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing pfSense and Wireshark, you can also consider the following products

MikroTik RouterOS - The main product of MikroTik is a Linux-based operating system known as MikroTik RouterOS.

Zabbix - Track, record, alert and visualize performance and availability of IT resources

OPNsense - OPNsense® you next open source firewall. Free Download. High-end Security Made Easy™. Offers Intrusion Prevention, Captive Portal, Traffic Shaping and more.

Datadog - See metrics from all of your apps, tools & services in one place with Datadog's cloud monitoring as a service solution. Try it for free.

OpenWrt - OpenWrt is an open-source firmware based on Linux for wireless routers

SolarWinds NPM - Advanced network monitoring for on-premises, hybrid, and cloud. Download a FREE 30-day trial of SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM) today!