2.5G Cyber Safety Firewall & Router

Over time, I’ve reviewed many client routers from manufacturers like Netgear, TP-Hyperlink and D-Hyperlink.

I’ve then reviewed loads of extra area of interest merchandise such because the Vilfo VPN Router, Netduma R3 Gaming Router and the ExpressVPN Aircove.

Then, to a lesser extent, prosumer and enterprise choices such because the Zyxel SCR 50AXE Safe Cloud-Managed Router and the EnGenius ESG510 SD-WAN Gateway.

Then, after I began work for an MSP, I lastly dedicated and went all in with Unifi and have been utilizing the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max for the previous 12 months.

I’ve all the time hated the fanboyism in direction of Unifi, however, on the finish of the day, since committing to Unifi, my community has been fault-free and simple to handle.

One model I’ve by no means had an opportunity to work with till now’s Firewalla.

Not dissimilar to Unifi, Firewalla straddles the world of fanatic shoppers/prosumers and enterprise.

The corporate was based by a staff of veteran Cisco engineers, together with co-founder Jerry Chen whose daughter’s hacked child digital camera impressed the mission, Firewalla’s mission is to carry enterprise-grade cybersecurity to on a regular basis customers in a easy, inexpensive bundle.

Firewalla units mix intrusion detection and prevention (IDS/IPS), firewall performance, VPN servers, ad-blocking, parental controls, and behavioural analytics, all wrapped in a user-friendly cell app expertise.

The Firewalla Gold Plus sits under the 10GbE Professional mannequin and might be the candy spot for fanatics, particularly within the UK.

Its 4 ports are 2.5GbE, and it helps 5Gbps IPS/IDS, making it ideally fitted to 2500Mbps CityFibre connections. Particularly, it’s reported to work nicely with PPPoE connections, which is one thing that Unifi has not all the time been good at.

Sadly for me, I’ve been ready for CityFibre to put in a brand new 2500Mbps line for round 6 months, with them continuously cancelling. I had hoped that it will be arrange for this overview, and I might push the Firewalla to its limits and evaluate the efficiency of my Unifi, however I’m nonetheless caught on Virgin Gig1.

Nonetheless, I’ve nonetheless been very impressed with this highly effective little router.

Firewalla Product Specification Comparability

Core {Hardware} Specs

Community Efficiency & Connectivity

VPN Efficiency

Superior Options & Limitations

Bodily Specs

Value and Goal Customers

• Gold Professional: The Intel N97 is genuinely quick – I’d count on this to deal with 10Gb throughput with out breaking a sweat. The fan is reportedly silent, nevertheless it’s nonetheless a transferring half that might fail over time.
• Gold Plus: The J4125 is a strong selection for many customers. 4 2.5Gb ports provide you with correct flexibility, and LAG means you may truly get near 5Gb mixture throughput.
• Gold SE: The ARM CPU retains prices down and runs cooler, however you’re buying and selling some uncooked efficiency. Nonetheless, 2Gb+ throughput is greater than satisfactory for many UK broadband connections.
• Purple: That 6-core ARM setup (4+2 huge.LITTLE design) is surprisingly succesful. The WiFi is helpful for moveable use, although the 867 Mbps ranking is theoretical most.
• Purple SE: Actually, 500 Mbps with full IPS/IDS is respectable for the value level. Excellent should you’re on FTTP 300-500 Mbps packages.

Options

{Hardware} Specs

The Gold Plus homes a 64-bit Intel processor with 4 cores – particularly what seems to be a Celeron J4125 based mostly on the opinions I’ve seen. You get 4GB of DDR4 reminiscence, which frankly feels a bit tight for a tool at this value level in 2025. The unit measures 13 x 11 x 3.4 cm and weighs 565g, so it’s compact sufficient for many setups.

Energy consumption sits between 10-15W, which is affordable for an always-on gadget. The aluminium housing acts as a passive heatsink, so no noisy followers – although it’ll get noticeably heat throughout heavy utilization. Working temperature vary is 0°C to 45°C with correct airflow.

Community Efficiency and Connectivity

That is the place issues get attention-grabbing. You get 4 2.5 Gigabit Ethernet ports – no mixing with slower 1Gb ports just like the cheaper Gold SE. The deep packet inspection can deal with as much as 5 Gbps complete throughput, which is genuinely spectacular for a sub-£600 gadget.

Two USB 3.0 ports are included, together with an HDMI output for console entry. There’s a USB-C port for serial console as nicely. The pink Bluetooth dongle that ships with it handles preliminary pairing along with your cell gadget.

Safety Options

The safety stack is complete, although I’d be sceptical of some advertising claims. You get:

• Intrusion Detection and Prevention (IDS/IPS)
• Deep packet inspection at line fee
• Geo-IP filtering to dam whole international locations
• Behaviour analytics for recognizing uncommon exercise
• Energetic malware safety with real-time updates
• Community segmentation for isolating units
• New gadget quarantine
• DNS over HTTPS (DoH) and Unbound recursive DNS

The gadget robotically blocks malicious websites and might provide you with a warning to suspicious exercise. Community segmentation is especially helpful – you may isolate IoT units or create separate networks for friends, children, or work units.

VPN Capabilities

Constructed-in OpenVPN server helps as much as 120 Mbps throughput, while WireGuard VPN can deal with 500 Mbps. No month-to-month charges for the VPN service, which is refreshing in comparison with industrial VPN suppliers. You too can use it as a VPN shopper to route visitors by third-party providers.

Website-to-site VPN helps as much as 10 simultaneous connections, making it viable for small enterprise situations.

Content material Filtering and Parental Controls

The ad-blocking works throughout all units in your community, utilizing DNS filtering. Parental controls embody:

• Time-based restrictions
• Utility blocking (gaming, social media, and many others.)
• Protected search enforcement throughout main search engines like google and yahoo
• Class-based filtering (gaming, social, grownup content material, playing)
• “Social Hour” characteristic to dam social networks briefly

Superior Options

• Multi-WAN help for load balancing or failover
• Superior Good Queue for visitors prioritisation and buffer bloat discount
• Coverage-based routing to ship totally different visitors sorts by totally different connections
• VLAN help
• Bridge mode, router mode, or easy inline deployment
• Docker container help for customized purposes
• Net interface (beta) to enhance the cell app

Bandwidth Monitoring and Administration

Deep perception offers granular bandwidth monitoring all the way down to particular person units and domains. You may set fee limits on particular units or actions, and the month-to-month utilization monitoring helps should you’re on a capped connection.

Unboxing / Design

The Gold Plus arrives in a compact brown cardboard field with minimal branding. Inside, you’ll discover the unit itself, a 40W energy adapter with US plug (worldwide adapters out there individually), an Ethernet cable, wall mounting bracket, and the important pink USB safety dongle.

The unit itself is surprisingly compact at 13 x 11 x 3.4cm, becoming comfortably in your palm. The brushed aluminium end provides it a premium really feel that’s acceptable for the value level. 4 rubber ft preserve it steady on surfaces, and the passive cooling design means silent operation.

The entrance panel homes two USB 3.0 ports, with one occupied by the pink safety dongle. There’s additionally an HDMI port for console entry. The rear options 4 similar 2.5GbE RJ45 ports, energy enter, and a USB-C console port.

Construct high quality feels strong all through. The aluminium building serves as an efficient heatsink, although the unit does get noticeably heat throughout heavy use. That is regular and anticipated for passive cooling.

Modes

If you’re spending $600 on this, then you’ll probably be shopping for it to make use of as a router to take advantage of the funding, however you don’t need to.

This could work as a safety equipment, both in legacy mode with it connected to the community as you please, or in bridge mode, the place it sits between your router and community. For many of my overview, I truly used it in bridge mode and also you get all the good options out there within the router mode.

Router Mode: The Gold Plus replaces your present router totally. You join your ISP modem on to the Gold Plus, which then offers DHCP, NAT, and all routing capabilities. This mode provides you most management and options.

Bridge Mode: The Gold Plus sits between your present router and community infrastructure. Your present router continues to deal with DHCP and primary routing, whereas the Gold Plus offers safety, monitoring, and superior options. That is supreme if you wish to preserve your present setup.

Easy Mode: A legacy mode the place the Gold Plus operates extra like a conventional add-on safety equipment. This mode has limitations and Firewalla is planning to part it out in favour of improved bridge mode performance.

I examined primarily in bridge mode because it allowed me to check straight with my present UniFi setup. The transition was seamless – units maintained their IP addresses and community configuration while gaining all of the Firewalla security measures.

Set Up

Preliminary setup is refreshingly easy. After connecting the gadget to your community and powering it on, you obtain the Firewalla cell app and use it to scan the QR code on the gadget. The pink USB dongle handles Bluetooth pairing for preliminary configuration.

The app guides you thru community detection and deployment mode choice. Most customers will need both router mode (changing present router) or bridge mode (retaining present setup). The setup wizard handles the heavy lifting, although you’ll want to grasp your present community topology to make the suitable decisions.

As soon as deployed, the gadget begins studying about your community. This preliminary discovery interval takes a number of hours because it catalogues units, identifies providers, and establishes baseline behaviour patterns. The notifications could be overwhelming throughout this era, however they cool down because the system learns.

One frustration is the obligatory cell app requirement for preliminary setup. While the online interface exists (in beta), you can’t full setup with out the cell app.

Whereas this can be the norm with sensible house units, I believe most prosumers who’ve an curiosity in networking would a lot want an online interface for your complete set-up and administration.

Putting in Your Personal Software program

The Gold Plus helps Docker containers, permitting you to increase performance with customized purposes. The 4GB of RAM is considerably limiting right here – you may run light-weight containers, however don’t count on to host resource-intensive purposes.

Standard Docker purposes embody UniFi Controller (for managing UniFi entry factors), Pi-hole (although the built-in ad-blocking is sort of good), and numerous monitoring instruments. The Docker implementation is easy should you’re aware of container know-how.

The flexibility to run customized software program is a big benefit over client routers. Nonetheless, the restricted RAM and x86 structure prohibit your choices in comparison with a devoted server or NAS.

I’ve learn experiences which you could improve the RAM as that is mainly simply an x86 mini PC. The additional RAM can be useful for any Docker containers you run.

Firewall App Settings / GUI

The cell app is well-designed and intuitive for primary operations. The dashboard offers a superb overview of community standing, safety occasions, and gadget exercise. Navigation is logical, and commonest duties are simply accessible.

Nonetheless, complicated configuration duties could be irritating on a cell interface. Creating subtle firewall guidelines, managing VLANs, or configuring superior routing requires endurance and a number of display screen faucets. The net interface (in beta) addresses a few of these issues however feels incomplete.

The app’s power lies in monitoring and alerting. Safety occasions are clearly offered with enough element to grasp what’s taking place. Machine administration is easy, and the power to rapidly block or quarantine units is efficacious.

Net Interface

There’s a net interface that’s out there at https://my.firewalla.com/, which it’s important to join with by way of the app.

Alternatively, there’s a Firewalla MSP portal, which has a Household plan choice for $40 per 12 months, or for precise MSPs, there’s the marketing strategy, which is $300 per 12 months.

The free Net UI is sort of primary with restricted management over the Firewalla, it’s primarily for viewing information and appearing on alerts. I do want utilizing this to the cell app.

The MSP net UI provides extra performance, together with 30 days of flows.

The next compares the options of the three plans:

Notifications / Alarms / Guidelines 

The primary few days with the Firewalla are fairly annoying because of the quantity of notifications you obtain. However in case you are proactive and mute notifications and/or arrange guidelines, then these will turn out to be manageable inside a few days.

Whereas the notifications are annoying, that’s type of the purpose; you need to establish weak spots in your community.

You’ll obtain alerts for brand spanking new units, safety occasions, coverage violations, and system standing modifications. The granularity is spectacular, you may see precisely which gadget accessed which service at what time.

Rule creation is easy for primary situations however turns into complicated for classy insurance policies. The cell interface struggles with intricate rule units, making the online interface nearly important for superior customers.

The alerting system is efficient at catching real safety issues. Throughout testing, it recognized a number of suspicious connection makes an attempt and blocked them appropriately.

Ask FireAI

Firewalla contains an AI-powered assistant to assist with configuration and troubleshooting. In apply, it’s helpful for primary questions however struggles with complicated situations. The responses are generic and infrequently level you to documentation slightly than offering particular steerage.

The AI characteristic feels extra like a advertising checkbox than a genuinely useful gizmo. Skilled customers will depend on documentation and group boards, while novices may discover the responses too technical.

Advert Blocking

The built-in ad-blocking within reason efficient. It operates on the DNS degree, blocking recognized promoting domains earlier than they’ll serve content material. The efficiency impression is minimal and can rival Pi Gap or different related choices with out-of-the-box settings.

You may customise block lists and whitelist particular domains. The default configuration blocks most promoting while avoiding false positives with legit providers. The month-to-month bandwidth financial savings are noticeable – sometimes 15-20% discount in total visitors.

For households with a number of units, network-level ad-blocking is simpler than browser-based options. It protects all units robotically, together with these that may’t run ad-blockers like sensible TVs and IoT units.

Whereas it’s typically good, it’s far much less customisable than Pi Gap or Adguard Residence, or premium hosted options like NexDNS.

Personally, I’d be inclined to put in Pi Gap as a Docker container on the Firewalla for much superior advert blocking.

Scanning

The community scanning capabilities are complete. The gadget repeatedly screens for brand spanking new units, modifications in gadget behaviour, and potential safety threats. The scanning is passive and doesn’t considerably impression community efficiency.

Machine identification is usually correct. Most typical units are appropriately categorised, although some IoT units might require guide classification. The asset stock is efficacious for understanding what’s truly linked to your community.

Vulnerability scanning is primary in comparison with enterprise options however satisfactory for house and small enterprise use. It identifies widespread safety points like default passwords, open providers, and outdated firmware.

VPN Server

The built-in VPN server is among the Gold Plus’s strongest options. Each OpenVPN and WireGuard protocols are supported, with WireGuard providing superior efficiency and battery life for cell units.

Setup is easy by the cell app. QR codes simplify shopper configuration, and the efficiency is superb. I persistently achieved over 500 Mbps by WireGuard on my gigabit connection.

The VPN server contains helpful options like break up tunneling, computerized DNS configuration, and bandwidth monitoring. For street warriors or distant staff, having a succesful VPN server constructed into your firewall is extraordinarily helpful.

DNS / Providers

DNS administration is subtle for a client gadget. You may configure customized DNS servers, allow DNS over HTTPS (DoH) for privateness, and create customized DNS guidelines for particular units or domains.

The Unbound recursive DNS resolver offers higher privateness than forwarding to third-party servers. Efficiency is superb, and the power to create native DNS data is helpful for house servers and providers.

DNS filtering integrates with the security measures to dam malicious domains robotically. The risk intelligence feeds are commonly up to date, offering efficient safety in opposition to newly found threats.

Firewalla MSP

The Managed Safety Supplier (MSP) interface prices $40 yearly however considerably improves the person expertise for complicated configurations. The net-based interface is way more appropriate for creating subtle guidelines and managing enterprise options.

For enterprise customers, the MSP subscription is sort of obligatory. The cell app merely isn’t satisfactory for managing complicated networks or creating detailed safety insurance policies. The annual value is affordable in comparison with enterprise firewall licensing.

The MSP interface contains higher reporting, historic evaluation, and batch operations. If you happen to’re managing a number of Firewalla units or want detailed compliance reporting, the subscription is worth it.

Value and Various Choices

The Firewalla Gold Plus prices $599 and is shipped from the US. Delivery is freed from cost however you’d be on the hook for any VAT and import charges.

The Gold Professional has 2x 10GbE ports plus 2×2.5GbE and prices $899 whereas the Gold SE has 2x 2.5GbE and 2x1GbE for $479.

Then the Purple fashions are gigabit solely with the Purple have 2 ports, one every for LAN/WAN for $369 and the SE is a decrease spec mannequin priced at $249.

The primary competitor is inevitably Unifi.

The Cloud Gateway Max is the closest competitor within the sense that it has all 2.5GbE ports. It has some benefits with extra ports and multi-WAN performance. I additionally want the best way the VPN works. However, the firewall components and visitors inspection are usually not pretty much as good. You may subscribe to CyberSecure for improved IDS/IPS efficiency at a price of £95 per 12 months.

The Cloud Gateway Fiber has 1x10GbE WAN then 2x 10G SFP+ ports with one for WAN and 4x 2.5GbE ports with one being POE. That is £275.

Total

The Firewalla Gold Plus is undeniably a formidable little bit of equipment that brings some spectacular enterprise performance to the prosumer/fanatic market. Additionally it is a viable choice for small companies.

The safety capabilities are genuinely spectacular. The IDS/IPS system catches threats that will slip previous client routers, and the community segmentation options present enterprise-level isolation. VPN efficiency is superb, and the absence of ongoing subscription charges for core security measures is refreshing.

The {hardware} is well-built and efficiency is robust. 4 2.5GbE ports with 5Gbps mixture throughput offers wonderful future-proofing for when multi-gigabit connections turn out to be extra widespread. The passive cooling ensures silent operation, and the compact type issue suits most installations.

Software program improvement seems lively with common updates and new options. The group is engaged, and Firewalla responds to person suggestions. The Docker help offers extensibility that client routers merely can’t match.

I discover the mobile-first strategy a bit odd. I believe most individuals who take networking critically would a lot want browser entry as the first type of administration, and I dislike having to make use of the cell app to scan the QR code simply to log in. That being stated, you may acquire entry to the Firewalla MSP interface for $40 per 12 months.

It’s not an inexpensive gadget within the first place, and it’s a arduous promote to UK consumers with import charges. You’d be over £600 making this greater than double the value of Unifi.

The Firewalla Gold Plus is a succesful gadget that delivers on its safety and efficiency guarantees. The characteristic set is complete, construct high quality is strong, and ongoing prices are affordable. Nonetheless, the excessive upfront value for UK consumers and mobile-centric administration strategy restrict its enchantment.

If you happen to want the superior security measures and might justify the price, it’s a strong selection. The absence of ongoing subscription charges makes the full value of possession affordable over time. Nonetheless, most house customers can be higher served by cheaper options except they particularly want the enterprise-grade safety capabilities.

For small companies or severe fanatics prepared to put money into complete community safety, the Gold Plus represents good worth regardless of the excessive preliminary value

I’m James, a UK-based tech fanatic and the Editor and Proprietor of Mighty Gadget, which I’ve proudly run since 2007. Keen about all issues know-how, my experience spans from computer systems and networking to cell, wearables, and sensible house units.

As a health fanatic who loves operating and biking, I even have a eager curiosity in fitness-related know-how, and I take each alternative to cowl this area of interest on my weblog. My various pursuits permit me to carry a novel perspective to tech running a blog, merging way of life, health, and the newest tech traits.

In my tutorial pursuits, I earned a BSc in Info Programs Design from UCLAN, earlier than advancing my studying with a Grasp’s Diploma in Computing. This superior research additionally included Cisco CCNA accreditation, additional demonstrating my dedication to understanding and staying forward of the know-how curve.

I’m proud to share that Vuelio has persistently ranked Mighty Gadget as one of many high know-how blogs within the UK. With my dedication to know-how and drive to share my insights, I purpose to proceed offering my readers with partaking and informative content material.