Summary: A concise comparison of FortiGate NGFW appliance families to help you match model tiers to your site size, throughput needs and connectivity requirements.
FortiGate appliances are grouped into families tuned for different deployment scales: Branch/Small Office, Mid-Range, and High-End/Data Center. Choosing the appropriate family simplifies decisions around throughput, inspection capacity, interface types and lifecycle planning.
The table below highlights representative models from each family and their typical performance characteristics. Use the inspection (threat protection / SSL) numbers when you plan to enable deep security features, not just raw firewall throughput.
| Family | Representative Models | Firewall Throughput (example) | Threat Protection Throughput (example) | SSL Inspection Throughput (example) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Branch / Small Office | 30G, 80F, 200G (variants: Wi-Fi, PoE, LTE/5G) | 4 Gbps → 10 Gbps → 39 Gbps | 500 Mbps → 900 Mbps → 6 Gbps | 400 Mbps → 715 Mbps → 7 Gbps |
| Mid-Range | 120G, 200G, 400F, 600F, 700G, 900G | ≈39 Gbps → 79.5 Gbps → 164 Gbps (varies by model) | 2.8 Gbps → 9 Gbps → 30 Gbps | 3 Gbps → 8 Gbps → 16.7 Gbps |
| High-End / Data Center | 1000F → 3500F; 3700F → 7121F (hyperscale) | 100s of Gbps up to multi-Tbps (1000F: ~198 Gbps → larger models: hundreds of Gbps to Tbps) | 10s of Gbps up to several hundred Gbps (largest models) | 10 Gbps up to 300+ Gbps (high-density SSL inspection) |
Note: numbers above are illustrative of the performance tiers within each family. Exact model specifications vary and should be checked when finalizing a purchase.
Branch models offer convenient local connectivity (multiple RJ45 ports, small-form factors and optional Wi-Fi/PoE). Mid-range appliances expand into 10G and 25G interfaces for aggregation and higher throughput. High-end models support 40G, 100G, 200G and 400G ports for data center and carrier environments. Confirm the required uplink speeds and SFP / transceiver compatibility before procurement.
FortiOS runs across the appliance families, providing consistent policy constructs, security profiles and logging. Centralized management and reporting options are available to unify administration across many deployed units and families.
Fortinet documents QuickStart deployment services and administrator training that can simplify rollout and handover. For migrations, conversion utilities exist to translate configurations from older or third-party firewalls to FortiGate format.
If you have a rough estimate of users, internet speed and whether you plan deep inspection (SSL/TLS), DC360 can recommend an appropriate family and a short list of models to evaluate.