Palo Alto Networks Prisma Access vs Zscaler Internet Access: Side-by-Side Comparison (2026)

Palo Alto Networks Prisma Access

Mid-market and enterprise security teams needing to move beyond VPN should pick Palo Alto Networks Prisma Access for its Zero Trust enforcement across remote users and branch offices without forcing a complete network rebuild. The 99.999% uptime SLA and native SD-WAN integration mean you get access control and application performance in one path, not bolted together. Skip this if your organization runs mostly on-premises infrastructure with minimal cloud migration plans; Prisma Access is built for distributed work, not legacy datacenter security.

Zscaler Internet Access

Mid-market and enterprise security teams replacing on-premise web gateways will find Zscaler Internet Access worth the migration effort because it actually inspects encrypted traffic at scale without killing performance, something most cloud SSE platforms struggle with. The platform covers DE.CM and DE.AE through continuous monitoring and AI-powered threat detection across DNS, URLs, and files, giving you visibility into what your old gateway missed. Skip this if your organization needs deep integration with on-prem infrastructure or runs custom legacy applications that depend on transparent proxy architecture; Zscaler's cloud-first design optimizes for modern SaaS and internet access, not hybrid networks.