Cortex XDR vs. SentinelOne

Learn why organizations choose Cortex XDR over SentinelOne for attack prevention, detection and response.

In the 2024 MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Evaluations (Round 6), Cortex XDR once again showcased industry-leading detection and prevention capabilities, autonomously blocking 8 out of 10 advanced attack steps with zero false positives — surpassing SentinelOne in both speed and accuracy. Keep reading to learn why organizations worldwide trust Cortex XDR’s consolidated approach over SentinelOne’s fragmented EDR.

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Cortex XDR is by far the smarter choice to stop modern threats.

In Round 6 of the 2024 MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Evaluations, Cortex XDR prevented sophisticated adversary behaviors with no configuration changes, while SentinelOne needed manual tuning mid-evaluation. This underscores Cortex XDR’s out-of-the-box efficacy and robust data analytics compared to SentinelOne’s narrower EDR approach.

SentinelOne’s Singularity™ approaches XDR with a one-size-fits-all solution, leaving organizations vulnerable to advanced threats. It simply lacks deep visibility and enterprise-ready features such as remote execution support for Python scripts, the preferred language for incident response tasks.

Cortex XDR excels far beyond. One simply has to look at performance in the 2023 MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Evaluations (Turla). In fact, we outperformed all XDR vendors. How do we do this? Keep reading.

Cortex XDR breaks down data and product silos to provide prevention, detection and response across all data.

Real XDR

Cortex XDR delivers 15.3% more technique-level detections — the highest level of detections possible — than SentinelOne because it can continuously process the threat-level data that provides the context to answer why an adversary performed an action. The results from the 2023 MITRE ATT&CK Evaluations (Turla), which pitted XDR products against network implants and backdoors used by Russia’s Federal Security Service, further revealed that Cortex XDR outperformed SentinelOne in analytic detections, with 100% vs. 91.6%, and in blocking substeps, with 100% vs. 97.7%.

SentinelOne's XDR solution has some key limitations, mainly its heavy reliance on endpoint agents and data, and the lack of native forensic capabilities and visibility into unprotected endpoints. This approach may leave security teams without a complete overview, which is crucial for effective XDR.

Cortex XDR automates advanced stitching and customizable correlation rules so that alerts are efficiently grouped, managed and resolved as distinct incidents. It integrates network, cloud, identity and third-party data for comprehensive security across many complex environments. It’s why 6,000+ organizations worldwide count on the industry’s first true XDR.

Cortex XDR advances security beyond just endpoint protection and data collection, integrating native network, cloud, identity and third-party data to stop modern cyberattacks.
Data from any source is automatically stitched together to reveal the root cause and timeline of alerts to identify and quickly put a stop to threats.

Cortex XDR uses robust threat intelligence and provides more than just traditional sandboxing with WildFire malware prevention.

SentinelOne’s lack of critical features slows incident response.

Several capabilities are needed to pinpoint anomalous behavior and enable quick investigation of alerts. For example, without integrated cloud sandboxing and real-time file analysis, SentinelOne customers may be exposed to new forms of malware. When they outsource sandboxing, it causes increased cost, limited dynamic analysis and manual upload of samples to the cloud.

In Round 6 of the MITRE ATT&CK Evaluations, advanced malware and living-off-the-land techniques challenged the participating EDR/XDR platforms. Cortex XDR’s integrated WildFire^® sandbox and behavioral analytics quickly identified new malicious files. SentinelOne’s limited coverage increased risk exposure to such threats, forcing analysts to rely on external tools for deeper analysis.

Integration with our WildFire malware prevention service goes beyond traditional sandboxing to detect unknown threats in a complete cloud analysis environment.
Behavioral analytics analyzes data by tracking more than 1,000 behavior attributes to profile behavior and detect malicious activity.
Host Insights combines vulnerability assessment, application and system visibility, along with a powerful Search and Destroy feature to help identify and contain threats across all endpoints.

Cortex XDR’s incident management dashboard intelligently groups related alerts into one incident with unified incident management.

SentinelOne’s lack of customization hurts enterprise readiness.

Different operating systems have unique configurations, security needs and vulnerabilities. The rigid, inflexible structure of SentinelOne may not handle the requirements of each OS — or the demands of each SOC. Additionally, SentinelOne does not provide a natively integrated forensics module for macOS devices. This is crucial due to the growing use of macOS in business settings and its unique security challenges.

In stark contrast, Cortex XDR significantly enhances security with a flexible management system. It adeptly groups, manages and resolves related alerts as single incidents, reducing alerts by an astounding 98%.*

^{*Based on an analysis of Cortex XDR customer environments.}

With a single click, analysts can instantly reveal the root cause, reputation and sequence of events, lowering the experience needed to verify threats.
Customizable correlation rules allow analysts to define rules based on dozens of different parameters to help identify misuse of systems and applications and thwart evasion techniques.

Compare Cortex XDR to SentinelOne

Products	SentinelOne	Cortex XDR
Latest MITRE Results	2024 Round 6 Fewer attack steps blocked, with multiple false positives	2024 Round 6 8/10 attack steps blocked, 0 false positives
	Reliance on manual configuration changes	80 technique detections with real-time analytics
	Misses advanced techniques due to endpoint-only data focus.	No configuration changes needed.
Real XDR	Lacks the full picture Limited ability to ingest and stitch third-party, endpoint, network and cloud data.	Broader visibility Incorporates data from virtually any source, regardless of vendor.
	No natively integrated forensics module leaves endpoints without agents vulnerable.	Integrates with Palo Alto Networks NGFWs and Prisma® Cloud, extending visibility to the network and cloud.
		Provides visibility and forensic analysis of any endpoint, regardless of security vendor.
Critical Feature Set	Fragmented solution Incomplete malware defenses do not have local or behavior analytics.	Full and flexible features Integrated cloud sandboxing delivers static and behavioral analysis, along with on-execution and dedicated ransomware protection.
	Lack of UEBA and network traffic analysis allows anomalous activity to go undetected.	Machine learning enables behavioral analytics across any data source to identify anomalies and raise alerts in real time.
	Additional third-party data sources aren’t available for detection analytics.
Incident Management	Disconnected alerts Can only group alerts by hash, which requires more time and effort for analysis.	Efficient, high-performance automation Alerts across datasets are automatically stitched together to see the bigger picture.
	Can’t create a complete view for incidents with different alert sources.	Intelligent alert grouping and deduplication reduce alerts by 98%.*
		Cross-data insights reveal the root cause of alerts, reducing investigation time by 88%.**

^{* Based on an analysis of Cortex XDR customer environments.
** Palo Alto Networks SOC analysis showing reduced investigation time from 40 minutes to 5 minutes.}