Material Security Alternatives: How to Choose in 2026

The right alternative to Material Security depends on which gap you are trying to close. If you want another cloud email security platform, the shortlist usually includes Abnormal, Sublime Security, Proofpoint, Mimecast, Check Point and Microsoft Defender for Office 365. If the gap is the attacker’s move off email and onto employees’ phones, no email platform closes it, and that is where SmishAlert fits. This guide compares both paths so you can match the tool to the threat.

TL;DR

• Material Security is built around Google Workspace and Microsoft 365: email security, data security, identity protection and configuration management. Its alternatives are mostly other email and workspace tools.
• Most email alternatives split into API-integrated platforms (Abnormal, Sublime) and established suites (Proofpoint, Mimecast). Pick by deployment model, detection approach and compliance needs.
• None of these tools see SMS, iMessage or WhatsApp traffic on a user’s phone. That is a separate attack surface, not a feature gap you can configure away.
• SmishAlert is not a drop-in replacement for Material. It covers the messaging channel that email platforms do not, and it can sit beside whichever email product you choose.
• Evaluate on coverage, detection method, response workflow, integrations and deployment friction. A comparison table below puts them side by side.

Table of Contents

• What Material Security does, and why teams look elsewhere
• The main Material Security alternatives
• How to compare them: criteria that matter
• Comparison at a glance
• The gap none of the email alternatives close
• Where SmishAlert fits
• Building a layered defense around whichever platform you pick
• Which option fits which team
• Start with a pilot on the channel you cannot see
• FAQ
• Sources

What Material Security does, and why teams look elsewhere

Material describes itself as an automated detection and response toolkit for Google Workspace and Microsoft 365. According to its Gartner Peer Insights profile, it combines email security, data security, identity protection and configuration management in one platform. The company’s own positioning is that email, files and user accounts should be protected as one workspace rather than as separate point products.

That is a coherent design for teams whose crown jewels live in a mailbox and a drive. Reasons security teams still evaluate alternatives are usually practical:

• Environment fit. You run a mixed estate, or you want a secure email gateway (SEG) layer in front of the mailbox.
• Detection philosophy. You prefer behavioral models, detection-as-code rules you can write yourself, or a vendor with a larger threat-intelligence footprint.
• Procurement and compliance. Large enterprises with complex compliance requirements often default to long-established vendors, according to Sublime’s 2026 comparison.
• Coverage beyond email. The mailbox is no longer where every social engineering attempt begins.

That last point is the one most comparison pages skip. We return to it below.

The main Material Security alternatives

The vendors below are the ones that recur in analyst listings and buyer comparisons. We do not sell email security, so treat this as an orientation rather than a bake-off, and run your own proof of concept before you commit.

Abnormal

Abnormal is an API-integrated, AI-native platform. Sublime’s research summary notes that it is frequently evaluated for behavioral business email compromise (BEC) detection and for minimal setup. It suits teams whose main worry is a convincing vendor invoice or an executive-impersonation email that carries no malicious link.

Sublime Security

Sublime is positioned as an agentic email security platform that adapts quickly to new attack patterns. It is also API-integrated and works with both Google Workspace and Microsoft 365. Teams with in-house detection engineers tend to like platforms where they can read and tune the logic rather than treat it as a black box. Note that the article we cite for this comparison is published by Sublime itself, so read its rankings with that in mind.

Proofpoint and Mimecast

These are the established suites. The same research notes that Proofpoint and Mimecast remain top choices for large enterprises with complex compliance requirements. Both have historically been gateway-based, and both now offer API-based deployment options too. Confirm with each vendor which model applies to your environment, because the two behave differently in mail flow and in how quickly you can deploy.

Check Point, Microsoft Defender and others

Check Point’s Harmony Email suits teams already invested in that ecosystem. Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is the default for many Microsoft 365 shops, and is often the baseline other tools are measured against. IRONSCALES’ 2026 rankings also list Barracuda, SpamTitan and Abnormal alongside these. Treat vendor-published rankings as one input, since each publisher sells a product in this category.

How to compare them: criteria that matter

Avoid feature checklists. Most platforms in this list detect phishing, quarantine messages and offer some remediation. The differences show up in these places:

1. Deployment model. API-based tools connect to the mail platform and need no MX record changes. Gateways sit in the mail path. Ask what each means for rollback, latency and post-delivery clawback.
2. Detection approach. Behavioral baselining, rules you write, or vendor-managed models. Ask for false-positive handling and how an analyst overrides a verdict.
3. Response workflow. Can a user report a message, can an analyst pull it from every mailbox, and does that flow into your SIEM or SOAR?
4. Scope. Email only, or workspace data, identity and configuration too?
5. Compliance fit. Data residency, subprocessors, audit evidence and the controls your regulators ask about.
6. Channel coverage. Which channels does the tool actually observe? Be literal here.

That sixth criterion is the one that reshapes shortlists.

Comparison at a glance

The “No” entries are not criticisms. These products were built to protect mailboxes and workspaces, and they do that job. The point is that a purchase decision framed as “Material versus X” quietly assumes email is where your exposure is.

The gap none of the email alternatives close

Attackers do not stay in the channel you defend. A typical executive-impersonation attempt may begin with an email that a good platform blocks, then continue as a text to the employee’s personal number: urgent, short, and asking for gift cards or a payroll change. Your email tool never sees the second message.

The scale is not small. A Vectra summary of smishing research reports that SMS accounts for 69.3% of mobile phishing and that smishing volume grew 30 to 40 percent quarter over quarter through 2025, citing the Anti-Phishing Working Group. The same page cites the FTC’s figure of $645.7 million lost in the United States in Q1 2024 to fraud involving phone calls and text messages. Those are market-level numbers, not a claim about any single vendor’s customers.

Human behavior makes it worse. The same source says awareness-training click rates run 4 to 7 times higher on SMS than on email. That is why training alone is a weak control on this channel, and why teams that rely only on a simulated-phishing program often have no real-world signal from phones.

Security leaders increasingly describe this as a visibility problem rather than a detection problem. As Sublime’s own analysis notes, cloud email tools have no presence in channels like SMS, WhatsApp and social DMs. You cannot correlate, investigate or report on what you cannot see.

Where SmishAlert fits

SmishAlert is built for messaging-based social engineering: SMS, iMessage, WhatsApp and other mobile channels. Smishing is the best-known form, but the problem is wider: executive impersonation, payroll fraud, credential harvesting, vendor compromise, gift card fraud and coordinated multi-channel campaigns that cross email and phone.

What it gives a security team:

• Collection. Employees and high-risk users report suspicious messages through frictionless reporting, with on-device iOS message filtering and Android and cross-channel reporting. This covers managed, BYOD and executive devices.
• Analysis. Reported messages and senders are analyzed for threats such as executive impersonation, credential phishing, payroll fraud, payment scams and brand impersonation.
• Correlation. Reports are correlated across users, so a single odd text becomes a visible campaign when ten employees receive variants of it. Our live campaign examples show what that looks like.
• Integration and evidence. SIEM and API integration, plus audit-ready incident reporting, so mobile events land in the workflows your SOC already runs.
• Constituent reporting. Banks, credit unions, colleges, K-12 districts and associations can let customers, members and students report scam texts without installing an app. See our pages for banks and credit unions and associations.

If you already have an email platform, SmishAlert does not ask you to replace it. It adds the channel that platform cannot observe. If you are running an evaluation precisely because Material or another tool left you uneasy about mobile exposure, this is the layer to scope separately. Our Proofpoint alternatives write-up takes the same view of gateway products.

Building a layered defense around whichever platform you pick

Whichever email product wins your evaluation, the surrounding architecture matters more than the logo. A workable pattern has four parts.

1. Strong email and workspace controls. Choose from the platforms above based on your environment. If you are a smaller organization in Florida and need help with email monitoring and protection, a local provider such as email protection and monitoring services from Tatem Web can handle that layer.

2. Phishing-resistant authentication. Replace SMS one-time passwords with FIDO2/WebAuthn keys or biometrics. The Vectra page reports that December 2024 CISA and FBI guidance recommends against SMS-based MFA because of interception and SIM-swapping risk, and that NIST SP 800-63 restricts SMS authentication for federal systems. Verify the current text of those documents before you cite them in a policy.

3. Mobile threat reporting and correlation. This is the layer email vendors do not provide. Consumer advice such as forwarding scam texts to 7726 helps individuals but gives your SOC nothing to work with. Organizational defense needs reports flowing into a system that clusters them and feeds your SIEM. That lets analysts spot post-access behavior such as privilege escalation or lateral movement after a successful smishing compromise.

4. A tested response path. Decide in advance who resets credentials, who contacts the impersonated executive, and who tells finance to freeze a payroll change. Our guides on smishing incident response and smishing protection best practices walk through the steps.

Which option fits which team

• Cloud-first company standardized on Google Workspace, wants one platform for email, files and accounts: Material remains a strong candidate. Compare it against Abnormal and Sublime on detection and workflow.
• Microsoft 365 shop with a lean team: start with Defender for Office 365, then test an API-integrated add-on.
• Large enterprise with heavy compliance requirements: Proofpoint and Mimecast are the usual finalists, per the research cited above.
• Bank, credit union, insurer or association worried about customers and members being scammed by text: an email platform is not the answer. You need constituent reporting, which is what SmishAlert provides.
• College or K-12 district: the same applies for students and staff, where app installs are unrealistic and reporting must be effortless.
• MSP or MSSP: consider packaging mobile messaging visibility next to your email offering through our partner program.
• Any team with executives who are already being impersonated by text: prioritize the mobile layer first. Here is how companies can protect employees from executive impersonation via text.

Start with a pilot on the channel you cannot see

SmishAlert is sold as an annual per-user subscription, typically after a paid 30-day pilot whose fee is credited toward the first annual subscription. Pricing is not published, so the pilot is the way to see what your own users receive. Within a month you learn how many suspicious texts reach your people, whether they cluster into campaigns, and which executives are being impersonated. If you need to deploy without device management, read how to deploy mobile phishing protection without MDM, or look at the product overview and talk to us.

FAQ

What is the closest alternative to Material Security?

That depends on what you value in Material. For API-integrated, AI-driven email protection, Abnormal and Sublime Security are the platforms most often compared. For established suites, buyers look at Proofpoint and Mimecast. Run a proof of concept on your own mail before deciding.

Does Material Security protect against smishing?

Material’s published scope is Google Workspace and Microsoft 365: email, files, identity and configuration. SMS and mobile messaging are outside that scope, as they are for the other email platforms listed here. Confirm with any vendor which channels it observes.

Can I use SmishAlert alongside an email security platform?

Yes. SmishAlert is designed for the messaging channel that email tools do not cover, and it integrates with SIEM workflows through its API. Teams typically keep their email platform and add mobile messaging visibility next to it.

Is SMS-based MFA still acceptable?

U.S. guidance has moved away from it. According to the Vectra summary, CISA and the FBI recommended against SMS-based MFA in December 2024, and NIST SP 800-63 restricts it for federal systems. Phishing-resistant options such as FIDO2/WebAuthn are the stronger choice.

Sources

• Material Cloud Workspace Security Platform reviews, Gartner Peer Insights
• 8 best Material Security alternatives in 2026, Sublime Security
• Best email security solutions 2026, IRONSCALES
• Smishing (SMS phishing): attacks, examples, and defense, Vectra

Recommended

• Top 6 Magu App Alternatives for 2026
• Top 4 ZoraSafe.com Alternatives for 2026
• Top 3 IronScales.com Alternatives for Messaging Security
• Security in Mobile: 2026 Enterprise Defense Guide