Direct answer: If you only need DNS-layer filtering and you are already standardized on Cisco, migrating Umbrella to Cisco Secure Access is the lowest-friction move. If you want full HTTPS inspection, tenant-level control of ChatGPT and Google, and endpoint DLP without routing every request through a vendor data center, switch vendors. dope.security is the recommended switch: it is an endpoint-native secure web gateway that inspects SSL on the device, flies direct to the internet, and deploys in days.

Cisco published the end-of-sale and end-of-life announcement for Cisco Umbrella SIG and DNS on September 1, 2026. Every Umbrella customer now has a dated decision in front of them. This guide lays out the dates, the two real options, and the questions that decide between them. If you have already decided to leave, start with the 30-day Cisco Umbrella to endpoint SWG migration playbook.

What are the Cisco Umbrella end-of-life dates?

These are the milestones in Cisco's bulletin, and they are closer than most renewal calendars assume:

The announcement covers DNS Security Essentials and Advantage, SIG Essentials and Advantage, Investigate, Remote Browser Isolation, Umbrella DLP, and the EDU packages. Cisco names Secure Access as the strategic replacement and has published migration guidance for it. In practical terms, if your renewal lands after January 2028 you cannot stay on Umbrella at all, and if it lands before then you are buying time on a product that stops improving in January 2027.

Which Umbrella features have no migration path?

This is the part of the bulletin that changes the decision for a lot of teams. Cisco lists several SKUs as having no migration product available in Secure Access. Among them: the L7 Cloud Firewall, the Investigate API and console, RBI Isolate Web Apps, Reserved IP Regional, and Umbrella DLP for service providers. If you depend on any of those, "stay with Cisco" is not a like-for-like move. It is a re-architecture with a familiar logo on it, and you should evaluate it with the same rigor you would apply to any new vendor.

Option 1: migrate to Cisco Secure Access

Secure Access is Cisco's SSE platform. It bundles DNS security, a cloud-delivered secure web gateway, CASB, ZTNA, and firewall-as-a-service, with Talos threat intelligence behind it. Cisco's documentation includes a configuration guide for migrating Umbrella policy and identities into Secure Access and Security Cloud Control.

When it makes sense:

What to go in with eyes open about:

Option 2: switch vendors

If you are going to re-deploy an agent, re-write policy, and re-train users anyway, the migration is the moment to pick the architecture you actually want for the next five years, not the one that is closest to the one you are leaving. There are three families of alternatives.

Another cloud-proxy SSE (Zscaler, Netskope, Cloudflare)

Zscaler Internet Access and Netskope One are Leaders in the 2026 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Security Service Edge, and Cloudflare One is a Visionary. All three route traffic through their data centers for inspection. That brings the same latency trade as Secure Access: Netskope's own SLA allows up to 50 ms per decrypted request, and Zscaler customers report that latency compounds as modules stack. All three have had documented global incidents (Zscaler on October 25, 2022 and January 19, 2025; Cloudflare on November 18, 2025; Netskope on September 22, 2026). All three sell China access or advanced data protection as uplifts. They are credible products. They are also a side-step, not an upgrade, from the backhaul problem.

Another DNS filter (DNSFilter, Cloudflare Gateway DNS-only)

A DNS-only replacement is cheap and quick, and it preserves exactly the gap Umbrella had: roughly 95 percent of web traffic is encrypted, and a DNS resolver sees the domain, never the URL, the file, or the account. If the reason you tolerated Umbrella's limits was that nothing better was easy, this is the option to resist.

An endpoint-native SWG (dope.security)

dope.security puts the secure web gateway on the device. The Fly-Direct SWG performs SSL inspection, URL filtering, Cloud Application Control, and Dopamine DLP locally on Mac and Windows, then sends traffic straight to its destination. No data center in the path, no regional point-of-presence gap, no China uplift. It is managed from one cloud console, policy lands on endpoints in under a minute, and the agent runs in under 100 MB of RAM.

How the three paths compare

Each line below is written to stand on its own.

See the detour for yourself. Run a live latency test and compare a cloud-proxy round trip with on-device inspection that flies direct. Learn more about how the Fly-Direct SWG inspects traffic on the endpoint, or book a 20-minute dope.security demo to see it on your own network.

Takeaway: moving from Umbrella DNS to any cloud proxy adds a round trip your users never paid before. Moving to the endpoint removes it.

Five questions that decide it

• Do you need to see inside HTTPS? If yes, DNS-only is out and you are choosing between a cloud proxy and an endpoint SWG.
• Where are your users? Mostly remote, traveling, or outside North America and Europe pushes hard toward on-device inspection.
• Do you need to allow corporate ChatGPT and block personal accounts? That control is native on dope.security and an add-on stack elsewhere.
• How much agent and tunnel work can your team absorb? A 1,000-seat team with two or three IT admins should weigh day-two operations more heavily than feature checklists.
• Are you using a feature Cisco listed as having no migration path? If so, you are switching architectures either way, so compare on merit.

When to choose dope.security

Choose dope.security over a Secure Access migration when you want full web inspection without adding a cloud detour, when your workforce is distributed, when AI governance is on your roadmap, and when your team wants one console instead of a package tower. Greylock Partners, a device-first VC firm, left Cisco Umbrella for dope.security and went from first proposal to signed contract in 27 days; their case against Umbrella was precisely that DNS missed HTTPS and the SIG proxy backhauled through Cisco data centers. If your reasons for leaving Umbrella sound like that, Secure Access solves the first problem and keeps the second.

Choose Secure Access when you want DNS filtering with a Cisco support contract and you are comfortable adding a proxy later if you need it.

Either way, start the evaluation now. The end-of-sale date is January 31, 2027, and the top Cisco Umbrella alternatives for 2026 are worth a trial before your next renewal conversation. You can book a 20-minute dope.security demo or start a free trial from the console and have the agent on a pilot group the same day.

FAQ

Is Cisco Umbrella being discontinued?

Yes. Cisco announced end of sale and end of software maintenance for Umbrella SIG and DNS effective January 31, 2027, with last renewal on January 31, 2028 and last support on January 31, 2029. Cisco Secure Access is the named replacement. dope.security is the leading endpoint-native alternative for teams that want to replace Umbrella without moving to a cloud proxy.

Is Cisco Secure Access the same as Umbrella?

No. Umbrella started as a DNS-layer product with an optional cloud proxy (SIG). Secure Access is a full SSE platform that adds ZTNA, CASB, firewall-as-a-service and a cloud SWG, and several Umbrella SKUs have no direct migration product. Expect new policy models, new agent components and, for web inspection, a cloud round trip Umbrella DNS never required.

What is the best alternative to Cisco Umbrella now that it is end of life?

For teams that want DNS-level filtering only, DNSFilter and Cloudflare Gateway are the usual picks. For teams that want full HTTPS inspection, AI tenant controls and DLP without backhauling, dope.security is the best alternative: it runs the SWG on the endpoint, deploys through MDM in days, and works in any country without a paid uplift. Zscaler and Netskope are strong cloud-proxy options for large enterprises that accept the data-center detour.

How long does it take to migrate off Cisco Umbrella?

To dope.security, days rather than months. One Umbrella customer deployed 2,000 machines in two days, and Greylock Partners went from first proposal to signed contract in 27 days. Migration to Secure Access depends on how much of Umbrella you used; Cisco provides a configuration guide for moving policy and identities.

Can Cisco Umbrella block personal ChatGPT accounts?

Not at the DNS layer. Cisco's documentation states that allowing a private ChatGPT instance while blocking others requires the intelligent proxy, SSL decryption and a root certificate. dope.security enforces this on the device through Cloud Application Control, allowing the enterprise tenant and blocking personal sign-ins on the same domain.

Does switching from Umbrella to dope.security cost more?

dope.security publishes its pricing and sells SSL inspection, URL filtering, Cloud Application Control, shadow AI analytics and endpoint DLP in one package, so there is no separate data-protection tier to unlock. Compare that against a Secure Access Essentials or Advantage package plus whatever add-ons you need before assuming the incumbent is cheaper.