Organisations that replaced legacy endpoint security tools with CrowdStrike achieved a 273% return on investment over three years, with payback in under six months, according to a new Total Economic Impact (TEI) study conducted by Forrester Consulting.
The study, commissioned by CrowdStrike, assessed a composite organisation based on interviews with multiple customers across sectors including oil and gas, healthcare and retail. It highlights how modernising endpoint security can deliver not just stronger protection, but also clear economic benefits at a time when endpoints have become a major risk surface for enterprises.
$5 million in quantified benefits over three years
Forrester found that organisations moving away from traditional endpoint security tools generated around $5 million in quantified benefits over three years. These gains were driven by lower technology and labour costs, simplified security operations and faster deployment across new environments and acquisitions.
A major contributor to the ROI was reduced breach risk. The study estimates $1.7 million in avoided breach-related costs over three years, reflecting fewer endpoint-driven security incidents once legacy tools were replaced.
Operational simplicity improves analyst productivity
Beyond direct cost savings, the study points to significant operational improvements. By consolidating endpoint security around a single, lightweight sensor, organisations reduced endpoint security management labour by 95%, according to the analysis. This also led to fewer alerts and false positives, allowing security teams to focus on real threats without expanding headcount.
Interviewed customers emphasised the practical impact of this shift. An enterprise security manager at an oil and gas company told Forrester that their previous endpoint solution was “very hard to manage”, prompting the move to a simpler, more integrated approach with CrowdStrike across endpoint, identity and SIEM capabilities.
A healthcare cyber defence leader noted that the ability to expand beyond endpoint detection and response from a single agent deployment required “little to no effort”, while a retail CISO highlighted the speed of investigations enabled by improved enterprise-wide visibility.
Designed for consolidation as security estates grow
The report also underlines the importance of consolidation as security environments become more complex. Forrester notes that CrowdStrike’s cloud-native, single-sensor architecture allows organisations to extend protection into areas such as identity, next-generation SIEM and cloud security without additional deployments or operational disruption.
Commenting on the findings, Elia Zaitsev, chief technology officer at CrowdStrike, said many enterprises are still relying on endpoint security designed for an earlier threat landscape. The study, he argued, shows that modern endpoint security is not only more effective, but also “more economically rational”.
As enterprises face rising cyber risk, skills shortages and pressure to justify security spend, the findings suggest that endpoint security modernisation is increasingly being evaluated not just on protection metrics, but on measurable business outcomes and speed to value.