Akamai App and API Protector vs Fortinet FortiDDoS comparison

Akamai and Fortinet are both solutions in the Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection category. Akamai is ranked #9 with an average rating of 7.7, while Fortinet is ranked #13 with an average rating of 8.0. Akamai holds a 4.2% mindshare in DDOS, compared to Fortinet’s 2.5% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Akamai users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 90% of Fortinet users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 5, 2024

Fortinet FortiDDoS and Akamai App and API Protector are key players in the cybersecurity sector. Fortinet FortiDDoS leads in pricing and customer support, while Akamai App and API Protector offers superior advanced features, making it an attractive choice for those prioritizing comprehensive security capabilities.

Features: Fortinet FortiDDoS provides powerful DDoS protection, real-time threat analysis, and automatic mitigation which focus on network security enhancement. Akamai App and API Protector, on the other hand, delivers extensive API security, bot management, and adaptive threat protection, offering a versatile range of policies suitable for varied environments.

Room for Improvement: Fortinet FortiDDoS could enhance its capabilities in API security and flexibility of security policies. Improvements in handling complex application-level threats might also be beneficial. Akamai App and API Protector could simplify its deployment process, offer better pricing strategies, and further reduce complexity in user interface operations for wider accessibility.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Fortinet FortiDDoS impresses with easy deployment and responsive customer service, offering straightforward guidelines. Akamai App and API Protector provides comprehensive documentation and skilled support, although its deployment is more complex. Customers can benefit from Akamai’s robust feature set with the right resources.

Pricing and ROI: Fortinet FortiDDoS is lauded for its attractive pricing and efficient cost-to-benefit ratio, resulting in faster ROI. Akamai App and API Protector, despite higher initial costs, shows strong long-term ROI owing to advanced security capabilities. The choice depends on budget limits and needed security feature levels.

To learn more, read our detailed Akamai App and API Protector vs. Fortinet FortiDDoS Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Akamai App and API Protector vs. Fortinet FortiDDoS

December 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Cloudflare

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2025, in the Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection category, the mindshare of Cloudflare is 17.8%, up from 17.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Akamai App and API Protector is 4.2%, up from 3.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortinet FortiDDoS is 2.5%, down from 2.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Cloudflare	17.8%
Akamai App and API Protector	4.2%
Fortinet FortiDDoS	2.5%
Other	75.5%

Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection

Featured Reviews

Herb Angle

Owner at Hga consulting

Has helped manage client domains with streamlined access control and threat visibility

I don't know what areas could be improved with Cloudflare WAF; Cloudflare is constantly improving and adding features to their feature set. They're doing a good job, and as far as DNS and support for any domains that I create or my clients create, it's mandatory for me to make sure that they have Cloudflare as their DNS provider. The Cloudflare load balancing capability hasn't really helped in enhancing my website's uptime and resiliency because we don't really get that much traffic; it's mostly remote users, and web hosting is done by a web hosting service. It doesn't pay to try to host your own website.

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Gavin Pinho

Privacy & Risk Management Vice President, Information Security at a computer software company with 501-1,000 employees

Has provided strong protection against evolving threats but still needs support for configuration fine-tuning

The standout features of Akamai App and API Protector are rooted in it being the Web Application Firewall, where all traffic gets scanned, including the implementation of web firewall rules, and after this phase, traffic proceeds through the BMP, which is Bot Management. Akamai App and API Protector exceeds expectations in terms of AI capabilities, and it genuinely combines a plethora of advanced features. The area in which Akamai excels compared to other competitors with a WAF is in threat intelligence, as threats continually evolve, requiring ongoing updates to backend algorithms to effectively capture smart bots, and Akamai's commitment in that regard is backed by an excellent team, while other providers are still catching up.

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Marcos AntonioOliveira

IT Analyst at Evapco, Inc.

Reliable protection and smooth setup enhance company security

Currently, I have two firewalls, with one located in Sorocaba, model 90D, and the other in São Paulo, model 30D. They are connected by VPN. I use the firewalls for VPN and final protection for my company, and my equipment is maintained by an internet company called Multiprox The equipment works…

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Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The solution is stable, and the DNS servers are simple to use."

"New and innovative way to protect the client's data."

"What I like best about Cloudflare is that my company can use it to trace and manage applications and monitor traffic. The solution tells you if there's a spike in traffic. Cloudflare also sends you a link to check your equipment and deployment and track it through peering, so it's a valuable tool."

"The DDoS protection is the most valuable aspect of the solution."

"Cloudflare has many features."

"Cloudflare makes it easier for me to handle and set up DNS for multiple users and multiple clients, and basically go in and access their account, make the changes they need, and it's a one-stop shop."

"The most valuable feature is its usability."

"The UI is good."

More Cloudflare pros

"I can attest to its benefits in terms of understanding and mitigating threats...The solution's technical support team seems to be pretty responsive."

"The product is user-friendly."

"Akamai Web Application Protector is a good solution that provides basic web application protection."

"The solution can scale extremely well."

"The dashboard is the most interesting feature of the Akamai portal where you can have a detailed analysis of all the attacks that are happening. You can drill down an issue and see exactly what is happening, who are the bad guys attacking your website, and how Akamai is protecting the website. That is the most valuable feature."

"The support that we got from their technical team has been fantastic. I have never experienced this level of support from other CDN providers."

"The solution easily identifies, delays, or allows business traffic."

"The most valuable feature is the DDoS protection, which is the main reason we got it."

More Akamai App and API Protector pros

"It is a user-friendly product in terms of monitoring and updating policies."

"The solution already has security profiles and it can protect from DDoS attacks and other kinds of attacks."

"The product's initial setup phase was really easy."

"The solution is very user-friendly and very easy to use."

"Packet inspection has been effective for mitigating DDoS attacks."

"The equipment works very well, and I have not encountered any issues with it."

"The equipment works very well, and I have not encountered any issues with it. It is a good solution for my company."

"This solution can protect Layer 3, Layer 4 and Layer 7 attacks of applications for us."

More Fortinet FortiDDoS pros

Cons

"Integration involving API with other products could be more user-friendly."

"I think the APIs are a little bit hard for us to work with. The APIs could be more open so that we could integrate better with our SolarWinds or our monitoring solution."

"The timing aspect can lead to it being considered overpriced. This is a particular concern we have with Cloudflare, as they may struggle with accurately detecting the client."

"The product needs to improve its automation."

"Technical support is lacking."

"Cloudflare could offer a better view or maybe dashboards of the main resources used in the client."

"The tool needs to improve caching of servers. The product needs to include PFX certificate as well."

"Areas like how assessment, discovery, and payload are dealt with and how it all comes into your organization can be considered when trying to make suggestions to Cloudflare for improvements."

More Cloudflare cons

"It could have better analytics and reporting visibility in the OEM console."

"It's fine for a simple tool, but as I recall, if you encounter a lot of bots, scrapers, and other things, you'll need this tool bot and this other thing they offer called Bot Manager."

"One area where Akamai can improve is the captcha part. Cloudflare provides a captcha if there are a certain number of threats. For example, I can assign that if there are 10 requests within a second from a single IP, it should send a captcha to the user. The user should fill in the captcha, and only after that, the user should be able to access our website. This captcha feature should be built into Bot Manager. I love this captcha feature of Cloudflare."

"The effectiveness of Akamai's bot management in reducing unauthorized access is quite good, although it does require a lot of fine-tuning and tweaking, which involves spending ample time with their support teams to tailor the configuration to our applications."

"Akamai App and API Protector is very new to me, so I do not have any insights on improvement areas for the product. However, when we ask for some help, it can take some time. We understand that the job is done by professionals, but if that time can be reduced, it would be great."

"The WAF features definitely have a lot of room for improvement. A lot of the WAF is really basic. For some products or some of our solutions, we need to run a second layer of more advanced WAF. If it had better layer seven protection then we would not need a second WAF."

"Akamai needs to focus on quickly responding to risks, even those that may potentially be of zero threat..Maybe some of the documentation is a little confusing. They have a lot of different places where you can go to get information, and some of the information is quite out of date."

"The interface is a little bit clunky and can be improved."

More Akamai App and API Protector cons

"The primary area for improvement is the on-premises capacity limit, currently fixed at 10 GB."

"The web interface could be much better."

"All the thresholds that need to be configured should be included in the default so that user will not forget or misconfigure."

"The product’s pricing needs improvement."

"The tool needs to focus more on the area of application traffic management, where it currently has some shortcomings."

"There aren't really any aspects of the solution we are unhappy with. It's been a positive experience overall."

"I find that there have been issues in the past year with the solution hanging. It freezes often."

"The challenge lies within the customer environment, particularly in Brazil, where companies have stringent security requirements for implementing solutions."

More Fortinet FortiDDoS cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"For Cloudflare, I recommend it heavily for small businesses with revenue under a couple of million dollars. Onboarding is easy, and they even have a free plan. This makes it simple for businesses in the $100,000-$500,000 range to try it out and see its value, allowing them to scale up their infrastructure as needed."

"The cost primarily depends on the size of the organization."

"I think the pricing is competitive. I think as far as licensing is concerned it's pretty straightforward because it's based on domain. It's just that sometimes domains could be tricky with some customers."

"The product's pricing is minimal compared to other products."

"The pricing for the service is reasonable, neither excessively cheap nor prohibitively expensive. It aligns well with the value of their solution."

"Cloudflare's pricing is not much higher and is good for middle-level organizations."

"The tool is a premium product, so it is very expensive."

"I give the price a five out of ten."

More Cloudflare pricing and cost advice

"Akamai is very expensive."

"Its price is at the medium level. It is not very high. It is also not very low. It serves the purpose."

"The product is expensive, but it is worth the money."

"Based on the billing discussions in the DevOps team, Akamai's cost does not seem to be a major thing. However, LOE is an issue. When it comes to support, we know that even all the competitors do this. For a 30-minute issue, they give us a LOE of one or two hours. That is a basic practice, but that is something we worry about."

"Its price is slightly high. Every company has a justification for the high price. Overall, it feels worth the money based on how the service has been structured, but we do negotiate it."

"The solution is expensive."

"Price-wise, I would say Akamai's pricing is competitive."

"There is no license at all for Akamai. They are going to charge us only for the usage."

More Akamai App and API Protector pricing and cost advice

"The product’s pricing needs improvement."

"It's quite pricey."

"The solution is reasonably priced."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

19%

Computer Software Company

Manufacturing Company

Performing Arts

Manufacturing Company

12%

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	46
Midsize Enterprise	8
Large Enterprise	25

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	4
Midsize Enterprise	7
Large Enterprise	18

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	10
Large Enterprise	6

Questions from the Community

Which is the best DDoS protection solution for a big ISP for monitoring and mitigating?

Cloudflare. We are moving from Akamai prolexic to Cloudflare. Cloudflare anycast network outperforms Akamai static GR...

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Which would you choose - Cloudflare DNS or Quad9?

Cloudflare DNS is a very fast, very reliable public DNS resolver. It is an enterprise-grade authoritative DNS service...

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What do you like most about Cloudflare?

Cloudflare offers CDN and DDoS protection. We have the front end, API, and database in how you structure applications.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Akamai Web Application Protector?

The price is higher than others. It could be about 80% to 70% more expensive than other tools. So, it’s not just a sl...

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What needs improvement with Akamai Web Application Protector?

There are no significant areas for improvement on the WAF side or for Akamai App and API Protector solution; they are...

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What is your primary use case for Akamai Web Application Protector?

The main use case for Akamai App and API Protector is serving as the WAF, Web Application Firewall.

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Which is the best DDoS protection solution for a big ISP for monitoring and mitigating?

Arbor would be the best bid, apart from Arbor, Palo Alto and Fortinet have good solutions. As this is an ISP, I would...

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What do you like most about Fortinet FortiDDoS?

The product's initial setup phase was really easy.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiDDoS?

Fortinet FortiDDoS offers lower costs compared to other solutions. The licensing costs are annually renewed.

See all answers

Comparisons

Quad9 vs Cloudflare

Compared 52% of the time

Akamai vs Cloudflare

Compared 4% of the time

Imperva Application Security Platform vs Cloudflare

Compared 3% of the time

Azure DNS vs Cloudflare

Compared 2% of the time

Myra Security DDoS Protection vs Cloudflare

Compared 2% of the time

More Cloudflare Competitors

Prolexic vs Akamai App and API Protector

Compared 8% of the time

Microsoft Azure Application Gateway vs Akamai App and API Protector

Compared 7% of the time

AWS WAF vs Akamai App and API Protector

Compared 5% of the time

Arbor DDoS vs Akamai App and API Protector

Compared 5% of the time

Imperva Application Security Platform vs Akamai App and API Protector

Compared 5% of the time

More Akamai App and API Protector Competitors

Arbor DDoS vs Fortinet FortiDDoS

Compared 22% of the time

Radware DDoS vs Fortinet FortiDDoS

Compared 11% of the time

Fortinet FortiWeb vs Fortinet FortiDDoS

Compared 7% of the time

VMware NSX vs Fortinet FortiDDoS

Compared 6% of the time

Fortinet FortiADC vs Fortinet FortiDDoS

Compared 5% of the time

More Fortinet FortiDDoS Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cloudflare

December 2025

Download Cloudflare product report

Buyer's Guide

Akamai App and API Protector

December 2025

Download Akamai App and API Protector product report

Buyer's Guide

Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection

November 2025

Download Fortinet FortiDDoS product report

Also Known As

Cloudflare DNS

Akamai Web Application Protector, Akamai Kona Site Defender, Akamai Kona DDoS Defender

Fortinet DDoS, FortiDDos

Overview

Cloudflare enhances web performance and security with features like CDN caching and DDoS mitigation while providing easy DNS management and intuitive setup through its user-friendly dashboard.

Cloudflare is recognized for its comprehensive web security and performance solutions. Speed improvements are achieved through caching mechanisms and DDoS protection, combining ease of DNS management with flexible page rules. The robust analytics and threat insight tools provide valuable data, assisted by a user-friendly dashboard allowing quick setup and configuration. An API offers dynamic DNS settings ensuring low latency and high performance across the globe.

What are Cloudflare's key features?

CDN Caching: Enhances website speed through content delivery network caching.
Web Application Firewall: Protects websites from online threats.
DDoS Mitigation: Shields against distributed denial-of-service attacks.
DNS Management: Offers easy-to-use and flexible domain management.
SSL Certificates: Ensures secure connections between users and servers.
Analytics: Provides insights with robust analytics tools.

What benefits and ROI should users evaluate?

Enhanced Security: Strengthening web security with DDoS and firewall protection.
Speed Improvement: Faster content delivery with CDN caching.
Operational Simplicity: Simplifies website optimization through a user-friendly interface.
Scalable Solutions: Scales with global reach, lowering latency for improved performance.
Cost Efficiency: Offers layers of valuable functionality with pricing options.

Cloudflare finds utility across industries for DNS management and defense mechanisms. Its content delivery network assures fast content distribution and fortified security. Businesses integrate features like web application firewalls, load balancing, end-to-end SSL, and zero trust to protect websites from cyber threats while ensuring resilience and reliable performance.

Cloudflare

Akamai App and API Protector provides website security by preventing DDoS attacks, acting as an application firewall, managing content delivery, and monitoring APIs. It adapts to threat profiles and is used for fast media delivery and identifying malicious activities.

Akamai App and API Protector offers strong protection, adaptable security features, and efficient traffic management. Its WAF blocks IP addresses and country-specific threats while preventing SQL injections. Companies utilize it for scalable CDN services and comprehensive traffic analysis. Known for its cost-effectiveness and user-friendly dashboard, this protector stands out for its customizable rules and technical support. Users also highlight the ease of integration and detailed attack insights available through its advanced dashboard.

What are the key features of Akamai App and API Protector?

DDoS Protection: Strong defense against Distributed Denial of Service attacks.
Scalable CDN: Manages content delivery efficiently under high traffic loads.
WAF Capabilities: Blocks specific IPs and countries, prevents SQL injections.
Traffic Filtering: Analyzes and controls incoming requests to maintain security.
Adaptive Stream Delivery: Adjusts content delivery to meet bandwidth needs.

What benefits should users expect?

Cost-Effectiveness: Provides robust security tools at a competitive price.
Enhanced Security: Comprehensive protection against cyber threats.
Scalability: Easily handles increasing traffic and data loads.
Ease of Integration: Simple integration with existing systems.
Insightful Analytics: Offers data-driven insights into traffic and attack patterns.

In media, Akamai App and API Protector ensures smooth streaming by handling high bandwidth demands. E-commerce companies use it to guard against fraud and data breaches. Financial sectors rely on its ability to protect sensitive transactions. Implementations in healthcare focus on safeguarding patient data while maintaining compliance with regulations.

Akamai

Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks are ever-evolving and use a variety of technologies. To successfully combat these attacks, you need a dynamic, multi-layered security solution. FortiDDoS protects from both known and zero day attacks with very low latency. It’s easy to deploy and manage, and includes comprehensive reporting and analysis tools.

Fortinet

Sample Customers

Trusted by over 9,000,000 Internet Applications and APIs, including Nasdaq, Zendesk, Crunchbase, Steve Madden, OkCupid, Cisco, Quizlet, Discord and more.

Douglas Omaha Technology Commission, ZALORA, PrintPlanet

Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data

Buyer's Guide

Akamai App and API Protector vs. Fortinet FortiDDoS

December 2025

Free Report: Akamai App and API Protector vs. Fortinet FortiDDoS

Find out what your peers are saying about Akamai App and API Protector vs. Fortinet FortiDDoS and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.

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See our Akamai App and API Protector vs. Fortinet FortiDDoS report.

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