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Akamai Ion vs Fortinet FortiADC comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 17, 2024

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

Akamai Ion
Ranking in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
15th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Fortinet FortiADC
Ranking in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
6th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
25
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) category, the mindshare of Akamai Ion is 0.9%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortinet FortiADC is 9.4%, up from 9.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Fortinet FortiADC9.4%
Akamai Ion0.9%
Other89.7%
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
 

Featured Reviews

HarshBhardiya - PeerSpot reviewer
Reliable bot management with valuable traffic analytics and good delivery configuration
We are using Akamai Ion primarily for CDN services. It is more about delivery configuration, and for security, we use Akamai WAF security controls and Botman Akamai Ion helps protect us from DOS, SQL injection, cross-site scripting, and scraping tools. Real-time analytics are very helpful for…
GANESAN K - PeerSpot reviewer
Has supported load balancing for medical applications and could benefit from more custom configuration options
Some customers need custom management for handling their applications across the servers. Instead of having a predefined solution, if we had space for custom-based algorithms to load balance the traffic, it would be better. We have faced such cases with A10, where we can leverage many custom scripts and do much more. Even though A10 primarily focuses on SMBs, they have also ventured into the enterprise market. Fortinet has been a pioneer for enterprise solutions, such as firewalls, SASE, ZTNA, and SD-WAN solutions, and they are in a leader quadrant. Therefore, they should have more options. From a pricing perspective, it is expensive.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature is bot management."
"Akamai is easy to use and very effective."
"I like the solution's load balance with DNS intelligence."
"I am impressed with the product's load-balancing feature."
"The product has flexible and interesting licensing options."
"TSL and SSL offloading are both very good features."
"We can do patches offline without causing customers outages. The web application firewall features, especially those related to the OWASP Top Ten, provide automated protections. This allows more flexibility in patching the backend applications. Additionally, it offers visibility into the requests being made to the applications, and you can't protect what you can't see."
"From a technical perspective, it is the most scalable device from Fortinet."
"The solution provides high-level services such as availability, redundancy, and load balancing between servers."
"The GSLB, the DR side, is the best part. Because we had our main side in one city, we created another, and we had a complete MPLS over the internet. We used the GSLB and data loss for our business applications."
 

Cons

"Log management should display data for more than two months."
"The product must provide more flexibility."
"The solution needs to integrate sFlow. sFlow provides better visualization of the bandwidth and types of traffic passing through the device. When used in the traffic path, this information can be really useful."
"Issues with SSL and encrypted traffic."
"Fortinet FortiADC should include an advanced-level SD-WAN."
"Some customers need custom management for handling their applications across the servers. Instead of having a predefined solution, if we had space for custom-based algorithms to load balance the traffic, it would be better."
"Because it is so generic, the documentation requires special attention. A person who has not worked on Fortinet FortiADC or a similar product will struggle to understand what the document is trying to say. The documentation could be more specific, and more detailed."
"Technical support and documentation could both be improved."
"There is a mismatch between the number of features they are offering and the device capacity on how much it can handle."
"The initial setup could be simplified."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool is expensive."
"The price is competitive"
"The solution is less expensive than F5 or Imperva and is the most reasonably priced option available."
"The solution could be more cost-effective."
"Our basic license excludes features such as antivirus and IDS. Due to license limitations, some functionalities are not configured."
"The solution's pricing is an issue and should be improved."
"Compared to F5, FortiADC pricing is better."
"They offer a perpetual license."
"The product has average pricing. I rate its pricing a five out of ten."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Educational Organization
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise7
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Akamai Ion?
Akamai is easy to use and very effective.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Akamai Ion?
The billing cycle is monthly, however, payment is done yearly. While expensive, it provides value for the services offered.
What needs improvement with Akamai Ion?
Log management should display data for more than two months. The traffic report needs to be more flexible. The response time of technical support should be improved.
Is Citrix ADC (formerly Netscaler) the best ADC to use and if not why?
For ADC, any ADC can do a good job. But in case if you want to add WAF functionality to the same ADC hardware you have to look for other ADC's like F5, Imperva, Radware, Fortinet, etc.
Do you recommend Fortinet FortiADC?
I recommend Fortinet FortiADC. My experience with Fortinet has been very positive. Our company has been using it for around five years. We mainly use FortiADC for the load balancing of application ...
What do you like most about Fortinet FortiADC?
The user interface is very easy and integrates with Sandbox easily.
 

Also Known As

No data available
FortiADC Application Delivery Controller, FortiADC
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Eurail, Boston Scientific
Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data
Find out what your peers are saying about Akamai Ion vs. Fortinet FortiADC and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
869,566 professionals have used our research since 2012.