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Akamai vs Windows Azure CDN comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 6, 2025

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
Sponsored
Ranking in CDN
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
79
Ranking in other categories
WAN Optimization (4th), Web Application Firewall (WAF) (9th), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (2nd), Managed DNS (1st), Domain Name System (DNS) Security (5th), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (15th)
Akamai
Ranking in CDN
4th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Windows Azure CDN
Ranking in CDN
10th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the CDN category, the mindshare of Cloudflare is 15.0%, down from 21.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Akamai is 11.6%, down from 16.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Windows Azure CDN is 2.8%, down from 3.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
CDN Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cloudflare15.0%
Akamai11.6%
Windows Azure CDN2.8%
Other70.6%
CDN
 

Featured Reviews

M.A. Faisal - PeerSpot reviewer
General Manager at bKash Limited
Advanced protection has secured critical web workloads and provides clear traffic visibility
From a security perspective, there remains a security loophole, as some browsers in the market can bypass the Turnstile solution, which requires approximately 40 seconds to do so. From a performance perspective, this is acceptable. We also tried Google reCAPTCHA, and that can also be bypassed. From a security perspective, I would say neither solution is completely secured. Regarding uptime, we have faced a couple of incidents due to Cloudflare in recent years, so I cannot say we receive 100% uptime for our region. We sometimes face challenges, including downtime and other issues. As a result, we are not receiving 100% uptime from Cloudflare's solution. Since most of our customers are in this region, we need alternatives. We need something more competitive than Cloudflare. Unfortunately, in Bangladesh, Cloudflare has three points of presence already, and we cannot find any other solution provider in Bangladesh as an alternative, which presents another challenge. Competitor solutions have more attack signatures, which ensure better security compared to Cloudflare's predefined configurations. Customers do not have options to modify any configuration parameters in Cloudflare, whereas other competitor solutions, such as F5 Distributed Cloud, allow customers to tune configurations according to their requirements. Cloudflare could improve in this area. Additionally, regarding visibility, Cloudflare has static visibility, but they could adopt dynamic graph features for their customers.
JV
Sr. Strategic Accounts Manager at a tech vendor with 5,001-10,000 employees
Improved security and faster operations with a seamless integration
They are one of the top solution vendors in the market. Premium though, but they're the best. We've worked closely with digital-native customers, not so much from the media segment. Fintechs, financial organizations, banking segment, manufacturing, these are the ones we have worked with. Not much on media because most of the media houses are already covered by Akamai. 95% of media houses are already covered by Akamai. It gives a seamless view of how your infrastructure is, from an attack perspective, from a threat perspective, how your assets are behaving. It gives a very comprehensive view. It depends on the customer's environment. Wherever the customer wants, but mostly it is on the private cloud or public cloud because it's a cloud-based SaaS solution that Akamai has to offer. Implementation is feasible anywhere. The solution is aimed at Enterprise customers because it is on a premium side. On a scale of 1-10, this solution rates at 9.5.
AA
Consultant at NatWest Group
Our data is cached faster and sites load faster
We use the solution for hosting static web applications. We use it to cache images or files We mostly distribute images through the CDN. Earlier, we were directly caching from the server to CDN. Since we started using the solution, there has been a significant improvement in the response time.…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Easier http to https redirect using page rules"
"Cloudflare is a security SaaS provider that provides security and protects us from any application layer attack."
"The most valuable feature is the web application firewall."
"The web application firewall brought us good security and a view of the accesses/blocks of the entire domain and subdomain that were accessed both by region (country) and IPs."
"The setup and configuration is also easy to perform and their support is excellent."
"Stability is great; I love their mechanisms, I love their GUI, I love their front end, I love their behind the scenes, algorithms and everything, it all makes sense."
"Even when there is a high load on our servers, Cloudflare is able to cache the data and serve it to users, ensuring they can still access the website."
"The most valuable feature of Cloudflare DNS is its global reach and it is always evolving."
"This solution can be used for web , video and media caching and streaming."
"This is a very expensive solution but it works well."
"The solution's technical support is very good...The installation phase of Akamai was easy."
"Akamai's scalability is good."
"Akamai provides low-latency throughput."
"As of now, the best thing about Akamai is WAF, and though CDN is a good feature, it comes in second place when compared to WAF. I am very impressed with the WAF offered by Akamai."
"The initial setup is simple, especially for SaaS solutions."
"The most valuable feature in managing web traffic has been the ability to handle vertical scaling effectively."
"The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that one can access Windows Azure CDN from anywhere."
"We use the product for faster content delivery with low latency."
"One of the tool's best features is its ability to handle edge cases. For instance, we encountered a situation where we needed to remove certain files from public access. The solution offered a purge feature that allowed us to remove these files. This feature ensured that the files were deleted from all edge servers. Subsequently, we were able to upload new versions of the files."
"One of the best features of Windows Azure CDN is that it has integrated WAF; it is not only CDN alone and it is a very smart and capable WAF."
"I like that CDN offers a routing feature."
"The most valuable feature of Windows Azure CDN is its effectiveness."
"The fact that it just delivers what it is supposed to do is its most valuable feature...The initial setup is very straightforward."
"It is a stable solution."
 

Cons

"I believe they currently have this feature, but there will most likely be integration with APIs so we can control some features through API."
"The solution could use more analytics on the backend to give us more insights into everything. More reports would be helpful."
"We experienced some downtime in the fall of 2013, causing us to switch to Incapsula."
"The solution could work at being less expensive. It costs a lot to use it."
"Cloudflare's console should be made more user-friendly."
"I rate technical support quite badly."
"The reporting can definitely be improved to offer a lot more explanation on something that may have happened or has actually happened."
"Cloudflare does not have an on-premise solution. If they had different approaches they could be better suited to accommodate more customers, such as on-premise and hybrid deployments. For example, hybrid deployments would be useful where you could move the traffic from the enterprise to the cloud."
"While it's great for solutions with high scalability, like global e-commerce, it's not really built for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs). It has too many options and can be complex for SMBs to utilize."
"Other solutions are probably easier to set up, but you have more capability in Akamai."
"Akamai's configuration part is an area of concern where improvements are required to make the process easy."
"The user console is quite overloaded, sometimes it's hard to find your way around."
"When we open tickets, we have a delay in response times."
"It would be better if we could be notified about specific attacks."
"Akamai could improve by providing its own cloud services. We have to use third-party cloud services at this time, such as Amazon AWS. The offering becomes a lot easier for an SMB if everything was in one single platform to be used for the services."
"After three or four months from this perspective, I don’t know all the features on the platform yet, so I am still learning about it."
"It is not a weakness of Windows Azure CDN; rather, it is the fact that it is outside Saudi Arabia, leading to some regulation issues."
"They should include configuration for cache rules."
"The response time of the support team must be improved."
"We have experienced issues with switch connectivity."
"Azure is continuously improving its CDN but the documentation should be up-to-date."
"Windows Azure CDN should lower its prices."
"I believe Windows Azure CDN can improve monitoring and measuring overall end-user performance. Providing monitoring tools or agents that can be integrated into our pages would be highly beneficial. Setting up a custom domain with Windows Azure CDN involves proving domain ownership, which can take some time. The process is relatively straightforward if your DNS or domain registrar is already integrated with Microsoft. However, the verification process may be more time-consuming if you use a different service provider."
"The high price of Windows Azure CDN is an area of concern where improvements can be made."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product's pricing is minimal compared to other products."
"I give the price a five out of ten."
"That is one of the great features. I was able to access the majority of the features and services for free."
"The pricing for the service is reasonable, neither excessively cheap nor prohibitively expensive. It aligns well with the value of their solution."
"The tool is a premium product, so it is very expensive."
"The price of the solution is expensive."
"When you compare Cloudflare DNS to other solutions, such as Akamai, the price is reasonable."
"We don't have any issues with the price."
"The price of Akamai could be less expensive."
"The pricing of Akamai is moderate, in my opinion. My company makes yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to Akamai. There are no additional costs besides the licensing costs for the solution."
"It is an expensive product. The licensing costs for the solution are based on the usage. If we need premium support, we need to buy it from Akamai."
"Akamai is an expensive tool. Moreover, we have a pay-as-you-go model for additional features."
"Price-wise, I find Akamai's pricing model's inclination to be more towards the expensive side of the spectrum, though I can't say that it is a very expensive product."
"The price of the solution depends upon its usage."
"The solution can be one of the more expensive options, reflecting their established market position."
"The solution's pricing is based on bandwidth."
"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a five out of ten."
"It comes at a relatively affordable cost."
"The solution's price is above the medium range."
"I rate the price of Windows Azure CDN a six on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is high."
"The pricing of the solution depends on usage and varies based on the company's needs. If you want additional features like advanced logging, it will be pricier. However, it could be cheaper if you don't need those features. It all depends on the resources and requirements."
"The solution's price depends on how much traffic you have. So, it was okay for us. Payments are to be made on a monthly basis since one has to pay for what they used."
"The tool's pricing is cheap."
"The tool's pricing is cheap."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
14%
Computer Software Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Financial Services Firm
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business46
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise26
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise14
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise6
 

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...
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...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cloudflare DNS?
The pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Cloudflare are a bit on the higher side overall.
What needs improvement with Akamai?
Other solutions are probably easier to set up, but you have more capability in Akamai. It would be beneficial if they...
What is your primary use case for Akamai?
We are using many of the solutions from Akamai, with the WAF in front of it and distribution to multiple targets wher...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Akamai?
The pricing is good, with no complaints about costs, which is essential when deciding to have Akamai in your network.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Windows Azure CDN?
In terms of pricing for Windows Azure CDN and the whole Microsoft products, you cannot compare networking alone or co...
What needs improvement with Windows Azure CDN?
It is not a weakness of Windows Azure CDN; rather, it is the fact that it is outside Saudi Arabia, leading to some re...
What is your primary use case for Windows Azure CDN?
We are using Windows Azure CDN, Azure AI capability for a translator, Azure Front Door for CDN, and from Microsoft's ...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Cloudflare DNS
No data available
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Trusted by over 9,000,000 Internet Applications and APIs, including Nasdaq, Zendesk, Crunchbase, Steve Madden, OkCupid, Cisco, Quizlet, Discord and more.
Amazon, Apple, AT&T, Bank of America, Capital One, Cisco, Coca-Cola, Delta Air Lines, Disney, Ebay, Facebook, Google, Home Depot, HP, IBM, Intel, JPMorgan Chase, LinkedIn, McDonald's, Microsoft, Netflix, Nike, Oracle, PayPal, Pinterest, Qualcomm, Rakuten, SAP, Spotify, Tesla, Toyota, Visa, Walmart, WeWork
NORAD, Agreeya Mobility
Find out what your peers are saying about Akamai vs. Windows Azure CDN and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
909,679 professionals have used our research since 2012.