Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Amazon Route 53 vs Cloudflare vs IBM NS1 Connect comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
4.4
Amazon Route 53 offers cost-effective, reliable DNS management, delivering ROI through downtime prevention, security, and integration, despite higher costs.
Sentiment score
6.5
Cloudflare enhanced speed, security, and data protection, providing significant ROI and improved operations and client satisfaction for businesses.
Sentiment score
8.0
IBM NS1 Connect improved performance, reduced costs, and enhanced efficiency through automation, benefiting application uptime and customer experiences.
The main factors are time-saving and security, even if the cost is slightly higher.
WordPress security can be tricky, and that's where Cloudflare can be absolutely helpful for small businesses.
For the small project I was working on, using the basic tier provided a huge improvement at zero cost.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
5.7
Amazon Route 53 support is generally positive, with high ratings and knowledgeable staff, but varies by support tier and plan.
Sentiment score
7.0
Cloudflare's customer service is efficient for paying users, but responses can vary in speed and effectiveness for others.
Sentiment score
9.1
IBM NS1 Connect offers exceptional customer support with expert guidance, responsiveness, and reliability, consistently exceeding customer expectations in DNS services.
Amazon services are very stable, and there are few problems.
Amazon's customer support is very good with a quick response time.
They provide a normal developer level of support, and within twenty-four hours for non-critical issues, which is acceptable for us.
This would help us address issues promptly, especially during unforeseen events like DDoS attacks.
Cloudflare does not offer hands-on technical support to fix customer problems but rather a self-service model.
The key factor is the language in which the support is offered, which, in this case, is in Thai.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
8.1
Amazon Route 53 is highly scalable and efficiently handles diverse needs, praised for integration despite some higher costs.
Sentiment score
8.1
Cloudflare is praised for seamless scalability, managing enterprise-level traffic efficiently and earning high customer satisfaction during peak events.
Sentiment score
8.3
IBM NS1 Connect efficiently scales to meet traffic demands with automation, low error rates, and global operational reliability.
We haven't faced any scalability issues, thanks to its integration with AWS services.
The scalability is maintained by AKS, and Route 53's scalability part is primarily involved with load balancing.
Amazon Route 53 is scalable as I use automation with YML files to handle scalability needs, and it works well.
It is a SaaS tool, but the fact that they have workloads deployed across the world proves that it is a highly scalable tool.
The tool offers very good performance, even during high-traffic periods.
I rate the solution’s scalability an eight out of ten.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.2
Amazon Route 53 is highly stable with consistent performance, minimal downtime, and is preferred for scalability and security.
Sentiment score
7.6
Cloudflare is widely regarded as stable and reliable, with improvements noted in uptime and performance on higher plans.
Sentiment score
8.2
IBM NS1 Connect offers high stability and reliability, with minimal downtime and excellent performance even during high-demand situations.
We use auto-scaling groups to manage load.
The solution is stable.
I have not experienced any outages or downtime.
For DDoS protection, I would not recommend Cloudflare.
I rate the solution’s stability an eight out of ten.
The service is very stable with no impacts during high-traffic periods.
 

Room For Improvement

Amazon Route 53 needs better concurrent request handling, interface, integration, security, error tracing, and simpler pricing and configuration.
Cloudflare requires improvements in analytics, CDN speed, API, technical support, DNS management, documentation, pricing clarity, and international and reseller support.
IBM NS1 Connect can improve by enhancing API, bulk changes, traffic management, DNS configurations, testing, and dashboard usability.
There could be improvements in the configuration process, particularly in the options provided during setup, such as subdomain configurations and certificate management.
They need to ensure that the threats reported on are actual threats.
There is room for improvement in restricting access through one website from S3 buckets.
There's a need for improvement in areas like AI-based DDoS attacks and Layer 7 WAF features.
Despite these challenges, overall, Cloudflare remains the preferred solution compared to Azure, AWS CloudFront, and Google Cloud Armor.
Cloudflare should add more documentation and pricing to the cloud version.
 

Setup Cost

Amazon Route 53 offers flexible, scalable pricing but may be costly compared to Google DNS and GoDaddy for certain features.
Cloudflare offers cost-effective, scalable plans with no setup fees, starting from free for small businesses to enterprise-level solutions.
IBM NS1 Connect provides competitive, value-driven pricing, satisfying enterprises with fair costs for high request volumes and advanced features.
Route 53 is more expensive.
The pricing of Route 53 is slightly higher compared to other services, however, it is justified by its high availability and reliability.
That's where Cloudflare shines for smaller businesses – it's ten times cheaper than Akamai.
I find it to be cheap.
I think they should consider reevaluating the pricing for support, as it can be quite high.
 

Valuable Features

Amazon Route 53 offers scalable DNS services with seamless AWS integration, robust features, user-friendly interface, and cost-effectiveness.
Cloudflare enhances security, speed, and SEO with easy-to-use features like CDN, SSL, DDoS protection, and centralized management.
IBM NS1 Connect offers geo-load balancing, automation, and real-time telemetry with integration capabilities, enhancing performance and user experience.
I find Amazon Route 53 valuable for its ability to manage DNS records and efficiently route traffic with features like failover routing and geolocation routing.
They do not alert on non-actionable items, making their alerts reliable and focused on concerns that matter.
Amazon Route 53 is beneficial for managing traffic and domain names, offering features like latency-based routing and multi-deployment options.
The most valuable features of the solution are performance and security.
Techniques like minification and image compression reduce the size of assets, leading to better performance and faster user load times.
The solution has been able to compare it to the market, and I think the product has taken great strides in automating quite a bit of things, and they use a lot of AI.
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Managed DNS category, the mindshare of Amazon Route 53 is 6.4%, down from 8.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cloudflare is 34.5%, down from 35.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM NS1 Connect is 1.2%, down from 1.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Managed DNS
 

Featured Reviews

ArunDhwaj - PeerSpot reviewer
Managed security and horizontal scaling enhance application performance
We are using Route 53 for application security. We are also using it for computing, EC2, and setting up our server plus a complete infrastructure Route 53 helps us manage security without manually handling it. We can maintain availability and horizontal scaling effectively. One of the best…
Carlos Alam Hernandez Baruch - PeerSpot reviewer
Fast and secure deployments simplify operations for government and fintech clients
It is a fast and secure DNS. It is very easy to deploy, and my customers are happy with this tool. Additionally, the CDN performance in Mexico is excellent, providing fast service and tools. It offers reliability during high-traffic periods, ensuring no impact on the environment. It helps my clients avoid using on-premise boxes, simplifying operations as they only use the prices on Cloudflare.
Adam Surak - PeerSpot reviewer
Handles customer-facing records and upstream selection logic with good efficiency
We leverage two things from Managed DNS that we couldn't do with any other solution. One is their filter chain technology, which allows us to shift some of the intelligence we need for the traffic steering to the DNS. The second one is data sources, which enables us to manipulate multiple records simultaneously using NS1's internal message DOS. In our case, we are trying to direct the traffic in over 150,000 different NS1 records to an arbitrary set of repeating responses. If we have about 1,000 endpoints, that translates to around 150,000 records. Assuming there's an even distribution, so every time a server fails or an endpoint goes on a level, we would have 150 updates. With NS1, we have one, so this had an even more significant effect. There are situations where we have thousands of specific records sharing the same responses. In that case, there is one update instead of thousands and thousands. When we chose Managed DNS in 2014, it was the only solution that could do what we wanted, but I'm not sure about the current state of the market. The NS1 API is an API on top of a managed DNS. It's not an afterthought. It's not like the solution existed. Someone was sending updates by email. Then a product manager came along and said, "Hey, there is this cool thing. It's called an API. Maybe we should do it?" And they are like, "Okay. Let's do it." In the case of NS1, they thought about how to use an API to manipulate and retrieve the stuff. It's supposed to be API-driven. Also, NS1 doesn't have hidden features that would not be available over the API. Even their dashboard is built on top of the API. You can leverage all the functionality programmatically. That's what we do. We don't use their native integrations because we have been customers before these integrations and real-time telemetry existed. Our solution isn't leveraging either of those. Instead, we leveraged their API integration, which was the first thing that existed. Indeed, the API is at the core of how we use Managed DNS. No one goes to the dashboard or manually clicks anything. Everything goes via the API, and we perform hundreds of changes every minute. The API automatically drives everything, so that's the integration we leverage. We don't use the Pulsar Active Steering feature because we don't have a website. Our solution is being used as an API for other solutions. You can put the Pulsar agent on the website and feed NS1 the information. In our case, we are integrating into third-party sites. We cannot put our JavaScript on their websites for NS1 to provide the data, so we don't.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Managed DNS solutions are best for your needs.
865,140 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Comparison Review

it_user68487 - PeerSpot reviewer
Nov 6, 2013
CloudFlare vs Incapsula: Web Application Firewall
CloudFlare vs Incapsula: Round 2 Web Application Firewall Comparative Penetration Testing Analysis Report v1.0 Summary This document contains the results of a second comparative penetration test conducted by a team of security specialists at Zero Science Lab against two cloud-based Web…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
University
5%
Computer Software Company
15%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Azure DNS or Amazon Route 53?
Azure DNS is a hosting service of DNS domains. It has excellent operating time and performance, resulting in fast res...
What do you like most about Amazon Route 53?
The most valuable features of the solution are the DNS, routing, and traffic features.
What needs improvement with Amazon Route 53?
Amazon Route 53 should focus on timeliness and work towards better accuracy. They need to ensure that the threats rep...
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 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.
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

Also Known As

Route 53
Cloudflare DNS
NS1 Managed DNS, NS1
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Hess, Expedia, Kelloggs, Philips, HyperTrack
Trusted by over 9,000,000 Internet Applications and APIs, including Nasdaq, Zendesk, Crunchbase, Steve Madden, OkCupid, Cisco, Quizlet, Discord and more.
Avast Software, Bloomberg L.P., BBC, Carfax, CNBC LLC, Deloitte Consulting LLP, Disney Streaming, Dropbox, EBAY Inc, Gannett Media Corp, Salesforce, Wayfair, Workday
Find out what your peers are saying about Cloudflare, Amazon Web Services (AWS), BlueCat and others in Managed DNS. Updated: August 2025.
865,140 professionals have used our research since 2012.