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Check Point WAF (formerly CloudGuard WAF) vs Symantec Web Application Firewall comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 16, 2026

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 Web Application ...
Sponsored
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
7th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
26
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Check Point WAF (formerly C...
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
5th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
60
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (5th)
Symantec Web Application Fi...
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
31st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2026, in the Web Application Firewall (WAF) category, the mindshare of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall is 4.0%, down from 5.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Check Point WAF (formerly CloudGuard WAF) is 2.1%, up from 1.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Web Application Firewall is 0.8%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Web Application Firewall (WAF) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Check Point WAF (formerly CloudGuard WAF)2.1%
Cloudflare Web Application Firewall4.0%
Symantec Web Application Firewall0.8%
Other93.1%
Web Application Firewall (WAF)
 

Featured Reviews

DB
CTO at PlayNirvana
Advanced security reporting has protected high-traffic betting platforms from constant attacks
I don't see room for improvement to Cloudflare Web Application Firewall. One thing I don't know much about because we have a dedicated IT team for that, and I'm not involved with Cloudflare much anymore. But if I were to compare them to F5, I would like to see more features that F5 offers. F5 has an option to bring the whole infrastructure, the whole WAF and all their packages, Bot Management, and everything else on your infrastructure. You need to install certain services from their side, and then you can choose if you would like requests to hit your servers immediately or if requests need to be proxied through F5 backbone. That would be a nice addition because we have 90% of the traffic as legit traffic coming from whitelisted servers. If it comes from whitelisted servers, I don't need to go every request through the backbone; I could easily just IP whitelist everything. Then I could maybe have Bot Management on my infrastructure that drastically reduces the price of Cloudflare. I would like to see Push CDN more improved in the next release of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall. And maybe something similar to Pushpin that Fastly has, which is an option where you can push messages that then can be scaled globally over the network. From our perspective, if we have a listener that listens for stock updates, I would just need to have one processor that pushes those updates to the Cloudflare API, and then Cloudflare would broadcast that message to all listeners. Cloudflare will check the order of the message, and if you, as a customer, are not connected or have some kind of network issue, when you reconnect, you will receive the latest state and missing updates.
Mohan Janarthanan - PeerSpot reviewer
Associate Vice President at Novac Technology Solutions
Integrated web protection has reduced breaches and now prevents attacks across critical apps
I have been using it for six months, and the biggest advantages for me are that Check Point WAF (formerly CloudGuard WAF) offers more than other F5 firewalls, which have only application protection called ASM (Application Security Monitoring). In contrast, Check Point WAF (formerly CloudGuard WAF) provides protection on IPS along with application protection. Check Point WAF (formerly CloudGuard WAF) itself provides an IPS function where I can protect against my Layer 7 traffic, which is not available in other vendors. The traditional WAF does not have the capacity of IPS functions. The intrusion prevention capability, I can only see in Layer 3 functions and stateful functions, which is the traditional firewall capability. Other vendors are keeping this in their Web Application Firewall, but Check Point WAF (formerly CloudGuard WAF) has integrated it differently. False positives are significantly less here compared to traditional Web Application Firewalls because they are more focused on the AI front. Check Point WAF (formerly CloudGuard WAF) integrates an AI platform within the Web Application itself using API protection with AI and what they call GenAI protection. They excel at creating the profile itself, which is the basic functionality of WAF. Normally, I deploy in preventive mode, which takes some time for learning, but I prefer to operate in preventing mode only.
Vatsal Mehta - PeerSpot reviewer
Director, Co-Founder & CEO at HEDEHI Solutions Pvt. Ltd.
Boosts Security Measures with Easy Deployment and Implementation
Regarding areas for improvement in Symantec Web Application Firewall, I think they can enhance the features they currently focus on, as there are various types of web applications, and it would be great if they could develop features to cater to all these types. For example, a feature to scan for unauthorized plugins or extensions could let us know if those extensions are authorized, unauthorized, or malicious. There's room for improvement in Symantec Web Application Firewall by introducing AI into their dashboard so that we can query the dashboard and fetch data insights, similar to querying ChatGPT for answers. They currently have this feature but can make improvements for better querying to get insights.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Some of the most valuable features of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall include its DNS zone setup and the zero trust policy."
"The setup process is very simple for me."
"It protects web applications efficiently."
"Cloudflare has positively impacted my organization by making it easier for me to handle and set up DNS for multiple clients; I can easily go in and access their accounts, make changes they need, and it's a one-stop shop."
"The impact of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall's integration with existing web technologies on our site's performance and security measures is quite great, actually."
"Very glad the WAF rulesets works out of box, and requires very little tuning or maintenance."
"We like that there's load balancing, firewall capabilities, DDoS protection, et cetera, all covered by Cloudflare."
"Technical support has a very fast response time and they are helpful."
"Support is the same with on-premise devices, and it is very good. Since it is cloud-based, I do not need them as much."
"The solution's ability to handle multiple websites and applications without needing more expensive hardware is a key advantage."
"The best feature of Check Point CloudGuard WAF is its advanced threat prevention, which is integrated with Check Point threat cloud intelligence providing real-time protection against web application attacks, including zero-day threats, automatically sourced from the threat cloud, Check Point threat intelligence database, analyzing millions of indicators of compromise daily."
"With the solution, we managed to obtain complete comprehensive visibility of the entire environment in the cloud, thus having better control of each of the resources."
"Check Point WAF (formerly CloudGuard WAF) is the best option on the market, and it is good for us."
"The features I have found most valuable are the comprehensive threat prevention capabilities, automated policy management, and seamless integration with cloud environments."
"The most effective CloudGuard feature for threat prevention is its web app protection."
"The most valuable features are its ease of use and multiple functionalities."
"It provides us with a sense of security."
"This product is doing what it should and what we are expecting from it."
"The setup was straightforward."
"The solution has an up-to-date data repository to deal with external threats."
"The interface is user-friendly."
"The best feature of Symantec Web Application Firewall is that it is very easy to use, and the deployment and implementation processes are really easy."
 

Cons

"Cloudflare Web Application Firewall should include port forwarding features."
"The accuracy of the Cloudflare Web Application Firewall could be improved by reducing the number of false-negative alerts."
"The ModSecurity core rules need to be updated."
"The notification part could be improved. It's very much connected to Web Application Firewall, rate-limiting, and DDoS protection."
"Their documentation could be better. They don't have documentation that explains everything well."
"Cloudflare should update the version of the ModSecurity core rule set that they run on."
"The blocked logs are difficult to read at times."
"The learning curve was steep initially."
"Check Point WAF (formerly CloudGuard WAF) pricing is not as competitive as other original equipment manufacturers like Cloudflare or Array WAF."
"As a reseller, the most difficult part is the lack of awareness."
"Areas where Check Point CloudGuard WAF can improve include simple policy tuning, as the protection seems strong, though initial rule tuning can be complex."
"Check Point CloudGuard WAF can be improved; initially, the setup is very complicated, and there's not a lot of documentation available, plus it didn't have something for anti-bot, but other than that, it is fine."
"The User interface can be improved, especially for 1st time user."
"It doesn't detect user activity like some of its competitors. It's not a vulnerability, but it's a legitimate activity that it doesn't detect. It only detects vulnerabilities or misconfigurations."
"CloudGuard for Application Security, like the other Check Point applications, has been presenting major latency problems when entering their administrative portal."
"While the GUI allows configuration for application-related features, specific definitions cannot be modified through the code."
"It would be an improvement if the management dashboards were not reliant upon Java."
"One of our issues is that sometimes scanning slows down the endpoints."
"There's room for improvement in Symantec Web Application Firewall by introducing AI into their dashboard so that we can query the dashboard and fetch data insights, similar to querying ChatGPT for answers."
"On a scale from one to 10, I would give it a five. I'm not convinced that it's necessarily the best solution going forward in the future."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing? I believe the pricing is not the best, but it's reasonable and acceptable. We also use the McAfee system in parallel. In terms of pricing, its okay - not great, but not bad either. It falls in the middle, which is acceptable. In terms of support licensing, last time, we were searching for a solution, and we considered products from resellers rather than directly from the cloud provider. However, the pricing we encountered was exceptionally high. As a result, we are inclined to select support from the reseller."
"The solution is expensive."
"The pricing model is very straightforward compared to the competition. You just pay per month for the product and usage."
"We pay $210 per month for CloudFlare WAF."
"Cloudflare offers different types of subscriptions for businesses, enterprises, and personal users, and the pricing is negotiable."
"The solution's pricing option needs to be more transparent for enterprise clients."
"It is not too pricey."
"It starts at $20 and can easily go up to $200 monthly"
"The base solution costs approximately 30,000 euros, with an additional 2,000 euros per year for licenses and support."
"Check Point CloudGuard Application Security's pricing is comparable to other products in the market."
"As Infiniti customers, the pricing is manageable, as we have allowances dedicated to each Check Point product. The price is not as high compared to other options I have dealt with in the past."
"I find the pricing to be reasonable."
"It is not cheap, but it is worth it."
"The pricing is competitive compared to other solutions on the market. So, the licensing cost is average."
"Check Point CloudGuard WAF is expensive compared to Azure WAF."
"The tool's licensing costs are yearly and competitive."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
19%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise6
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business38
Midsize Enterprise21
Large Enterprise24
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Cloudflare Web Application Firewall?
I don't see room for improvement to Cloudflare Web Application Firewall. One thing I don't know much about because we...
What is your primary use case for Cloudflare Web Application Firewall?
We are using Cloudflare Web Application Firewall's advanced reporting and analytics tools with their Zero Trust, so e...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for CloudGuard for Application Security?
The pricing is reasonable, and I believe it is acceptable. I am satisfied with the timing.
What needs improvement with CloudGuard for Application Security?
The negative aspect is that Check Point WAF (formerly CloudGuard WAF) uses Check Point Harmony in its management cons...
What is your primary use case for CloudGuard for Application Security?
I want to protect my application hosted in my cloud by preventing attacks against my top OWASP Top 10 threats. I am e...
What needs improvement with Symantec Web Application Firewall?
Regarding areas for improvement in Symantec Web Application Firewall, I think they can enhance the features they curr...
What is your primary use case for Symantec Web Application Firewall?
Our use case for Symantec Web Application Firewall is primarily for security purposes as we develop web application s...
What advice do you have for others considering Symantec Web Application Firewall?
I would recommend Symantec Web Application Firewall to other users due to all the benefits I mentioned earlier, such ...
 

Also Known As

Cloudflare WAF
Check Point CloudGuard Application Security, CloudGuard Application Security, CloudGuard AppSec
Symantec WAF, Blue Coat Protecting Web Applications
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

crunchbase, udacity, marketo, okcupid, zendesk
Orange España, Paschoalotto
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Check Point WAF (formerly CloudGuard WAF) vs. Symantec Web Application Firewall and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
902,894 professionals have used our research since 2012.