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Cisco Umbrella vs F5 BIG-IP DNS comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 15, 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

Cisco Umbrella
Ranking in Domain Name System (DNS) Security
1st
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
121
Ranking in other categories
Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (1st), Internet Security (1st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (2nd), Cisco Security Portfolio (2nd)
F5 BIG-IP DNS
Ranking in Domain Name System (DNS) Security
4th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
8.0
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Domain Name System (DNS) Security category, the mindshare of Cisco Umbrella is 21.2%, down from 26.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of F5 BIG-IP DNS is 6.4%, down from 6.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Domain Name System (DNS) Security
 

Featured Reviews

Emilio Montoya - PeerSpot reviewer
Ensures internet navigation safety and boosts productivity
The features of Cisco Umbrella I prefer most are DNS protection and traffic redirect. With Cisco Talos's threat intelligence, we reduce the impact of malware traffic in our network, and we currently see the behavior of equipment and choose the correct sites. Cisco Talos has helped us reduce the impact of malware traffic. We can see the behavior and choose the correct sites. We're currently testing secure access with Umbrella in order to secure access to core applications. It's a product that the user doesn't even know is there, even though it is protecting them. It's not hard on the equipment. And, for us, it centralizes everything, which improves productivity. With the Experience Insights feature of Cisco Secure Access, we've seen impacts on the management of user connectivity by allowing us to deliver safe connectivity. We are testing the Secure Access product with Cisco Umbrella to improve our connectivity with our users in order to secure access to the corporate applications. Cisco Umbrella is in the cloud, which is nice.
Richard Polyak - PeerSpot reviewer
A robust solution designed to inspect network and form an internal topology network with clients
While we haven't explored AI-driven features yet, it's part of our roadmap for future versions. I would recommend F5 BIG-IP DNS to others in the industry. Overall, I would rate it an eight out of 10 as it meets our current needs but it will always have room for improvement.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The DNS data exfiltration and the blocking of DNS tunneling are the most effective features for threat prevention in our company."
"The features of Cisco Umbrella benefit my company by allowing us to do protective DNS instead of URL filtering, which lets us avoid having to backhaul traffic and run it through a firewall in a data center."
"The stability and reliability of the Cisco Umbrella platform are great."
"The documentation is good, and we have been able to resolve any issues ourselves."
"Application performance has greatly improved and there are less operational issues. Productivity has been going up because we have less operational issues. Also, we have happy customers."
"Provides dependable DNS monitoring of external devices."
"We immediately block impersonating users from accessing services over Cisco Umbrella-controlled devices."
"Cisco Umbrella is a totally different solution. They are the first to come up with this idea of security. It's a totally new concept of security for everybody, for every time, real time, perfectionism."
"For one of our clients, F5 improved global server load balancing with an active-active site configuration for Disaster Recovery."
"F5 provides us with a mechanism to accomplish complex product balancing."
"It's very stable."
"The security features, DDoS mitigation facilities, and SQL configuration are the most valuable aspects of this solution."
"The configuration process is straightforward, making it easy to set up wide IPs and distribute traffic across local US sites and data centers via VPN."
"The solution is easy to configure and deploy. It is scalable and works without any downtime. F5 BIG-IP DNS is a flexible solution."
"F5 BIG-IP DNS is useful, depending on how you use it."
"The GTM feature is very good, It's very useful, especially if we have multiple data centers. If we want to load balance traffic from multiple data centers, the GTM feature is very useful."
 

Cons

"The only thing I can think of is that I'd like to see a little more flexibility in policy creation. The way that policy is currently structured is like a "first hit succeeds" kind of policy. It would be nice if it were more hierarchical."
"Missing a real data leakage prevention solution."
"The solution's technical support is not very good."
"I would like to see more integrability with other products."
"The locks and management could be better. The product is fairly new, and it may take some time to get all the features up and running."
"There should be a way to monitor traffic at the user level."
"Data reporting could be improved."
"Its reliability and the response time of the support team can be better."
"The initial setup could be easier."
"The tool needs to improve its UI."
"It would be great to see a F5 BIG-IP DNS cloud version. What we within the Australian government are looking at doing is utilizing a secured DNS service much the same as the English GCHQ version of their protected DNS service."
"I would like to see the login facilities improved, as well as more troubleshooting."
"Scalability is a concern, it could be improved."
"The support response time could use improvement."
"There is room for improvement in pricing. It is very pricey."
"The initial setup is a step-by-step process, so it can be a bit complicated for someone who's using it for the first time."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Pricing depends on the automation requirements of the organization."
"In terms of licensing, we're not able to be extremely clear with the customer because it's based on their reporting. It's not based on the actual traffic. If they say they have 50 users but they have 80, we'll just buy for 50 users. That's something where we'd like to have more flexibility."
"The product is pricey compared to Cisco Firepower."
"Our costs were negotiated, and they are okay."
"I think it's worth the money."
"It has a reasonable price. It is certainly not as expensive as it used to be. It is in line with other offerings on the market. There are a number of different flavors of Umbrella. They could bring Umbrella SIG down a bit because its price is a little bit high for what it does, but I also understand why its price is high."
"As an educational partner, we get better licensing structures. We are very happy with that. It has been very nice that Cisco has partnered with the educational sector to bring that."
"There is room for improvement when it comes to the cost."
"You cannot do much around DDoS protection without an additional license from F5."
"This product is quite pricey but if you compare the feature set and its compatibility with similar products on the market, you would understand why it's that price."
"I would rate the pricing a three out of ten, with ten being a low price."
"The on-prem version is only available on a yearly license, but the cloud version can be paid for on a day-by-day basis."
"In some cases, it is expensive."
"Cost is a factor. It is really costly."
"They are competitively priced."
"BIG-IP DNS is more expensive than its competitors like Citrix, but it gives good value for money."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
21%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Which is the better security solution - Cisco Umbrella or Zscaler?
Cisco Umbrella and Zscaler Internet Access are two broad-spectrum Internet security solutions that I have tried. Zscaler Internet Access is a good option for carrying out multiple security functi...
Which is the better security solution - Cisco Umbrella or Microsoft Cloud App Security?
Cisco Umbrella is an integral component of the Cisco SASE architecture. It integrates security in a single, cloud-native solution, unifying multiple features like DNS-layer security, threat intelli...
What do you like most about Cisco Umbrella?
Cisco Umbrella is easy to monitor, manage, and deploy.
What do you like most about F5 BIG-IP DNS?
For one of our clients, F5 improved global server load balancing with an active-active site configuration for Disaster Recovery.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for F5 BIG-IP DNS?
In terms of pricing, F5 BIG-IP is not cheaper compared to other solutions like Fortinet or Citrix. The cost can be high due to its comprehensive modules.
What needs improvement with F5 BIG-IP DNS?
The support response time could use improvement. In critical cases, such as in the big environment projects, faster support is needed to address critical issues promptly.
 

Also Known As

OpenDNS
F5 BIG-IP DNS, F5 DNS Delivery
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Chart Industries, City of Aspen, Eastern Mountain Sports, FLEXcon, George Washington University, Jackson Municipal Airport Authority, Ohio Public Library Information Network, PTC, Richland Community College, Smart Motors, Tulane University, VeriClaim
Ricacorp Properties, Bangladesh Post Office, Shawbrook Bank, Shinsegae Internet Duty Free
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Umbrella vs. F5 BIG-IP DNS and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
864,155 professionals have used our research since 2012.