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

Cloudflare Web Application Firewall vs Microsoft Azure Application Gateway comparison

Sponsored
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 20, 2025

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
6.5
Cloudflare enhanced speed, security, and data protection, providing significant ROI and improved operations and client satisfaction for businesses.
Sentiment score
7.4
Cloudflare WAF delivers immediate ROI by securing e-commerce and banking platforms, ensuring operational efficiency and cost-effectiveness.
Sentiment score
7.1
Microsoft Azure Application Gateway users save 30-40% on costs through reduced staff needs and vendor-maintained infrastructure.
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.
Microsoft Azure Application Gateway significantly impacts our cost savings while maintaining higher performance.
We have seen a return on investment in terms of time-saving and cost-saving by not creating our own infrastructure.
 

Customer Service

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
6.1
Cloudflare's support is praised for responsiveness and effectiveness, though some Indian users face communication challenges and prefer local help.
Sentiment score
6.2
Microsoft Azure Application Gateway's customer service receives mixed reviews, with praise for responsiveness but criticism for slow support and outsourcing.
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.
The technical support of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall rates between five and seven at maximum.
There is room for improvement, specifically in paid support, by providing more direct contact.
 

Scalability Issues

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
8.1
Cloudflare Web Application Firewall is praised for its scalability, flexibility, automation, and superior advantages compared to open-source solutions.
Sentiment score
7.4
Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is scalable, with automatic demand adjustments, though some note costs and earlier version limitations.
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.
The scalability of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall rates between 8 to 9, as it depends upon the use cases and what exactly the client needs.
Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is a very scalable product.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.6
Cloudflare is widely regarded as stable and reliable, with improvements noted in uptime and performance on higher plans.
Sentiment score
8.4
Cloudflare Web Application Firewall is highly stable and reliable, ensuring uninterrupted, effective protection and user satisfaction.
Sentiment score
7.6
Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is generally reliable, though some users face configuration challenges impacting long-term stability confidence.
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.
The stability of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall deserves a perfect 10 out of 10.
 

Room For Improvement

Cloudflare requires improvements in analytics, CDN speed, API, technical support, DNS management, documentation, pricing clarity, and international and reseller support.
Cloudflare WAF must update features, improve documentation and support, reduce false negatives, and enhance usability, integrations, and visibility.
Many users find Microsoft Azure Application Gateway costly, challenging, and desire improvements in scalability, integration, security, and automation.
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.
The product can improve by having more multitenancy capability, which is currently not available.
They need to improve their support because getting a response for basic requests took around 48 hours, which is too long.
There is room for improvement in terms of support, such as assigning agents directly for more straightforward engagement.
In future releases of Microsoft Azure Application Gateway, I would like to see more AI functionalities and a better dashboard as well as some customizations.
 

Setup Cost

Cloudflare offers cost-effective, scalable plans with no setup fees, starting from free for small businesses to enterprise-level solutions.
Enterprise users find Cloudflare's Web Application Firewall competitively priced, reasonable, and transparent despite starting fees and optional features.
Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is seen as competitively priced, offering pay-as-you-go options without annual fees.
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.
Azure solutions are quite expensive.
When it comes to pricing for Microsoft Azure Application Gateway, I would rate it a seven out of ten.
 

Valuable Features

Cloudflare enhances security, speed, and SEO with easy-to-use features like CDN, SSL, DDoS protection, and centralized management.
Cloudflare WAF offers API configurability, comprehensive features, robust security, scalability, with strong integration and technical support.
Microsoft Azure Application Gateway offers ease of use, security, customization, and seamless integration for efficient application deployment and management.
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.
The custom rules and the geo-redundant geographical rule feature, which allows me to implement geographical rules for customers, add significant value.
The best features of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall are multiple, including the WAF, rate limiter, and bot attack protection.
We are using it for some of the security features for our applications, particularly for securing traffic in transit with SSL.
The Web Application Firewall (WAF) in Microsoft Azure Application Gateway has been very effective in protecting applications from security threats.
 

Categories and Ranking

Cloudflare
Sponsored
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
76
Ranking in other categories
CDN (1st), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (1st), Managed DNS (1st), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (13th)
Cloudflare Web Application ...
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
Web Application Firewall (WAF) (5th)
Microsoft Azure Application...
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
48
Ranking in other categories
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) (3rd), Web Application Firewall (WAF) (3rd)
 

Featured Reviews

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.
SachidDoshi - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers a huge signature repository and is superiorly effective in mitigating DDoS attacks
The solution's learning curve can still be further reduced, which presently stands at two or three months. The product has a custom rule set that users can modify and manifest as needed. The vendor can probably shorten the learning curve using cutting-edge technologies like AI. The solution provider can also work around the web applications and identify the toolset that needs to be implemented to deploy the solution in less time. The vendor has launched a SASE product that can function with Cloudflare Web Application Firewall, but many improvements are needed in terms of features, such as the web filtering feature, and CASB has not yet been added.
Bonieber  Orofeo - PeerSpot reviewer
Application gateway optimizes performance and simplifies cloud transitions
There are a lot of things I appreciate about Microsoft Azure Application Gateway. Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is beneficial for us as it helps in publishing our website, providing us comfort when it comes to the availability of our applications. The autoscaling feature in Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is very obvious, and I have no issues with it; it is well planned and organized. Microsoft Azure Application Gateway impacts our cost savings while maintaining higher performance. The Web Application Firewall (WAF) in Microsoft Azure Application Gateway has been very effective in protecting applications from security threats. Microsoft Azure Application Gateway helps us manage our AI-driven applications by enabling faster transactions, improving our work.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Web Application Firewall (WAF) solutions are best for your needs.
861,170 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Educational Organization
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

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 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.
What do you like most about Cloudflare Web Application Firewall?
The product has a valuable security control functionality.
What needs improvement with Cloudflare Web Application Firewall?
I cannot say much about areas of improvement for Cloudflare Web Application Firewall because I haven't gone through d...
What's the difference between Azure Front Door and Application Gateway?
We found Azure Front Door to be easily scaled and very stable. The implementation is very fast and Microsoft provides...
How does AWS WAF compare to Microsoft Azure Application Gateway?
Our organization ran comparison tests to determine whether Amazon’s Web Service Web Application Firewall or Microsoft...
What do you like most about Microsoft Azure Application Gateway?
Application Gateway automatically redirects unwanted users and takes care of the security aspect. It also handles the...
 

Also Known As

Cloudflare DNS
Cloudflare WAF
Azure Application Gateway, MS Azure Application Gateway
 

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.
crunchbase, udacity, marketo, okcupid, zendesk
Lilly, AccuWeather, AIRFRANCE, Honeywell
Find out what your peers are saying about Cloudflare Web Application Firewall vs. Microsoft Azure Application Gateway and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
861,170 professionals have used our research since 2012.