F5 Advanced WAF vs F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

F5 Advanced WAF
Average Rating
8.6
Number of Reviews
57
Ranking in other categories
Web Application Firewall (WAF) (2nd)
F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Man...
Average Rating
8.2
Number of Reviews
117
Ranking in other categories
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2024, in the Web Application Firewall (WAF) category, the mindshare of F5 Advanced WAF is 14.8%, up from 11.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) is 2.7%, down from 3.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Web Application Firewall (WAF)
Unique Categories:
No other categories found
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
13.1%
 

Featured Reviews

RahoolSharma - PeerSpot reviewer
Jul 9, 2024
Geolocation feature works fine and minimize the effects of attacks
The WAF solution works perfectly fine. If we face any issues, we get hotfixes from the solution experts. It is a little bit difficult to engage with a solution expert firsthand, but once they're engaged, they do whatever is best to resolve the issue. We faced a lot of outside attacks on our VPNs and APIs, so the geolocation feature works perfectly fine for us. We use iRules as well. Our internal access VPN is advertised from a Cisco firewall, and above that, we have an F5 LTM. We have written some iRules on it to minimize the effects of attacks. We are a PCI DSS-compliant organization, and we have a lot of security balance to improve our infrastructure. So we use this software to meet those requirements. It works well. So, F5 helped to meet compliance and regulatory requirements.
John Bayangos - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 11, 2023
Reliable with good support and useful load-balancing features
We usually use the product for load balancing, as a web server, and for web traffic We're hosting a website for our company, and the solution has helped a lot with load balancing.  The load-balancing features are great. You can do several different types, depending on the application.  The…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It also has antivirus and DDoS mitigation capabilities. We have enabled these features."
"The solution is easily accessible on mobile and laptop devices."
"The most valuable features of F5 Advanced WAF are the security features and the protection."
"The most valuable feature is artificial intelligence and to get extra internal access."
"F5 Advanced WAF is a stable solution, we are satisfied. It is more stable than ForiWeb."
"This solution inspects your traffic and based on that, automatically create distinct qualities for you, so you can add this to the policy already created. That's what I like most."
"Customers find the load balancer feature as the most valuable."
"The most valuable features of F5 Advanced WAF are the easy identification of events and customization. We can pinpoint our settings."
"The main reason that we suggest this product to our clients is the great integration with other security tools, such as IBM Guardium."
"LTM's most valuable features include application security, data collection, and parameter-level rules."
"BIG-IP can do anything. It's like a Swiss Army knife."
"F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager is a stable and reliable solution."
"The capability is at a seven or eight out of ten."
"It helps us recognize sessions from certain IPs that are authorized to manage the application. This is a function we haven't found anywhere else."
"We like is how they integrate nicely with the Oracle PeopleSoft application."
"The tech support we got from F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager directly was pretty good."
 

Cons

"The BNS module needs improvement."
"The Sandbox integration feature could be improved."
"There is a learning curve that extends the time of implementation."
"I would like to see additional controls."
"I think the deployment templates can be better."
"You have to buy another module with an extra license, to have the authentication feature."
"The solution's dashboard could be improved. When you're moving from policy to policy, the logs and the integration of the logs in other systems aren't straightforward."
"The tool needs to improve its pricing."
"There are some aspects of F5 BIG-IP that could be improved, the main one being virtual machine support. We have seen that even with the virtual editions, there are some things that we would like to do that are currently not possible with virtual machines."
"In the LTM solution, it would be beneficial to have more algorithms for traffic segmentation or the ability to create user-defined algorithms rather than being restricted to predefined ones."
"F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager could improve by having an FNI feature for a single source to multi-domain load balancing."
"I would like to see better integration."
"The analytics should provide insight into latency across various traffic routes and virtual servers."
"The user experience for dashboards and reports can be improved. They should make dashboards and the reporting system easier for users. They need to add more reports to the dashboard. Currently, for complicated reports, I have to do the customization. It should have more integration with network firewalls to be able to gather all the information required for traffic management."
"The license terms for "non-commercial" will are challenging for us."
"The UI could be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There are different licenses available to use F5 Advanced WAF, such as BT, ASM, and LPM."
"The pricing is too high."
"The way we deployed it, I would rate it a four out of five in terms of pricing."
"The pricing of F5 Advanced WAF is more expensive than other solutions like Radware and CD18, it is quite high."
"The solution is very expensive so should only be used in the right environment."
"Licensing fees for this solution are paid on a yearly basis."
"F5 Advanced WAF pricing structure should be adjusted to meet the need of small to medium-sized companies."
"Pricing for this solution is higher than average."
"Purchasing through the AWS Marketplace was very simple. The main reason that we went this way was the simplicity of buying it there. It is maintained and upgraded for us, and this makes it easy to stay current."
"It is cheaper than the average on the market."
"I am a fan of using AWS natively. It is much cheaper."
"The pricing is inclusive of many features."
"BIG-IP LTM is considered a premium product, so it's quite expensive and isn't affordable for all customers."
"Security should be involved in any base license. When you bring on F5, you only have default license. Then, the ASM product license has to be purchased. It would be great if F5 could include the ASM in the base license."
"The cost that they have with AWS are almost prohibitive. I'm being forced to use F5 WAF. I would not simply use it based on cost. I agree that they have some great features, but for me, cost is key in terms of AWS."
"Though functionality is high, its cost can be considered slightly higher than its competitors​."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
15%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about F5 Advanced WAF?
It's a fairly easy-to-use and user-friendly tool. My administrators and team also like its ability to customize the rules per the requirements.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for F5 Advanced WAF?
I would rate the pricing as seven out of ten. Sometimes, for specific models, additional licenses over the standard one need to be purchased. F5 Advanced WAF doesn't offer a single license that fit...
What needs improvement with F5 Advanced WAF?
More legacy protocols should be added to the solution. The aforementioned protocols are generally less used and might have been phased out from multiple solutions. But some of the large corporation...
What do you like most about F5 BIG-IP?
The support from F5 BIG-IP LTM is good.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for F5 BIG-IP?
There are a few licensing options available for F5 BIG-IP LTM. You can have a perpetual license which is a lifetime license. You then only need to renew the support, if you choose to open a ticket ...
What needs improvement with F5 BIG-IP?
In the LTM solution, it would be beneficial to have more algorithms for traffic segmentation or the ability to create user-defined algorithms rather than being restricted to predefined ones.
 

Also Known As

No data available
F5 BIG-IP, BIG-IP LTM, F5 ASM, Viprion, F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition , Crescendo Networks Application Delivery Controller, BIG IP
 

Learn More

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

MAXIMUS, Vivo, American Systems, Bangladesh Post Office, City Bank
Riken, TransUnion, Tepco Systems Administration, Daejeon University, G&T Bank, Danamon, CyberAgent Inc.
Find out what your peers are saying about F5 Advanced WAF vs. F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) and other solutions. Updated: September 2020.
793,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.