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F5 Advanced WAF vs Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service comparison

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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:
 

Categories and Ranking

Cloudflare
Sponsored
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
77
Ranking in other categories
CDN (1st), WAN Optimization (4th), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (1st), Managed DNS (1st), Domain Name System (DNS) Security (5th), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (12th)
F5 Advanced WAF
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
72
Ranking in other categories
Web Application Firewall (WAF) (2nd)
Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF...
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
7
Ranking in other categories
Web Application Firewall (WAF) (23rd)
 

Featured Reviews

HA
Owner at Hga consulting
Has helped manage client domains with streamlined access control and threat visibility
I don't know what areas could be improved with Cloudflare WAF; Cloudflare is constantly improving and adding features to their feature set. They're doing a good job, and as far as DNS and support for any domains that I create or my clients create, it's mandatory for me to make sure that they have Cloudflare as their DNS provider. The Cloudflare load balancing capability hasn't really helped in enhancing my website's uptime and resiliency because we don't really get that much traffic; it's mostly remote users, and web hosting is done by a web hosting service. It doesn't pay to try to host your own website.
Kallamuddin Ansari - PeerSpot reviewer
Cyber Security Consultant at ProTechmanize
Application security has protected critical banking services while policy learning minimizes false blocks
F5 Advanced WAF performs well overall, but I have noticed some points that could enhance the solution. Initially, policy tuning could be simpler, as while the learning engine is powerful, initial tuning still requires experienced engineers, which can be challenging for new teams due to the complexity of options and parameters. A more guided and simple tuning workflow would help reduce the learning curve. Additionally, tighter native integration with SIEM or SOAR tools would simplify correlation and investigations for security teams, although log exports are available. Overall, these are not blockers, merely enhancement opportunities, and once tuned, F5 Advanced WAF is very stable and reliable; improving usability, reporting, and onboarding would make it even more effective for larger environments.
RA
Global Head - DevOps and AIOps Startegist at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
Cloud security has reduced web attack incidents and protects our public applications and APIs
The best features Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service offers include managed WAF rules, OWASP protection, bot mitigation, and Fortinet threat intelligence. In day-to-day work, I use all of the features: managed WAF rules, OWASP protection, bot mitigation, and Fortinet threat intelligence. This provides a strong baseline security without requiring deep WAF expertise internally. The integration with the broader Fortinet security system is a plus regarding the features. In terms of its impact on our organization, Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service has been positively protecting us from security threats and automated attacks. With this layered protection against common web and API attacks, we have noticed that the incidents and risks have been reduced to a greater extent.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Centralized, full-featured DNS."
"New and innovative way to protect the client's data."
"The most valuable feature of Cloudflare DNS is its global reach and it is always evolving."
"Its ease of integration with Office 365 and the fact that it's a good product compared to what I had before"
"The most valuable feature is its usability."
"The tool is user-friendly."
"Cloudflare is a security SaaS provider that provides security and protects us from any application layer attack."
"The most valuable feature is its usability."
"F5 Advanced WAF helps our engineers to learn the complete configuration, including fundamental and advanced policies."
"It's scalable and very easy to manage."
"The solution uses AI to protect against botnet attacks."
"The solution's most valuable features include application DDoS protection, bot blocking, and HTTP header verifications."
"Overall, I believe it has been a good decision to switch because I do not think any other product available on the market can compete with F5 at this time."
"My favorite feature of F5 is the ability to play around with the ciphers. I also like the ability to have an immediate display of the support IDs when a real blockage occurs. The protection offered is great."
"It can scale."
"The anti-bot protection is the solution's most valuable feature. Safe-guard or credential staffing are also useful features."
"Fortinet has created a holistic product that integrates features including AI and API protection, with straightforward automation and articulate reporting that even less experienced engineers can use easily."
"Regular updates are one of the aspects I appreciate about Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service, and it is provided by a leading brand in cybersecurity."
"The technical support is really good."
"I rate the overall solution ten out of ten."
"The company provides technical support, and they are mostly available 24/7."
"With this layered protection against common web and API attacks, we have noticed that the incidents and risks have been reduced to a greater extent."
"Fortinet FortiWeb offers a variety of protections, including machine learning that helps protect web applications."
"It is user-friendly and easy to work with."
 

Cons

"There could be more courses with engineers. I like e-learning, however, having a specialist in a classroom is more comfortable for me."
"Cloudflare's console should be made more user-friendly."
"We're facing challenges due to an upgrade in the machine learning model. The problem arises from some users abusing the APIs, resulting in an influx of suspicious traffic. Cloudflare's learning model mistakenly identifies this traffic as human. Consequently, it assigns it a higher trust score, akin to legitimate human traffic, causing complications in our architecture. Previously, such traffic would have been categorized as suspicious, enabling us to apply appropriate blocking rules. However, we encounter difficulties distinguishing between genuine and suspicious traffic with the new categorization. Despite these challenges, overall, Cloudflare remains the preferred solution compared to Azure, AWS CloudFront, and Google Cloud Armor."
"Cloudflare could be improved by introducing a mid-tier pricing option."
"I think the APIs are a little bit hard for us to work with. The APIs could be more open so that we could integrate better with our SolarWinds or our monitoring solution."
"Cloudflare's free plan is limited to 5,000 records for their free plan. They should increase that. For example, if I create a domain called abc.com and a subdomain called a.abc.com, my record count will be two. I can make a maximum of 5,000 subdomains. However, if we use our own DNS hosted on another provider, there is no limit. Their free plan also lacks name server customization."
"Even if I wanted to, I wouldn't be able to buy Cloudflare in my country."
"Cloudflare doesn't have a reverse lookup. We can only do a DNS lookup to get the IP address from the hostname. It doesn't work if you want to look up the hostname from an IPA address."
"The GUI interface can be confusing due to similar-looking tabs for policy building, traffic learning, and event logs."
"The solution is tedious. It takes a lot of discrete settings so one needs to get detailed and granular when they use the solution. It takes you a whole lot of energy and concentration to configure. It needs to be much more straight-forward, like other web solutions."
"They should work on the virtualization of NGINX."
"F5 Advanced WAF could improve the precision of the scanning. There are many false positives. They should improve their threat database."
"The DDoS capabilities should be enhanced."
"Scalability could be improved."
"People who want to work with the device have to be pro in Linux"
"We usually use a third-party tool for logging and reporting. It would be nice if we could do that right on this solution. They have one, but it's not very stable. Logging and reporting effectively would be a big enhancement."
"The usability of the interface could be improved as it is not user-friendly."
"I do not have any notes on improvement."
"The only thing I encountered was related to integration, mostly concerning translation."
"Better visibility and more intuitive reporting would be helpful for Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service."
"The usability of the interface could be improved as it is not user-friendly."
"The utilization of AI in Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service still needs to be upgraded and improved."
"Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service could be improved with better logging capabilities, as many come with less spacing, necessitating a FortiSIM for enhanced functionality."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"When you compare Cloudflare DNS to other solutions, such as Akamai, the price is reasonable."
"The solution is expensive when compared to other products but offers unlimited bandwidth."
"That is one of the great features. I was able to access the majority of the features and services for free."
"So far I use free tier and happy with it. You can subscribe to business package if needed."
"The solution has many features but there are ones that you need to pay for. Sometimes you have to find out which is available for free and which you have to pay for."
"I believe their performance has improved, but I'd like to refrain from discussing the pricing aspect related to the cloud. The pricing, in my opinion, could be simplified, and I think they should consider reevaluating the pricing for support, as it can be quite high. At times, this cost can make it challenging to choose CARFAGuard or opt for the support."
"The pricing for the service is reasonable, neither excessively cheap nor prohibitively expensive. It aligns well with the value of their solution."
"In terms of licensing costs, we don't pay for licensing for Cloudflare. We only establish communication, then for peering, Cloudflare takes care of the cross-connection in different data centers."
"F5 Advanced WAF technical support comes at a cost, and it's expensive."
"The pricing for F5 Advanced WAF is comparable to a Rolls-Royce. Its price is a bit high when you compare it with other vendors. F5 Advanced WAF is a bit expensive. The customer was on a three-year plan and it was around $560,000."
"I rate F5 Advanced WAF's pricing a three out of ten."
"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."
"The pricing is too high."
"There is an annual subscription for this solution."
"It is expensive. Its price should be better. Its licensing is on a yearly basis. Its licensing is also based on the model. There are no additional costs."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Energy/Utilities Company
12%
Hospitality Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business46
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise25
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise30
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise3
 

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 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 r...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for F5 Advanced WAF?
Regarding the price, I think the cost is a bit higher compared to others. Earlier we were using Radware, and compared...
What needs improvement with F5 Advanced WAF?
In terms of additional features I would like to see from them in the future, I think the GTM is a bit complicated to ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service?
My experience with the pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service is good, and i...
What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service?
Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service could be improved with better logging capabilities, as many come with less s...
What is your primary use case for Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service?
Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service protects our customers' websites, including e-commerce sites, normal website...
 

Also Known As

Cloudflare DNS
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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.
MAXIMUS, Vivo, American Systems, Bangladesh Post Office, City Bank
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Find out what your peers are saying about F5 Advanced WAF vs. Fortinet FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,853 professionals have used our research since 2012.