F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) vs Fortinet FortiADC vs Loadbalancer.org comparison

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Man...

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Fortinet FortiADC

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM), Fortinet FortiADC, and Loadbalancer.org based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about NetScaler, F5, Microsoft and others in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC).

To learn more, read our detailed Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) Report (Updated: June 2025).

Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)

June 2025

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Helped 862,077 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

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

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) category, the mindshare of F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) is 15.3%, up from 15.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortinet FortiADC is 9.9%, up from 8.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Loadbalancer.org is 3.7%, up from 3.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)

Featured Reviews

Bonieber Orofeo

IT Manager at Chong Hua Hospital

Identifying compromised traffic and securing data has been a significant advantage

One of the most beneficial features of F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) ( /products/f5-big-ip-local-traffic-manager-ltm-reviews ) is its ability to identify compromised traffic and its capabilities in authentication. Additionally, the security aspect of it provides a significant advantage as it helps us secure our data, which is a major investment and benefit for us. Before using this system, we had difficulties in storing our data and managing the traffic that comes in and out.

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OusaidAbaz

Security Network Architect at Inmac

Integrates load balancing efficiently within existing technology environments

FortiADC provides load-balancing capabilities needed for integration with other Fortinet platforms. It allows for the creation of virtual IPs and applying various algorithms for traffic management. Although it offers fewer algorithms than competing platforms like F5, its capability to manage load balancing makes it valuable. The security features depend on the environment, relying on firewalls like FortiGate.

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Roger Seelaender

UCaaS Engineering Manager at EarthLink

Great WAF - low-maintenance solution that performs as advertised

The solution can be improved with the development of a SIP engine because it is difficult to manage SBCs. All SBCs are really tough to write rules for. If we could put this in front of an SBC to have the right rules to possibly block the traffic, that would be very helpful. The solution can also improve the relationship between Loadbalancer.org and Metaswitch, or now, Microsoft because Metaswitch was purchased by Microsoft. They both position themselves as certified but don't always talk to each other. I wish there would be closer integration between the solution and the vendors when either release new upgrades to their product line. Often we find issues on either end post upgrades.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The scalability of the solution depends on the sizing of the network. Generally, the scalability is quite good."

"Features such as SSL offloading, various balancing methods, and the ability to work with HTTP, HTTPS, or TCP protocols are beneficial."

"It has made it a single entry point for all users, verging across all the VPCs. It is more of an SSO solution versus multitier user loggin."

"You can create multiple virtual servers on F5 BIG-IP technology, and within multiple virtual servers you can have multiple nodes, where a node equals two application servers."

"We like is how they integrate nicely with the Oracle PeopleSoft application."

"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."

"I have Big-IP change and control manager, which give me the roll back option. Therefore, I can view the last things which happened on the device."

"It is a very good, flexible solution. It helps us to catch up on flaws in our partner solutions on top of its load balancing feature."

More F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) pros

"From a technical perspective, it is the most scalable device from Fortinet."

"Fortinet FortiADC is a good product because each and every piece of content is monitored by it."

"It helps with defining server load balancing tasks and managing SSL certificates, ensuring the communication flow through the Fortinet gateway."

"Content caching and content compression are good features."

"Ease of use in deploying and having it up and running requires minimal knowledge."

"The most valuable feature is the SSL offloading capacity."

"TSL and SSL offloading are both very good features."

"The main feature that we use is GSLB (Global Server Load Balancing). GSLB makes the customer's network more reliable by scaling applications across multiple datacenters. GSLB as a disaster recovery solution can direct traffic based on site availability."

More Fortinet FortiADC pros

"We have about 30,000 connections going through at any one time and it's fine, it doesn't seem to sweat. It doesn't get overloaded."

"Loadbalancer is easy to use. It performs well, with low latency."

"It helps us to route the traffic to the available servers. If we didn't have Loadbalancer we would fail to set the end-user and it would cause a failure in the cluster."

"With basic network knowledge, our required system functionality can be configured and maintained."

"I found scalability in Loadbalancer.org valuable."

"The support we have received from Loadbalancer.org has been good."

"For now, it's stable."

"The most valuable features of Loadbalancer.org are related to its load balancing capabilities."

More Loadbalancer.org pros

Cons

"The pricing model has caused some frustration. My clients implemented the solution and later wanted to upgrade the features but the pricing structure was complicated. There are other solutions with better pricing models."

"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."

"For integration with other AWS environments, we do some tie-ins with some autoscaling groups. This has been challenging for us. We have had issues, where when autoscaling groups scale up, there are some instances which are not showing up in the proper size. Then, those IPs would get registered with F5, but never get released. Therefore, we are ending up with a whole bunch of ghosted IPs."

"Technical support could be faster. It's something I'd like to see them work on in the future."

"Lacking in free training to help users understand the product more, so they would know how to correctly use it. Like other vendors and their products, becoming more proactive is an area for improvement."

"F5 has another solution to load balance servers on the cloud, which they got after the purchase of NGINX. It is deployed as Kubernetes or something like that, but the problem now is that they have two solutions for two situations. They should make F5 deployable on the cloud."

"There are not very many areas for improvement, but the price is high."

"Technical support could be improved."

More F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) cons

"The solution needs to integrate sFlow. sFlow provides better visualization of the bandwidth and types of traffic passing through the device. When used in the traffic path, this information can be really useful."

"The L7 Persistent load-balancing algorithm has not worked for me after having tested it many times with my customer's in-house application. I'd like to suggest that the company make sure that all load-balancing algorithms work properly with most applications, even those that are in-house apps."

"The solution's WAF needs an upgrade because it is not as good as FortiWeb, VMware, F5, or Imperva."

"Though FortiADC is useful, I'd appreciate more user-friendly features and in-depth insights into network activity, like detailed logs and AI-driven feedback for optimization."

"Fortinet has some drawbacks, and it can be a bit challenging to scale."

"When the FortiADC is part of a platform with components like FortiManager and FortiGate, automation and pushing configuration are very inconvenient."

"The solution’s pricing could be improved."

"Fortinet FortiADC should include an advanced-level SD-WAN."

More Fortinet FortiADC cons

"The solution can be a bit pricey."

"I would like it if Loadbalancer had the ability to make rules for specific shared bots."

"I would like a notification when a new version of the software is available. They told me to sign up for their newsletter, but I have not received any notification for a newer software version."

"An area for improvement in Loadbalancer.org is that sometimes it works fine, but sometimes, it has issues. The setup for Loadbalancer.org is also complex, so that's another area for improvement."

"They're mostly designed to balance a particular type of traffic. I wanted to load balance DNS, and they just don't do it the way that we wanted to. So they're not used as DNS load balancers."

"There are many features you can set in the backend of Loadbalancer. They should simplify the configuration. The administrator should be able to configure it more simply. How it is now, you can only configure it if you have a lot of experience."

"Possibly a more graphical overview page (with colors) to give a two second overview to see if everything is working fine."

"We could enhance the security aspects of the load balancer."

More Loadbalancer.org cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"F5 BIG-IP is a stable solution. It is quite mature and does not have many concerns."

"They are expensive."

"Though functionality is high, its cost can be considered slightly higher than its competitors."

"It is the best solution, but that comes with an increased price."

"F5 is expensive."

"The solution is more expensive than one of its competitors."

"The cost is high for this product, so it's not suitable for small customers, e.g. those with small environments."

"BIG-IP LTM isn't a cheap solution - I'd rate its pricing as three out of five."

More F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) pricing and cost advice

"The product has average pricing. I rate its pricing a five out of ten."

"The product has affordable pricing."

"I believe the price is good. It's fair. There are no extra costs."

"The solution is less expensive than F5 or Imperva and is the most reasonably priced option available."

"Compared to F5, FortiADC pricing is better."

"I rate Fortinet FortiADC's pricing one out of ten. It is fixed."

"Our basic license excludes features such as antivirus and IDS. Due to license limitations, some functionalities are not configured."

"The solution's pricing is an issue and should be improved."

More Fortinet FortiADC pricing and cost advice

"I think it’s very affordable."

"I love that they do not price on some arbitrary throughput rating where you are guessing at what the load balancer is going to handle."

"These guys make their pricing scheme really easy."

"I’m not entirely sure about the rating since I'm not very technical. I haven't thoroughly compared the ratings. So, if you're asking for my impression so far, I would rate it around five out of 10."

"The costs associated with Loadbalancer.org depends on the technology. For some, we need to pay, but others are open, so they're free."

"We've got an unlimited license, which doesn't costs that much compared to other vendors, and we don't have to buy it again."

"It was easy to upgrade the license for unlimited clusters and servers. Pricing is fair."

"It filled a requirement for our project, and it did so at lesser cost than their competitors."

More Loadbalancer.org pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) solutions are best for your needs.

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862,077 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

16%

Computer Software Company

13%

Government

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

17%

Financial Services Firm

Government

Educational Organization

Computer Software Company

20%

Financial Services Firm

17%

University

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with F5 BIG-IP?

The price needs improvement as it is quite costly.

What is your primary use case for F5 BIG-IP?

We're using F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) ( /products/f5-big-ip-local-traffic-manager-ltm-reviews ) for our a...

What do you like most about F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)?

The solution is robust and reliable.

Is Citrix ADC (formerly Netscaler) the best ADC to use and if not why?

For ADC, any ADC can do a good job. But in case if you want to add WAF functionality to the same ADC hardware you hav...

Do you recommend Fortinet FortiADC?

I recommend Fortinet FortiADC. My experience with Fortinet has been very positive. Our company has been using it for ...

What do you like most about Fortinet FortiADC?

The user interface is very easy and integrates with Sandbox easily.

Do you recommend Loadbalancer.org?

Since Loadbalancer.org is an open-source solution, I would recommend this solution for smaller businesses that don’t ...

What do you like most about Loadbalancer.org?

Existing customers are trying to migrate from the physical F5 load balancer to the AVI load balancer because it is sc...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Loadbalancer.org?

Pricing of Loadbalancer.org is something to consider.

Microsoft Azure Application Gateway vs F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)

Comparisons

Compared 8% of the time

VMWare Avi Load Balancer vs F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)

Compared 8% of the time

NetScaler vs F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)

Compared 8% of the time

HAProxy vs F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)

Compared 7% of the time

Cloudflare vs F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)

Compared 2% of the time

More F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) Competitors

Fortinet FortiWeb vs Fortinet FortiADC

Compared 24% of the time

NetScaler vs Fortinet FortiADC

Compared 12% of the time

Kemp LoadMaster vs Fortinet FortiADC

Compared 9% of the time

A10 Networks Thunder ADC vs Fortinet FortiADC

Compared 4% of the time

HAProxy vs Fortinet FortiADC

Compared 4% of the time

More Fortinet FortiADC Competitors

NetScaler vs Loadbalancer.org

Compared 24% of the time

HAProxy vs Loadbalancer.org

Compared 19% of the time

Kemp LoadMaster vs Loadbalancer.org

Compared 14% of the time

Radware Alteon vs Loadbalancer.org

Compared 6% of the time

NGINX Plus vs Loadbalancer.org

Compared 4% of the time

More Loadbalancer.org Competitors

Product Reports

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)

July 2025

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) report

Download F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) product report

Download Fortinet FortiADC product report

Fortinet FortiADC

April 2025

Download Loadbalancer.org product report

July 2025

Also Known As

F5 BIG-IP, BIG-IP LTM, F5 ASM, Viprion, F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition , Crescendo Networks Application Delivery Controller, BIG IP

FortiADC Application Delivery Controller, FortiADC

No data available

Overview

F5 BIG-IP LTM optimizes the speed and reliability of your apps via both network and application layers. Using real-time protocol and traffic management decisions based on app and server and connection management conditions, and TCP and content offloading, BIG-IP LTM dramatically improves application and infrastructure responsiveness. BIG-IP LTM's architecture includes protocol awareness to control traffic for the most important applications. BIG-IP LTM tracks the dynamic performance levels of servers and delivers SSL performance and visibility for inbound and outbound traffic, to protect the user experience by encrypting everything from the client to the server.

BIG-IP LTM provides enterprise-class Application Delivery Controller (ADC). You get granular layer 7 control, SSL offloading and acceleration capabilities, and advanced scaling technologies that deliver performance and reliability on-demand. The highly optimized TCP/IP stack combines TCP/IP techniques and improvements in the latest RFCs with extensions to minimize the effect of congestion and packet loss and recovery. Independent testing tools and customer experiences show LTM's TCP stack delivers up to a 2x performance gain for users and a 4x increase in bandwidth efficiency.

Fortinet FortiADC is a robust application delivery controller (ADC) that delivers application optimization, application security, and application availability. FortiADC is a valued offering from Fortinet, which is widely recognized as a trusted supplier of dynamic security solutions worldwide. FortiADC offers dynamic security functions (AV, DDoS, and WAF) in addition to advanced application connectors for a simplified deployment and complete transparency to an organization's networks and applications. FortiADC offers three primary deployment options: physical machine, virtual machine, (VM) and cloud solution options.

Fortinet FortiADC Benefits

FortiADC security protocol: FortiADC integrates with FortiSandbox to improve the overall antivirus security protections where every file is scanned for known and unknown malicious risks. If a file is identified as malicious or problematic, it will be blocked in the future.
SSL protocol: FortiADC securely uses the most up-to-date cryptography to provide exceptional encryption and decryption using a hardware-based SSL ASIC. FortiADC offers complete transparency to inspect all traffic for threats, improves server response time, and reduces backend server load, SSL inspection and SSL offloading. FortiADC integrates seamlessly with Gemalto’s SafeNet Hardware Security Module (HSM).
FortiADC connectors: FortiADC Fabric Connectors offer open API-based integration and coordination with numerous software-defined networks (SDNs), third-party partners, and cloud management providers. Fortinet Fabric Connectors provide deep open and turnkey integration with recognized third-party vendors such as AWS, K8s, OCI, and SAP, in multi-vendor solutions, improving scalability, simplified management, and automation.
Business stability: FortiADC load balancing for on-premise global server load balancing (GSBL) and in the cloud (FortiGSBL Cloud) will ensure users can maintain a reliable and available network by improving the ability of scaling applications throughout numerous data centers to reduce application response times and enhance disaster recovery. Users are able to define protocols based on network latency concerns, overall data performance, and site availability.

Fortinet FortiADC Features

Application availability
- 4-7 application load balancing: DNS, HTTPS, RTMP, RADIUS, MySQL and more
- External fabric connectors: Splunk Integration, AWS/OCI Connector, Kubernetes Service.
- Security fabric connectors: FortiSIEM, Fortigate BanIP Integration, FortiAnalyzer, and more.
- Deployment modes: High availability (AA/AP Failover), Router mode, transparent mode (switch), one-arm mode (proxy with X-forwarded for support.
Web application firewall (WAF)
- Security services: Captcha support, cookie support, HTTP header security, XML/SOAP/JSON validation, CSRF protection, API gateway, and more.
- Application security: Web attack signature, bot detection, web vulnerability scanner, OWASP Top-10 Wizard, API protection and more.

Application enhancement
- HTTP and TCP improvement: TCP buffering, HTTP compressions/decompression, HTTP caching (dynamic and static objects), Bandwidth monitoring using quality of service (QoS), TCP buffering, and more.
- Authentication offloading: Two-factor authentication (Fortitoken/Fortitoken Cloud and Google Authentication), NTLM, AUTH2.0, SAML 2.0 (SP and Idp) RADIUS, LDAP, Kerbos, and local.
- Networking: Integration with Ansible, Cisco ACI, OpenStack and Nutanix, NVGRE and VXLAN support, VLAN and port trunking support, IPv6 Support (SLB, firewall, routing and interfaces), Dynamic NAT, Hide NAT, Static NAT for added scalability and flexibility.
- Management: Syslog support, SNMP using private MIBs with threshold-based traps. REST APIs, VDOMS, data analytics, real-time monitoring graphs, role-based monitoring, intuitive reporting, FortiView integration, and more.

Fortinet

Loadbalancer.org is a versatile solution that offers load balancing for small businesses, multiple instances of applications, web application firewall, publishing Windows and SQL applications, and security for telephone service systems. It is easy to use, cost-effective, and performs well with low latency.

The connection maintenance and security features are valuable, including managing logs on WAFs, identifying break-in attempts writing rules to block them and using HAProxy to control what is allowed. Loadbalancer.org has helped organizations reduce the impact of connection issues, provide security, and ensure no downtime or impact on productivity.

Top Industries that use Loadbalancer.org:

Healthcare: Loadbalancer.org is widely considered the top load balancer provider in the healthcare IT industry. Loadbalancer.org sees that healthcare IT personnel can ensure their organizations are moving seamlessly toward interoperability and are able to easily scale to meet today’s continually growing data demands with no compromise in performance.

Storage solutions: Loadbalancer.org has significant offerings and partnerships with object-based storage providers to ensure they are always ready for today's ever-changing dynamic storage needs. The comprehensive integration offers high-performance scalable solutions which can provide always available next-gen storage solutions.

Security: Loadbalancer.org solutions provide an extra layer of security to protect against the latest risk and threats. Loadbalancer.org will provide a close integration to ensure the organization is always secure.

Print: Loadbalancer.org can work with organizations to ensure their print environments keep working smoothly and is the only organization that fully supports Microsoft Print load balancing. Loadbalancer.org minimizes the complexities of print environments to ensure that all systems are consistently available.

Loadbalancer.org is certified as an OEM provider for all of Microsoft's most popular key applications and solutions. Loadbalancer.org has created and developed streamlined deployments to facilitate improved scalability, performance, and uptime. They offer a tailored GUI to make every process super easy. Loadbalancer.org offers several flexible licensing plans to ensure cost-effectiveness, improved margins, revenue opportunities, and optimized TCO. The numerous robust solutions Loadbalancer.org offers can ensure that any enterprise organization is able to satisfy the growing demands of today’s dynamic marketplace while maintaining an excellent user experience.

Reviews from Real Users

“Loadbalancer.org is less complex than Citrix. In some cases, our customers do not have an engineer on staff who can support this device. These customers have a large number of Linux engineers but don't have the money. We suggested using Loadbalancer.org and other open-source tools. Many customers are of different sizes and have different budgets. Loadbalancer.org has everything that is needed.” - Artem M., System Engineer at CROC

“We use Loadbalancer for balancing loads in our main application. Loadbalancer is easy to use. It performs well, with low latency.” - Walid M., Network and Security Engineer at a logistics company

Sample Customers

Riken, TransUnion, Tepco Systems Administration, Daejeon University, G&T Bank, Danamon, CyberAgent Inc.

Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data

Vodafone, NASA, Mercedes, NBC, Siemens, AT&T, Barclays, Zurich, Penn State University, Fiserv, Canon, Toyota, University of Cambridge, US Army, US Navy, Ocean Spray, ASOS, Pfizer, BBC, Bacardi, Monsoon, River Island, U.S Air Force, King's College London, NHS, Ricoh, Philips, Santander, TATA Communications, Ericcson, Ross Video, Evertz, TalkTalk TV, Giacom, Rapid Host.