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F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) vs Radware Alteon comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 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
6.9
Users experienced mixed returns from F5 BIG-IP, praising deployment and security, despite some criticisms of pricing and cloud transitions.
Sentiment score
7.3
Radware Alteon offers quick implementation, affordability, robust threat blocking, boosting performance and satisfaction with immediate return on investment.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.7
Customer service is generally praised for professionalism and expertise, but some experience delays and inconsistent response quality.
Sentiment score
7.5
Radware Alteon support is praised for responsiveness and Spanish assistance but criticized for delays and specific regional challenges.
Overall, my experience with F5 is very good compared to Radware.
Project Manager at IBM
I would rate the technical support of F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) nine out of ten.
IT Manager at Chong Hua Hospital
We never face support issues, and their team resolves any critical issues quickly once they are involved.
Project Manager at a tech vendor with 1-10 employees
There is a dedicated expert answering even the toughest questions.
Senior System Administrator at a financial services firm with 51-200 employees
The customer service and support are excellent.
IT Engineer at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.4
F5 BIG-IP LTM offers scalable solutions with flexible deployment, efficiently managing large environments, preferred for modular growth and adaptability.
Sentiment score
8.0
Radware Alteon offers seamless scalability and integration, supporting easy expansion and high performance under heavy loads for enterprises.
It handles peak loads and thousands of concurrent connections without exceeding 10% utilization.
Project Manager at a tech vendor with 1-10 employees
We have it deployed across multiple geographic locations, benefiting from load balancing resiliency.
IT Engineer at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
Within a couple of hours, if the deployment is very straightforward and if the requirements or the IP addresses are already in place, the deployment can be completed.
Technical Manager at Secur Links
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.0
F5 BIG-IP LTM is stable and resilient, with users rating its reliability high despite occasional hardware or update issues.
Sentiment score
8.3
Radware Alteon offers high stability with minimal downtime, effective updates, and user ratings of nine to ten for reliability.
We've never faced downtime, even during peak transaction hours.
Project Manager at a tech vendor with 1-10 employees
There is minimal downtime, and the solution is quite stable.
IT Engineer at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
There are no difficulties with the deployment of Radware Alteon; it is quite straightforward.
Technical Manager at Secur Links
 

Room For Improvement

F5 BIG-IP LTM faces criticism for high costs, inflexible licensing, complex management, and needing improved UI, synchronization, and security.
Radware Alteon needs improvements in automation, user interface, customer support, integration, security, and educational resources to enhance competitiveness.
The pricing of F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) is on the higher side compared to competitors, but it is worth it.
Project Manager at IBM
In the future, I would like to see some other security features added, such as DDoS, which is Distributed Denial of Service.
Technical Manager at Secur Links
Other OEMs offer free courses and hands-on labs on new technologies and features, which we find useful.
Project Manager at a tech vendor with 1-10 employees
They keep integrating new features that sometimes break our production, but we use clustered systems, so we can test those software releases.
Senior System Administrator at a financial services firm with 51-200 employees
 

Setup Cost

F5 BIG-IP LTM is costly but offers performance benefits, with various licensing options and potential discounts to match competitors.
Enterprise buyers favor Radware Alteon for its competitive pricing, strong performance, and flexible, simple licensing options.
For our solution, it was right in the middle of price performance.
Senior System Administrator at a financial services firm with 51-200 employees
The implementation and running costs are quite high.
IT Engineer at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
The cost of the Radware solution is reasonable and stable.
Project Manager at a tech vendor with 1-10 employees
 

Valuable Features

F5 BIG-IP LTM provides efficient traffic management, security features, and customization options with a user-friendly interface and robust performance.
Radware Alteon excels in availability, security, and load balancing with user-friendly GUI, scalability, and robust support services.
The impact of SSL offloading on reducing server load and latency is very much positive because whatever traffic we receive, we encrypt at our F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) level, which has definitely reduced the additional load and SSL decryption load on the servers, so it has very much helped us and it is very smooth; it will not take much time and will not impact our regular traffic.
Project Manager at IBM
One of the most beneficial features of F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) is its ability to identify compromised traffic and its capabilities in authentication.
IT Manager at Chong Hua Hospital
The product allows us to manage multiple networks and VLANs into a single box and add numerous web services and farms efficiently.
Project Manager at a tech vendor with 1-10 employees
The best feature of Radware Alteon is basically the configuration; how we configure it is very straightforward, and it is very simple to configure.
Technical Manager at Secur Links
The most valuable features include the availability with an optional high-availability mode ensuring service continuity because of the resiliency.
IT Engineer at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
 

Categories and Ranking

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Man...
Ranking in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
123
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Radware Alteon
Ranking in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
5th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
49
Ranking in other categories
Web Application Firewall (WAF) (11th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) category, the mindshare of F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) is 15.3%, up from 15.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Radware Alteon is 4.3%, down from 4.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)15.3%
Radware Alteon4.3%
Other80.4%
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
 

Q&A Highlights

HG
Works at Comisión Nacional del Servicio Civil
Dec 04, 2020
 

Featured Reviews

Bonieber  Orofeo - PeerSpot reviewer
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) 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.
reviewer2663061 - PeerSpot reviewer
Project Manager at a tech vendor with 1-10 employees
Manages SSL load balancing and offload efficiently while providing excellent support
The most valuable feature is the support from the engineering team. They quickly resolved a VLAN issue that other vendors could not. The product allows us to manage multiple networks and VLANs into a single box and add numerous web services and farms efficiently. The SSL management and integration capabilities are also standout features.
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Answers from the Community

HG
Works at Comisión Nacional del Servicio Civil
Dec 4, 2020
Dec 4, 2020
Apart from throughout consideration. Radware license charges based on throughput and F5 charges based on features only. For example, if you buy F5 with an appliance throughput of 10g that throughput available on day one, but if it's Radware, you will get a 1gbps license and hardware has 10gbps throughput. You can only use 1gbps on day one. On the load balancing side, both are equal only I rule ...
2 out of 3 answers
SP
Technical Specialist - Network & Security at a tech services company with 201-500 employees
Jun 3, 2020
I can say the difference between both high end devices as F5 BIG-IP 4200v and Radware Alteon 5224XL comparission, 1. Layer 4 Throughput of F5 BIG-IP is 10 GBps whereas Radware Alteon is 8 GBps. 2. Layer 4 Connection per second of Radware Alteon is 480000 whereas F5 BIG-IP is F5 BIG-IP is 300000 only. 3. Layer 7 Connection per second of Radware Alteon is 190000 whereas F5 BIG-IP is F5 BIG-IP is 100000 only. 4. SSL Transaction per second wise Radware Alteon is 11200 whereas F5 BIG-IP is F5 BIG-IP is 9000 only. 5. SSL Bulk Throughput of F5 BIG-IP is 8 GBps whereas Radware Alteon is 4.1 GBps only. 6. Compression rate of F5 BIG-IP is 8 GBps whereas Radware Alteon is 3.6 GBps only.
OK
Total Solution System Engineer at a comms service provider with 201-500 employees
Jun 4, 2020
For ADC both are very good, But in the leader in Gartner of ADC products, the tops rivals are Citrix ADC and F5  They are very good and can do the job but only some major differences to consider are. Citrix ADC -  Has App Expert Wizard which is a GUI ready to use to build simple to complex traffic syntax rule easily. Any admin that has some good background sees this syntax can understand and configure, it is very easy. This is good for a big complex environment or in case your network admin leaves the job and new one comes to take the role. GUI; Travesing each menu is very easy as they are all in the same pattern with every feature. F5 - Use the iRule, which does the same job. If you like to write programming code with lots of { {   } }, etc, it's ok. But for many admin teams, it may be hard to troubleshoot the traffics rules if the guy who wrote the rule left, not that hard to learn but still harder than GUI. GUI- F5 GUI is sometimes too complex than needed, sometimes it's left, right, under have to drill down a lot just to get to the simple tasks. Overall there are both good. 
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business62
Midsize Enterprise32
Large Enterprise85
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business18
Midsize Enterprise17
Large Enterprise21
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with F5 BIG-IP?
The pricing of F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) is on the higher side compared to competitors, but it is worth it.
What is your primary use case for F5 BIG-IP?
Our main use cases involve multiple applications, so we are using F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) services, and we are using WAF and ASM services to secure those applications and load balance...
What do you like most about Radware AppWall?
It saves us a lot of work in terms of management since it has tasks already defined automatically. That enables us to better administer our services. It is very dynamic and easy to administer.
What needs improvement with Radware AppWall?
There is room for improvement in reducing the number of false positives I receive. We could benefit from more configuration options to avoid these false positives, which can be overwhelming for a s...
What is your primary use case for Radware AppWall?
We primarily use Radware Alteon for load balancing our servers to ensure there are no bottlenecks and to have resiliency in place.
 

Also Known As

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

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Riken, TransUnion, Tepco Systems Administration, Daejeon University, G&T Bank, Danamon, CyberAgent Inc.
Convergys
Find out what your peers are saying about F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) vs. Radware Alteon and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
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