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Fortinet FortiDDoS vs VMware NSX 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
7.2
Number of Reviews
75
Ranking in other categories
CDN (1st), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (1st), Managed DNS (1st), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (13th)
Fortinet FortiDDoS
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (13th)
VMware NSX
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
102
Ranking in other categories
Network Virtualization (2nd), Cloud and Data Center Security (3rd), Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (8th), Network Detection and Response (NDR) (9th), Network Automation (5th), Microsegmentation Software (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection
Network Virtualization
 

Featured Reviews

Spencer Malmad - PeerSpot reviewer
It's easy to set up because you point the DNS to it, and it's working in under 15 minutes
Cloudflare is highly scalable. Cloudflare is a system with a web portal that the end users like me see. It's a console where we can adjust the DNS, caching, and security features all in that console. Cloudflare owns thousands of servers across the world that cache the data. It's a powerful solution. When clients sign up for Cloudflare, they're getting this monster content delivery network, security, and a web application firewall in one. It's all rolled into one, and it's massive. Unless you have your website hosted on a massive hosting provider, there's no way that you can deliver the amount of data that Cloudflare can provide to the end users. If you have static content, there's no way that you can ever match what Cloudflare can do. Obviously, there are competitors to Cloudflare that do the same, but I'm saying other types of solutions. Let's say you go with F5. Great, that's on-prem. That's in your colo. You can't deliver as much data to the internet as you can with a CDN. You don't have to spend $20,000 on a net scaler, F5, or whatever Cisco's selling now. You don't have to buy that. You pay them $50 a month or $150 a month. It's totally worth it because even in five years, you'll never get the performance value, not just the actual ROI. You have to consider how much throughput you can get with Cloudflare.
Yazan Omar - PeerSpot reviewer
An easy-to-use tool with great GUI
The product's initial setup phase was really easy. There is a lot of time involved in the testing phase and other processes related to the area of deployment, so it may take up to two weeks to deploy the solution. The solution is deployed on an on-premises model. One person is enough to take care of the deployment phase of the product. The person involved in the deployment phase needs to better understand topologies when dealing with Fortinet.
DanielBass - PeerSpot reviewer
Improves network security with micro-segmentation but setup is complex
I value the ability to dynamically configure our network on the fly using VMware NSX. This flexibility is a huge advantage because it allows us to avoid static configurations that come with traditional hardware setups. Additionally, the micro-segmentation feature is beneficial for adhering to strict security regulations from our security department.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The UI is good."
"There are key things that are used for our enterprise customers, such as Lambda and DNS."
"The simplicity of the overall dashboard makes it a great product for a user like me who has less understanding of the internet than a developer or other more technical people. It gives me peace of mind. I also love the easy customization of the Page Rules."
"Many websites require an SSL certificate because they sell stuff and want SSL. Cloudflare comes with an SSL certificate built in. It's automatic. You sign yourself up for Cloudflare, and an SSL certificate automatically protects your website. You don't necessarily need a certificate if you have a connection between your website and your host, the server, Cloudflare, and the host."
"Cloudflare allows us to self-host services such as Rocket.Chat and Node-RED, in high-availability mode, thanks to round robin DNS which allows us to share one hostname between our two locations."
"The tool is user-friendly."
"Cloudflare offers CDN and DDoS protection. We have the front end, API, and database in how you structure applications."
"It is a fast and secure DNS."
"The most valuable feature is the cloud DDoS scrubbing capability."
"The equipment works very well, and I have not encountered any issues with it. It is a good solution for my company."
"The solution already has security profiles and it can protect from DDoS attacks and other kinds of attacks."
"The product's initial setup phase was really easy."
"The product allows the users to adjust the thresholds."
"Packet inspection has been effective for mitigating DDoS attacks."
"This solution can protect Layer 3, Layer 4 and Layer 7 attacks of applications for us."
"The equipment works very well, and I have not encountered any issues with it."
"NSX has excellent security features like virtual firewalls. I also like the micro-segmentation features, which are useful for the virtual machines inside the servers."
"The solution is easy to use and is good for management control."
"The performance is good."
"The installation is straightforward, it took a couple of hours."
"It operates on a logical level, providing a comprehensive and centralized way to manage your network resources."
"Overall, for me, it's a good solution and has been working well."
"We secured our organisation with Micro-segmentation."
"This is a good firewall and overall it is rich in features."
 

Cons

"The product needs to improve its automation."
"The reporting can definitely be improved to offer a lot more explanation on something that may have happened or has actually happened."
"Areas like how assessment, discovery, and payload are dealt with and how it all comes into your organization can be considered when trying to make suggestions to Cloudflare for improvements."
"The solution could use more analytics on the backend to give us more insights into everything. More reports would be helpful."
"For large enterprises, the pricing is okay. However, the enterprise price for small projects is a bit high. A mid-tier pricing option would be beneficial."
"The solution could work at being less expensive. It costs a lot to use it."
"An integrated SSO feature would be useful for Cloudflare DNS."
"For the free and Pro plans, Cloudflare could use a simple bot to provide information to users. This would improve support, especially for less advanced users who utilize the free components."
"I find that there have been issues in the past year with the solution hanging. It freezes often."
"The primary area for improvement is the on-premises capacity limit, currently fixed at 10 GB."
"The product’s pricing needs improvement."
"The web interface could be much better."
"All the thresholds that need to be configured should be included in the default so that user will not forget or misconfigure."
"I would like to see analytics, big data."
"The main improvement would be to change the firewall model, however, currently, everything is fixed and working well."
"Alerts and reporting features must be improved."
"The initial configuration and integration within our existing environment were not easy."
"Quite a complex solution."
"The setup of the solution could be simplified."
"Some configuration maximums are limiting to the user, especially when it comes to the deployment of very, very large environments."
"It's a good product, but the way that it has got so many multiple levels that need to be purchased makes it expensive and cumbersome."
"VMware NSX could improve by having more compatibility with other none Window-based operating systems."
"It needs to be cheaper."
"A faster resolution time would be beneficial."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price is reasonable."
"A free version of the solution is available."
"Cloudflare's pricing is not much higher and is good for middle-level organizations."
"I think the pricing is competitive. I think as far as licensing is concerned it's pretty straightforward because it's based on domain. It's just that sometimes domains could be tricky with some customers."
"The price of the solution is expensive."
"It's a premium model. You can start at zero and work your way up to the enterprise model, which has a very high pricing level."
"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."
"The pricing for the service is reasonable, neither excessively cheap nor prohibitively expensive. It aligns well with the value of their solution."
"The solution is reasonably priced."
"It's quite pricey."
"The product’s pricing needs improvement."
"The tool's pricing is reasonable."
"We are using a perpetual license to use the solution and we have support."
"I would rate the pricing of VMware NSX as seven out of ten"
"The pricing model for VMware NSX is good."
"The price of VMware NSX is optimal. Additionally, the price of the solution can be negotiated with the vendor. Many areas of the solution can impact the cost, such as features, time for onboarding, and support needed."
"The product pricing ranges from medium to expensive. I rate the pricing a seven out of ten."
"VMware has a subscription and perpetual license. In the New Year, they're changing many things about the licensing model. Previously, NSX was licensed according to the number of sockets inside the appliance, so we bought VMware licenses based on that. However, that may have changed this year. We are still contacting the vendors to understand the new licensing strategy."
"The pricing is higher than other options from Palo Alto, Fortinet, and Cisco because it is sold in a bundle."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
16%
Computer Software Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
8%
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
 

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.
Which is the best DDoS protection solution for a big ISP for monitoring and mitigating?
Arbor would be the best bid, apart from Arbor, Palo Alto and Fortinet have good solutions. As this is an ISP, I would...
What do you like most about Fortinet FortiDDoS?
The product's initial setup phase was really easy.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiDDoS?
Fortinet FortiDDoS offers lower costs compared to other solutions. The licensing costs are annually renewed.
What are the biggest differences between Cisco ACI and VMware NSX?
There are some very major differences between both the Products and to name a few. -Cisco ACI have physical network g...
What are the biggest differences between Cisco ACI and VMware NSX?
Once you know your way around the Cisco ecosystem, using Cisco ACI is not so difficult. It is a global product, so wh...
What do you like most about VMware NSX?
The product has valuable features for security and network extension.
 

Also Known As

Cloudflare DNS
Fortinet DDoS, FortiDDos
VMware Nicira, Lastline Defender
 

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.
Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data
City of Avondale, Lumeta, Kroll Ontrack, Heartland Payment Systems, Baystate Heallth, Exostar, Tribune Media, iGATE, NTT Communications, Synergent, California Natural Resources Agency, Bloomington Public Schools, Columbia Sportswear, Join Experience S.A, Schuberg Philis
Find out what your peers are saying about Cloudflare, Radware, NETSCOUT and others in Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection. Updated: May 2025.
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