NGINX App Protect vs NetScaler comparison

NetScaler and F5 are both solutions in the Web Application Firewall (WAF) category. NetScaler is ranked #12 with an average rating of 8.3, while F5 is ranked #15 with an average rating of 8.7. Additionally, 91% of NetScaler users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 95% of F5 users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 1, 2025

NetScaler and NGINX App Protect compete in application security and performance delivery. NetScaler seems to have the upper hand due to its wide array of features serving large, diverse environments.

Features: NetScaler offers flexible deployment models with features like SSL offload, multitenancy, and strong integration with Citrix applications. Its configuration allows efficient traffic management crucial for large enterprises. NGINX App Protect shines in traffic management and security with its command-line interface and ease of integration, although it may lack advanced features for user guidance.

Room for Improvement: NetScaler needs to enhance ADC functionalities such as asymmetric content optimization and simplify its setup process. Its advanced feature configurations require streamlining. NGINX App Protect should address configuration complexity and improve its user interface, providing better bot protection and pricing adjustments.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: NetScaler supports both on-prem and hybrid cloud environments with versatile deployment options. However, its technical support has mixed reviews. NGINX App Protect supports diverse configurations but experiences gaps in customer service responsiveness and expertise.

Pricing and ROI: NetScaler is often critiqued for high costs and complex licensing, although users report significant ROI from its feature set. NGINX App Protect, with potentially lower costs, is considered flexible due to instance-based pricing, yet there's a call for better alignment with enterprise budgets.

To learn more, read our detailed NGINX App Protect vs. NetScaler Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

NGINX App Protect vs. NetScaler

April 2025

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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

Featured Reviews

Spencer Malmad

Owner at Tech Exchange

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.

Read full review

DEMİRHAN ÇAVUŞOĞLU

Cloud Consultant at Migros Ticaret A.Ş.

A tool for centralized management including inventory and sales tracking

Citrix ADM has the ability to implement policies to tighten security. For instance, you can restrict access to your network from outsiders or lack necessary security measures such as antivirus programs. Additionally, there's the Delivery Controller, which allows for comprehensive monitoring and management tasks such as remote restarts, maintenance, and registration. Another essential component is the Director, which provides detailed insights into sessions, including identifying session failures, connection issues, user lockouts, etc. It presents a list of problems to address, enabling you to click on them and resolve them efficiently.

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Saurav Kumar

Senior security architecture at National Payment Corporation Of India

Offers protection to users from external threats

NGINX App Protect secures our company's application, and it has helped me a lot, considering that we have critical infrastructure in India where we see how lots of attacks come onto our organization's servers. The tool offers protection against multiple threats present in India's IT ecosystem. The tool helps our company to make our payments secure, meaning it has the ability to provide a secure payment environment in India. Speaking about the improvements in our company's application performance since implementing NGINX App Protect, the gRPC support for the solution is very low. My company is not getting any proper documentation on how to deploy gRPC over NGINX App Protect. I recommend the product to those who plan to use it. People can use the product as their company's base server, WAF, or for its proxy manager, depending on the business requirements. My company follows PCI DSS compliance because we operate in a payment-related industry. Right now, my company follows all the standards, so we comply with all the requirements and policies. I rate the tool an eight out of ten.

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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 web application firewall brought us good security and a view of the accesses/blocks of the entire domain and subdomain that were accessed both by region (country) and IPs."

"Smaller businesses have seen great ROI due to the low investment and strong performance."

"We're using dynamic components to build flexible pages to create and manage Git merge requests for code and reviews."

"The most valuable feature of the solution is external DNS. It is also very secure. They have their own main server and once you configure it, the product takes care of everything. There are no issues in resolving IPs and low latency is also present."

"When using services like Heroku, Cloudflare is very useful for CNAME flattening. I also use it for their end-to-end SSL with TLS authentication on nginx for securing servers."

"I rate its stability a ten out of ten."

"The most valuable feature of Cloudflare DNS is its global reach and it is always evolving."

"Cloudflare is a security SaaS provider that provides security and protects us from any application layer attack."

More Cloudflare pros

"I like the solution's simplicity compared to Citrix's on-prem solutions."

"The work balancing applications are the most valuable feature."

"The web application firewall which protects our services on the internet, and then of course services like our ability to provide high availability for the services we are offering are the most valuable features."

"One feature that works really well is the SSL VPN. It's very easy to set up and you can go very granular with it. You can define what user groups get what kind of access and the management overhead is very low."

"NetScaler Gateway: Why? Availability/Security: We delivered more than 200 applications thru Xenapp. This feature give us the possibility to deliver the applications anywhere. Currently, 30% of access is made through our NetScaler Gateway (Internet connections)."

"The solution's technical support is good."

"Compared to other solutions, Citrix ADC is much more robust in terms of the native integration to cloud platforms. It is far more robust from an operational point of view as well."

"Manageability and visibility are good."

More NetScaler pros

"I would say that the most valuable feature is the ability to operate in a DevOps environment and to be configured through API and pipeline by the developers themselves."

"The most valuable feature of NGINX App Protect is its open source."

"There's a cache, or it works like a proxy, so it can speed up applications."

"WAF is useful to track mitigation, inclusion, prevention, and the parametric firewall."

"The most valuable feature is that there is a link in the system that will help to analyze the security of an application when something abnormal is found."

"The tool's most valuable feature is the OWASP certification. Additionally, the tool's ability to enforce strong passwords and OTP within minutes is impressive. With its analytics and recommendations, it is a very good solution."

"It is a very good tool for load balancing."

"We were looking for a product that is capable of complete automation and a container based solution. It's working."

More NGINX App Protect pros

Cons

"Technical support is not well developed. While there are good engineers, Cloudflare does not offer hands-on technical support to fix customer problems but rather a self-service model."

"Support response time could be improved."

"They lack a good way to manage DNS as a company, since everything is relegated to single account logins until you get to the higher levels. They have come out with a paid feature to remedy this, but I have not had a chance to fully review it yet to know if it fixes the access problem."

"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."

"If they improve on the placement of their data centers, it would be better. I'm living in a remote area. I would like to connect to them without any kind of lag."

"There could be more courses with engineers. I like e-learning, however, having a specialist in a classroom is more comfortable for me."

"The documentation could improve for Cloudflare DNS."

More Cloudflare cons

"If one device or switch fails, the failover to another device is not seamless which is painful."

"Citrix ADC can be really complex. It isn't very simple like some other appliances that I've worked with. You need a lot of skill and experience to manage it. I'm not talking about a year or two. You need at least four years to understand it very well. It is not that easy to learn. They should make it a lot simpler for users to understand the management of it. They can also provide some additional training. The material they have on the site is not sufficient enough for you to understand how to manage it. Their training is expensive, and not everyone has the funds and experience for it. Citrix isn't very popular around these parts of the world. So, it can use some more marketing, sales, enlightenment, and advertisement. These could bring more market for them. Basically, there are just a few companies that really go for Citrix. Most of the companies go for VMware because they marketed themselves more than Citrix. There isn't much difference between Citrix and VMware. VMware is a little more robust than Citrix. Citrix has focused more on desktops rather than server virtualization, and that's the advantage VMware has over Citrix. Citrix also needs to educate and inform users about the infrastructure that is supported with a version. Currently, if the customers don't look at the datasheet, they might miss this important information."

"Should offer more flexible cost-effective licensing for small to medium sized organizations."

"Currently, it is not easy to use the configuration capabilities of the product."

"They need to make the solution a little more familiar with easy study guides, learning videos, etc."

"The setup for Citrix NetScaler has room for improvement. It could be easier."

"An area for improvement would be the difficulty in finding information about standard licensing costs over the internet. They should provide some reference prices on the net to be quickly referred to."

"ADC from Citrix has added functionalities from other products and the usability is very difficult for someone who is used to a simpler user interface, it's a little bit of a mess to use."

More NetScaler cons

"Right now, the tool doesn't provide an option revolving around update feeds, specifically the signature update option in the UI."

"The product's price is high, making it an area of concern where improvements are required. The tool's licensing model is also not good."

"Setting policies and parameters through the UI should be more automated because the process is manual, where we can only edit one rule at a time."

"They could provide a better user interface."

"The integration of NGINX App Protect could improve."

"It would be better if it were easier to implement and if there was more information from F5 regarding hardware requirements and specifications to deploy the service, to avoid disruptions after implementation."

"The product's user interface is an area with shortcomings as it can be quite confusing for users, making it an area where improvements are required."

"I encountered issues with NGINX App Protect while trying to upgrade custom rules."

More NGINX App Protect cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is expensive when compared to other products but offers unlimited bandwidth."

"There are no additional costs beyond the standard licensing fees."

"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."

"The price of the solution is expensive."

"The pricing depends on the usage, but the cheapest would be around 5,000 USD a month."

"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."

"We are using the free version."

"The cost primarily depends on the size of the organization."

More Cloudflare pricing and cost advice

"We have been evaluating F5, Citrix, and other ADC products. Citrix is the most expense of all of them."

"The tool is cheap."

"Regarding pricing, while it's expensive, I can't comment on the exact ROI without a budget analysis. However, in terms of service quality, it's worth the price."

"We are quite happy with price. It's not too high."

"Citrix NetScaler's pricing is slightly above average but not overly expensive. I would consider F5 BIG IP to be the most expensive, Citrix NetScaler to be the second most expensive, and then Kemp Load Balancer to be the third."

"You get the value for your money. There aren't any hidden fees."

"For the specific use case that my customers primarily engage with, I would give the pricing a rating of seven out of ten."

"We get value for money. Its price is fair. I don't think it is overpriced."

More NetScaler pricing and cost advice

"Our licensing costs are about $40,000 a year."

"The pricing is reasonable because NGINX operates on an instance basis."

"The product's price is high."

"The price of NGINX App Protect is approximately $3,000 annually. All of our licenses are observed by a managed service partner."

"The licensing fees for this solution are pretty expensive for what it does, but there is no alternative."

"There is a license needed to use NGINX App Protect."

"There is a monthly or annual subscription to use NGINX App Protect. There are not any additional costs to the subscription."

"The solution's price is reasonable."

More NGINX App Protect pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

17%

Computer Software Company

14%

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

15%

Educational Organization

13%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Government

Computer Software Company

18%

Financial Services Firm

14%

Comms Service Provider

Retailer

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...

See all answers

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...

See all answers

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.

See all answers

What do you like most about Citrix ADC?

The most valuable feature for us is the application firewalling in Citrix NetScaler, ensuring only valid traffic ente...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Citrix ADC?

After deployment, Citrix Netscaler shifted to a subscription-based license scheme for support, which is slightly more...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Citrix ADC?

Citrix NetScaler is a robust product, but mastering it requires significant learning and training due to its complexi...

See all answers

What do you like most about NGINX App Protect?

It's very easy to deploy.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NGINX App Protect?

I don't know the pricing yet because in my other project, I was not part of the buying side and I was just starting t...

See all answers

What needs improvement with NGINX App Protect?

It would be better if it were easier to implement and if there was more information from F5 regarding hardware requir...

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 50% of the time

Akamai vs Cloudflare

Compared 4% of the time

Azure Front Door vs Cloudflare

Compared 3% of the time

Azure DNS vs Cloudflare

Compared 3% of the time

Imperva DDoS vs Cloudflare

Compared 2% of the time

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Microsoft Azure Application Gateway vs NetScaler

Compared 11% of the time

HAProxy vs NetScaler

Compared 11% of the time

Fortinet FortiADC vs NetScaler

Compared 9% of the time

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

Compared 8% of the time

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Microsoft Azure Application Gateway vs NGINX App Protect

Compared 22% of the time

Azure Front Door vs NGINX App Protect

Compared 18% of the time

Fortinet FortiWeb vs NGINX App Protect

Compared 15% of the time

F5 Advanced WAF vs NGINX App Protect

Compared 10% of the time

AWS WAF vs NGINX App Protect

Compared 8% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cloudflare

April 2025

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Buyer's Guide

NetScaler

April 2025

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Buyer's Guide

NGINX App Protect

April 2025

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Also Known As

Cloudflare DNS

Citrix ADC, Citrix NetScaler VPX, NetScaler Console, NetScaler Web Application Firewall

NGINX WAF, NGINX Web Application Firewall

Overview

Cloudflare is a highly-regarded Content Delivery Network (CDN) and a Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) protection solution. The robust global connectivity cloud platform that is Cloudflare ensures users are able to connect to the Internet quickly, securely, and reliably. Cloudflare is one of the world's largest networks in the marketplace today. Using Cloudflare, businesses, educational entities, NGOs, vloggers, bloggers, and anyone else with an internet presence can experience more secure, faster websites and applications.

Currently, there are millions of Internet locations on Cloudflare, and the Cloudflare network
continues to grow every day by the thousands. The solution is able to fulfill the requests for
millions of websites seamlessly and serves on average 45 million HTTP requests per second.

Cloudflare has safe, secure data centers in close to 300 cities worldwide to ensure every
client request is filled as quickly as possible. It is Cloudflare’s edge network that makes this
possible by keeping content and other services as close to each client as possible, so the
information requests are always only seconds away.

Many organizations that work in democracy, civil society, human rights, or the arts are able to
access Cloudflare's highest levels of protection for free via Project Galileo. Additionally, official
election websites can be secured from hacking and fraud through Cloudflare’s Project
Athenian, also at no additional cost.

Cloudflare can also help organizations of all sizes develop a robust zero-trust strategy to
ensure the highest levels of productivity and profitability. Employees, stakeholders, and end users have a greater level of satisfaction and overall improved user experience, which can, in
turn, result in higher revenues and overall ROI. Zero-trust and BYOD (bring your own device)
access ensure end users and employees always have the best resources and technology
available to them at all times.

Cloudflare benefits

Cloudflare has many benefits. Some of its most valuable benefits include:

- Faster load times

- Robust DNS security

- Intuitive cloud Web Application Firewall (WAF)

- Free universal SSL

- Image enhancement

- Automatic browser caching

- Next-generation cloud load balancer

- Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP)

- Rate limiting

- Minification

- Zero-trust capabilities

- Cost-effective

- Reduced carbon footprint

Reviews from real users

“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. If you have a connection between your
website and your host, the server, Cloudflare, and the host, you don't necessarily need a
certificate.” Spencer M., Owner at Tech Exchange

“What I like best about Cloudflare is that my company can use it to trace and manage
applications and monitor traffic. The solution tells you if there's a spike in traffic. Cloudflare
also sends you a link to check your equipment and deployment and track it through peering,
so it's a valuable tool.” Daniel P., Network Engineer at Ufinet

“The most valuable feature of Cloudflare is the GUI. You are able to control the solution very
well through the interface. There is a lot of functionality that is embedded in the service.” PeerSpot user, Competence Center Manager at a tech services company

Cloudflare

One platform for a consistent application delivery and security experience because nobody has time to learn multiple systems to manage ADC deployments. NetScaler is built with a single code base using a software-based architecture, so no matter which ADC form factor you choose — hardware, virtual machine, bare metal, or container — the behavior will be the same.

NetScaler

NGINX App Protect application security solution combines the efficacy of advanced F5 web application firewall (WAF) technology with the agility and performance of NGINX Plus. The solution runs natively on NGINX Plus and addresses some of the most difficult challenges facing modern DevOps environments:

Integrating security controls directly into the development automation pipeline
Applying and managing security for modern and distributed application environments such as containers and microservices
Providing the right level of security controls without impacting release and go-to-market velocity
Complying with security and regulatory requirements

NGINX App Protect offers:

Expanded security beyond basic signatures to ensure adequate controls
F5 app‑security technology for efficacy superior to ModSecurity and other WAFs
Confidently run in “blocking” mode in production with proven F5 expertise
High‑confidence signatures for extremely low false positives
Increases visibility, integrating with third‑party analytics solutions
Integrates security and WAF natively into the CI/CD pipeline
Deploys as a lightweight software package that is agnostic of underlying infrastructure
Facilitates declarative policies for “security as code” and integration with DevOps tools
Decreases developer burden and provides feedback loop for quick security remediation
Accelerates time to market and reduces costs with DevSecOps‑automated security

Sample Customers

Trusted by over 9,000,000 Internet Applications and APIs, including Nasdaq, Zendesk, Crunchbase, Steve Madden, OkCupid, Cisco, Quizlet, Discord and more.

ABB Schweiz, Aer Lingus, AIDS Healthcare Foundation, Amnet Technology Solutions, Aramex International, Ascenty, Atos, Autodesk

Information Not Available

Buyer's Guide

NGINX App Protect vs. NetScaler

April 2025

Free Report: NGINX App Protect vs. NetScaler

Find out what your peers are saying about NGINX App Protect vs. NetScaler and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.

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