We performed a comparison between F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager and Microsoft Azure Application Gateway based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: F5 BIG-IP comes out on top in this comparison. It is powerful and flexible with a proven ROI. Azure Application Gateway does come out on top in the pricing and ease of deployment categories, however.
"The v11 clustering is a new technology they have brought in that does not require improvement. They are the leader in it."
"The most helpful thing is that it's open-source. It's very easy to program and customize."
"It makes the publishing of applications to the Internet safer."
"The feature I find the most valuable is the support infrastructure."
"It has so many features. First of all, it has a full proxy architecture, it has multiple modules. The best feature is the WAF, the web application firewall module. It also has cashing type capabilities. It has all kinds of load-balancing algorithms based on your IT requirements."
"It provides first-tier firewalling, for you application. And it provides server load-balancing, it provides optimization, and it provides a proxy feature, where your users cannot directly access your server. It acts as a fully proxy architecture. It has client-side and server-side connections, both, and they're separate."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"Where we are finding the AWS version helpful is when we are trying to scale up new environments. AWS Marketplace helps here a lot."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is the web application firewall (WAF)."
"Load balancing and web application firewall features are the most valuable."
"The solution's integration is very good."
"I find Application Gateway’s WAF module valuable because it helps prevent layer 7 attacks."
"The solution provides great automation and it is easy to upgrade service."
"The most valuable feature of Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is its ease of use."
"I find Application Gateway’s WAF module valuable because it helps prevent layer 7 attacks."
"We find it valuable because it is compatible with our existing Azure solution."
"LTM's cloud capabilities could be improved. Cloud providers all offer load balancing, but you can't get the same level of security. F5's cloud service is still not on par with its on-prem service."
"It would be good to have better traffic and better data. It would be nice to have more granularity to see packets in terms of the header details, the analytics, etc. It would be nice if that was also part of it and to have analytics added to the traffic."
"Technical support could be faster. It's something I'd like to see them work on in the future."
"I would like them to expand load balancing, being able to go across multiple regions to on-premise and into the cloud. This could use improvement, as it is sometimes a little cumbersome."
"There is a need for a more modular version to concentrate on the current monolithic structure of both the virtual and hardware versions."
"I would like F5 to incorporate the ability to create your own custom roles and customised permissions within the product set. I have seen many customers wanting to give a certain level of access for the purposes of out-of-hours servicing to out-of-hours staff or teams that fulfill an operations type role."
"Certificate management needs improvement. I would like automated deployment of new certificates without manual intervention to be in the next release of this product."
"It is a hardware load balancer, and its installation procedure is more complex than a software load balancer. There are pros and cons of using hardware load balancing. You have to have specific hardware deployed in your data center to activate this load balancer. They never came up with any software-based load balancing solution. It is all hardware-based."
"I believe that there is room for improvement in terms of additional functionality. It is an advantage to have features readily available for configuration without needing customer-defined rules."
"Application Gateway’s limitation is that the private and the public endpoint cannot use the same port."
"The configuration is very specific right now and needs to be much more flexible."
"The product's performance should be better."
"Application Gateway’s limitation is that the private and the public endpoint cannot use the same port."
"I want the solution's support to improve. The tool is also expensive."
"The support provided for the solution has certain shortcomings that need improvement, especially when it comes to the response time from the support team."
"The tool is a pain to deal with when it comes to the area of configuration."
More F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) Pricing and Cost Advice →
More Microsoft Azure Application Gateway Pricing and Cost Advice →
F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) is ranked 1st in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) with 117 reviews while Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is ranked 4th in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) with 43 reviews. F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) is rated 8.2, while Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is rated 7.2. The top reviewer of F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) writes "Reduces maintenance downtime and has a strong user community". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Microsoft Azure Application Gateway writes "High stability with built-in rules that reduce alerts and are easy to configure". F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) is most compared with Citrix NetScaler, Fortinet FortiADC, NGINX Plus, A10 Networks Thunder ADC and HAProxy, whereas Microsoft Azure Application Gateway is most compared with F5 Advanced WAF, Citrix NetScaler, AWS WAF, Cloudflare Web Application Firewall and Imperva Web Application Firewall. See our F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) vs. Microsoft Azure Application Gateway report.
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We monitor all Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.