We compared Akamai and Cloudflare based on our user's reviews in several parameters.
In summary, the key differences between Akamai and Cloudflare are highlighted in user feedback regarding their valuable features, customer service, implementation duration, pricing, return on investment, and areas for improvement. While Akamai is praised for exceptional performance, speed, and personalized solutions, Cloudflare stands out for its robust security measures, user-friendly interface, and efficient caching capabilities. Akamai receives positive feedback for its responsive customer service, competitive pricing, and positive ROI, while Cloudflare is commended for its real-time threat detection, flexible scalability, and reasonable cost. Areas for enhancement on Akamai include improving performance and speed, customer support, and analytics features, while Cloudflare could benefit from enhancements in network performance, user interface, documentation, customization options, pricing transparency, and integration with other services.
Features: Akamai's valuable features include exceptional performance, reliable content delivery, advanced security, efficient caching, and comprehensive analytics. On the other hand, Cloudflare offers robust security, reliable content delivery, efficient caching, user-friendly interface, enhanced website performance, protection against DDoS attacks, SSL support, easy DNS management, extensive analytics, real-time threat detection, and flexible scalability.
Pricing and ROI: When comparing the setup cost between Akamai and Cloudflare, both products are considered to have minimal and straightforward setup costs. Akamai offers flexible and customizable licensing options, accommodating different business needs. Cloudflare's licensing experience is smooth and satisfactory, with no expressed concerns or issues., Akamai users reported positive ROI with improved website performance and security, scalable and reliable platform. Cloudflare users also experienced positive ROI including improved website performance, increased security, and user-friendly interface.
Room for Improvement: Akamai could improve its performance and speed, user interface and navigation, customer support and responsiveness, occasional latency issues, and reporting and analytics features. Cloudflare could benefit from enhancements in network performance, user interface, documentation and support, customization options, pricing transparency, and integration with other services.
Deployment and customer support: Based on user feedback, both Akamai and Cloudflare have varying durations for establishing a new tech solution. However, Cloudflare emphasizes the importance of evaluating the context in which these terms are used, suggesting possible differences in deployment and setup phases., Akamai's customer service is highly praised for their responsive and efficient assistance, personalized solutions, and commitment to customer satisfaction. Cloudflare is commended for their exceptional assistance, quick and knowledgeable responses, and reliable and efficient support.
The summary above is based on 29 interviews we conducted recently with Akamai and Cloudflare users. To access the review's full transcripts, download our report.
"The worldwide reach of the Akamai CDN is one of the key values of this CDN and the agreements worldwide that they keep running."
"With 300 servers deployed worldwide, it's highly scalable and is the best web application firewall on the market."
"The solution's most valuable feature is that it has been quite helpful in our company, especially when it comes to applications needing updates frequently."
"If an attacker conducts an attack, we can check what query he is running and whether he wants to see our password or any other files."
"Akamai provides low-latency throughput."
"As of now, the best thing about Akamai is WAF, and though CDN is a good feature, it comes in second place when compared to WAF. I am very impressed with the WAF offered by Akamai."
"Akamai has a very established network of PoPs globally."
"The solution's technical support is very prompt and good."
"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."
"The solution offers the flexibility to control configuration rules."
"Cloudflare has many features."
"The most valuable feature of Cloudflare is that it has a free version. They give us the free version with the anti-DDoS features and also the load balancing solution."
"The solution provides good load balancing and protection against DDoS attacks."
"I like Cloudflare's application gateway and DDoS protection."
"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."
"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."
"Local connectivity would be great linked to our own telecom/Cablevision CDN."
"I would like to see improvements in the security aspect. The web application firewall needs to be enhanced and offers more customization options."
"I'd like to see improvements in log files and data visualizations within the interface."
"Akamai's configuration part is an area of concern where improvements are required to make the process easy."
"I'd like to see more Web 3.0 and IoT solutions."
"Akamai should improve its integrations."
"The product's scalability can be improved since certain shortcomings regarding the security part of the solution currently exist."
"Sometimes a little hard to navigate around the user console."
"There are some issues with the CDN services."
"It would be beneficial for us if Cloudflare could offer a scrubbing solution. This would involve taking a snapshot of my website and keeping it live during a DDoS attack, ensuring uninterrupted service for our users. DDoS attacks are typically short in duration, and having Cloudflare maintain the site's availability from its secure network would enhance the overall user experience. I would appreciate it if Cloudflare could consider implementing this feature. Many organizations already utilize similar capabilities in their CDN platforms, where a static snapshot of the web page is displayed during DDoS attacks. In terms of features, Cloudflare needs to enhance its resilience and stay more focused on adopting new technologies. For instance, solutions like F5 XC Box, Access Solution, and Distributed Cloud Solution have impressive features, and Cloudflare should strive to match and exceed those capabilities. There's a need for improvement in areas like AI-based DDoS attacks and Layer 7 WAF features. Cloudflare should prioritize enhancements in areas such as behavioral DDoS and protection against SQL injection attacks, considering the prevalent trend of public exposure to the internet for business reasons. Overall, Cloudflare needs to invest more in advancing its feature set."
"Although I think it's quite good, it doesn't provide me with all the features I would expect to have if I were using Imperva."
"The solution could use more analytics on the backend to give us more insights into everything. More reports would be helpful."
"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."
"One area of improvement is in the Access Rules. Hypothetically, if we wanted to block or challenge traffic outside of the United States, the only way to currently do that (as far as I know) is to enter every single country outside of the United States. That could be a labor intensive job. A solution could be to enable users to create a rule where traffic is only allowed within a certain country."
"It should be easier to collect the logs with companies like Sumo. However, based on my discussions with the salespeople, I understand that's how they make their money. With the enterprise product, they want people doing those kinds of enterprise features to do the logging. They want them to pay a lot of money, and that's where I have an issue with them. That should be a default. You should be able to get the log no matter what. The logging should be universal."
"I would like Cloudflare to offer a dedicated account manager for large enterprise clients like us."
Akamai is ranked 3rd in CDN with 18 reviews while Cloudflare is ranked 1st in CDN with 56 reviews. Akamai is rated 9.0, while Cloudflare is rated 8.4. The top reviewer of Akamai writes "An easy to setup product offering multiple useful functionalities under a single package". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Cloudflare writes "It's easy to set up because you point the DNS to it, and it's working in under 15 minutes". Akamai is most compared with Azure Front Door, Imperva DDoS, Amazon CloudFront, Fastly and AWS Global Accelerator, whereas Cloudflare is most compared with Azure Front Door, Imperva DDoS, AWS Shield, Microsoft Azure Application Gateway and Arbor DDoS. See our Akamai vs. Cloudflare report.
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