AWS Shield vs Akamai App and API Protector comparison

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2,454 views|1,845 comparisons
100% willing to recommend
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3,156 views|2,706 comparisons
100% willing to recommend
Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Akamai App and API Protector and AWS Shield based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) Protection solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.
To learn more, read our detailed AWS Shield vs. Akamai App and API Protector Report (Updated: March 2024).
772,649 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"Everything will be handled by Akamai's system before it reaches our infrastructure.""The most valuable feature is the custom rules feature. This is because many of our customers require a lot of custom rules. Because it's a very customized project for our customers, I think they have the best of everything already.""The CDN and the WAF features are the best.""The solution can scale extremely well.""I can attest to its benefits in terms of understanding and mitigating threats...The solution's technical support team seems to be pretty responsive.""It gives us a report of traffic. It gives us a report of the day-to-day URL traffic, and it also gives an individual report. If we reach out to Akamai, they give us the IPs as well.""The product has a good user interface.""They have a fantastic tool for analyzing and viewing your traffic."

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"The product has a good mechanism to analyze trends and trigger events.""We have integrated the tool with Active Directory. The most important feature is that it's transparent and doesn't degrade the performance of our solution. Additionally, it's easy to configure, which is crucial for us. It's easy to use and set up and stops attacks on our servers. We haven't encountered any attack problems because the solution stops them in real-time. AWS Shield specifically focuses on defending against denial-of-service attacks, making it a great solution for that type of threat.""The solution's ease of use is the most valuable feature.""It is integrated with AWS. So, it gives you a good first step.""I am impressed with the product's multiple features like security."

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Cons
"The product should provide a secure NTP.""One thing I asked them is to integrate the API discovery product that they have and push that data into Akamai App and API Protector so that we do not have two types of reviews to identify the type of traffic. We already know the APIs that are frequently getting used, so analysis becomes easier. We can integrate both products and use them.""One area where Akamai can improve is the captcha part. Cloudflare provides a captcha if there are a certain number of threats. For example, I can assign that if there are 10 requests within a second from a single IP, it should send a captcha to the user. The user should fill in the captcha, and only after that, the user should be able to access our website. This captcha feature should be built into Bot Manager. I love this captcha feature of Cloudflare.""Support and the pricing need to improve.""I do not see any area for improvement. Akamai is already maintaining its own databases for the security concerns, vulnerabilities, and attacks that are there. If anything, they should have a solution in the infrastructure security area as well. They should not be only in cloud cybersecurity; they should also be in infrastructure security.""In terms of precedence of Akamai rules, the last one is implemented. That is the one that is operational. If two rules contradict, the last one is implemented. We had a clash, but it was really tough to find that out. I would like to have a rulebook because, in their architecture documentation, it is not mentioned anywhere that if two rules clash, the last one works, and if it does not work, then what to do. This is something we were debating today with their tech support. With AWS, we get documents for the issues so that they do not occur in the future. Akamai's support and knowledge base needs to be improved.""The pricing could be reduced a bit.""If we talk about application layer attacks, including WAF, CloudFlare is leading. Akamai can focus a bit more on the application layer attacks and how to protect them."

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"The product needs to improve its logs and reports to make it read better.""The product should give users more flexibility to customize their security policies according to their requirements.""The product is expensive.""We end up having to pay extra for features that AWS adds that we don't need.""The management of it is a bit hard. If you don't engineer it on the front side, it is hard to go back in and change it. It could be improved in terms of architecture requirements and then ongoing support requirements as a secondary component to it. People tend to set up things like this, and they just expect it to work without the care and feeding that needs to go back into it either from an application team or a network environment team."

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Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "There is no license at all for Akamai. They are going to charge us only for the usage."
  • "The price they are offering is quite reasonable for premium customers, but it's very expensive if you're a small and medium-sized enterprises."
  • "Cost depends on the volume of traffic."
  • "The solution is not expensive."
  • "The product’s price is high."
  • "The solution is expensive."
  • "Akamai Web Application Protector is an expensive product."
  • "Price-wise, I would say Akamai's pricing is competitive."
  • More Akamai App and API Protector Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "It depends on your subscription level and the volume that you're spending with AWS. So, it is very relative to the consumption alignment in your subscription level. It is a well-constructed, scalable pricing option, but it is relative to how much you're spending on AWS. Because the more you spend, typically, the more you get off on services like this. I find it to be comparable to other solutions."
  • "The cost depends on traffic each month, so on average, it costs us between US$200 and US$300 per month."
  • "We pay $3000 per month for the solution."
  • "The tool's pricing is good."
  • More AWS Shield Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:The custom rules must be improved. If we have a domain to be monitored, we can use the solution to alert us if a certain specification is met. If we need only 20,000 transactions, but there are 40,000… more »
    Top Answer:We have integrated the tool with Active Directory. The most important feature is that it's transparent and doesn't degrade the performance of our solution. Additionally, it's easy to configure, which… more »
    Top Answer:The product needs to improve its logs and reports to make it read better.
    Ranking
    Views
    2,454
    Comparisons
    1,845
    Reviews
    16
    Average Words per Review
    669
    Rating
    8.6
    Views
    3,156
    Comparisons
    2,706
    Reviews
    5
    Average Words per Review
    605
    Rating
    8.6
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    Akamai Web Application Protector, Akamai Kona Site Defender, Akamai Kona DDoS Defender
    Learn More
    Overview

    Akamai App & API Protector brings together web application firewall, bot mitigation, API security, and Layer 7 DDoS protection into a single solution. It quickly identifies vulnerabilities and mitigates threats across your entire web and API estates — even for the most complex distributed architectures. Recognized as the leading attack detection solution on the market, App & API Protector is easy to implement and use. It delivers automatic updates for security protections and provides holistic visibility into traffic and attacks.

    AWS Shield is a managed Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) protection service that safeguards applications running on AWS. AWS Shield provides always-on detection and automatic inline mitigations that minimize application downtime and latency, so there is no need to engage AWS Support to benefit from DDoS protection.

    Sample Customers
    Douglas Omaha Technology Commission, ZALORA, PrintPlanet
    netflix, dow jones, mapbox, pearson, rovio, youview, moviestar planet, asurion, payplug, hour of code
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Computer Software Company21%
    Retailer16%
    Financial Services Firm16%
    Leisure / Travel Company11%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Financial Services Firm28%
    Computer Software Company13%
    Manufacturing Company8%
    Insurance Company6%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company18%
    Financial Services Firm18%
    Manufacturing Company7%
    Comms Service Provider6%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business15%
    Midsize Enterprise22%
    Large Enterprise63%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business16%
    Midsize Enterprise13%
    Large Enterprise71%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business24%
    Midsize Enterprise13%
    Large Enterprise62%
    Buyer's Guide
    AWS Shield vs. Akamai App and API Protector
    March 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about AWS Shield vs. Akamai App and API Protector and other solutions. Updated: March 2024.
    772,649 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    Akamai App and API Protector is ranked 3rd in Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) Protection with 27 reviews while AWS Shield is ranked 6th in Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) Protection with 5 reviews. Akamai App and API Protector is rated 8.4, while AWS Shield is rated 8.6. The top reviewer of Akamai App and API Protector writes "Easy to learn and gives us a report of traffic". On the other hand, the top reviewer of AWS Shield writes "The solution automatically scales according to traffic, only takes minutes to deploy, and is maintenance-free". Akamai App and API Protector is most compared with Cloudflare Web Application Firewall, Microsoft Azure Application Gateway, AWS WAF, Prolexic and Arbor DDoS, whereas AWS Shield is most compared with Cloudflare, Cloudflare DDoS, Azure DDoS Protection, Prolexic and Imperva DDoS. See our AWS Shield vs. Akamai App and API Protector report.

    See our list of best Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) Protection vendors.

    We monitor all Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) Protection 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.