We performed a comparison between HAProxy and Kemp LoadMaster based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: Kemp LoadMaster comes out on top in this comparison. It is a comprehensive and powerful solution with excellent customer support.
"Performance configuration options with threads, processes, and core stickiness are very valuable."
"Software defined load balancing allows us to dynamically adjust and codify routing decisions. This speeds up development."
"I estimate that this product has saved our company hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars in possible downtime from previous load balancers. We make a lot of our money from online sales, so it is critical to have 99.9% uptime."
"The technical support has been, in one word, perfect. Every time I call, I’m on the phone with a representative within five minutes who is highly skilled and willing to help, whether in the case of critical issues or simple advice."
"The most valuable thing for me is TCP/IP Layer 4 stuff you can do with HAProxy. You can go down to the protocol level and make decisions on something."
"I can't speak to all of the HAProxy features because we don't use them all, but load balancing is very good."
"We were able to use HAProxy for round robin with our databases, or for a centralized TCP connection in one host."
"The solution is user-friendly and efficient."
"With Kemp 360 Central, our customers get a nice overview of their Kemp products and an easy way to upgrade firmware on all devices from a single interface."
"Exchange load balancing and reverse proxy for Skype for Business are key features."
"One of the most valuable features I like is the ability to block specific cipher suites like RC4, and older protocols like SSL 3.0."
"The user interface is very easy to work with."
"The Global WAF has saved us more than one time from unwanted traffic."
"Managing and maintaining multiple servers is done in a single place."
"The feature that allows us to easily disconnect a server when we need and bring back online is the most valuable. It's a click of a button. This allows us to keep all systems up. We can then run updates, perform reboots whatever we need to one of the servers without taking production down."
"We are most impressed with the ease of use and great support."
"The solution can be improved by controlling TCP behavior better and mandating to clients what the expected outcome must be in order to avoid receiving contestant timeout logs."
"I would like to evaluate load-balancing algorithms other than round robin and SSL offloading. Also, it would be helpful if I could logically divide the HAProxy load-balancing into multiple entities so that I would install one HA Proxy LB application which could be used for different Web servers for different applications. I am not sure if these features are available."
"There is room for improvement in HAProxy's dynamic configuration."
"There is no standardized document available. So, any individual has to work from scratch to work it out. If some standard deployment details are available, it would be helpful for people while deploying it. There should be more documentation on the standard deployment."
"Sometimes it's challenging to get through the log, and you need a log to understand what is going on. It isn't easy to map the logging with the documentation, and every time I read the log, I have to pull out the documentation to understand what I'm reading."
"It needs proper HTTP/2 support."
"The logging functionality could use improvement, as it is a little cryptic."
"The web stats UI, which provides the status of the health and numbers, could greatly benefit from having a RESTful interface to control the load-balanced nodes. Although there is a hack around the UI (by issuing a POST request to HAProxy with parameters), a RESTful interface would greatly improve the automation process (through Chef and Ansible)."
"The configuration of the basic services is pretty straight forward but for more complex solutions, there needs to be better documentation or knowledge base articles."
"Although Kemp is very user-friendly, it lacks a more custom configuration."
"The only thing that I miss is that the TMG server was giving me live information about who is connected and what is the request about."
"The auth website of ESP is really lacking. It’s not responsive (mobile friendly) and the procedure of changing the website is difficult. We tend to avoid using pre-auth for that reason."
"Some of the support documentation seems to make assumptions that the person installing or configuring is experienced with the product or concepts."
"SNMP and/or RESTCONF management, in order to collect many counters, for plotting in a central application need to be improved."
"There is room for improvement in the stability of the solution."
"Several elements of the GUI need work. For example, if you have many content switches, it’s difficult to find the ones you need. And where is the search feature?"
HAProxy is ranked 3rd in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) with 41 reviews while Kemp LoadMaster is ranked 6th in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) with 48 reviews. HAProxy is rated 8.2, while Kemp LoadMaster is rated 9.4. The top reviewer of HAProxy writes "Useful for for small and quick load-balancing tasks". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Kemp LoadMaster writes "Reliable, easy to set up, and can increase your security score". HAProxy is most compared with Microsoft Azure Application Gateway, NGINX Plus, Citrix NetScaler, Envoy and F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM), whereas Kemp LoadMaster is most compared with NGINX Plus, Fortinet FortiADC, Citrix NetScaler, F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) and A10 Networks Thunder ADC. See our HAProxy vs. Kemp LoadMaster report.
See our list of best Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) vendors.
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.
