We're a media site, so we use Akamai for content delivery and streaming.
It's spread across multiple departments. We're using several Akamai tools, including Property Manager, Cloud Identity, Bot Manager Premium, the CDN, and AMD for video streaming.
Head Of Digital Engineering Director at a media company with 10,001+ employees
It provides low-latency throughput
Pros and Cons
- "Akamai provides low-latency throughput."
- "I'd like to see more Web 3.0 and IoT solutions."
What is our primary use case?
How has it helped my organization?
Akamai provides low-latency throughput.
What needs improvement?
I'd like to see more Web 3.0 and IoT solutions.
For how long have I used the solution?
Our organization has been using Akamai for three or four years. I took over the head engineering position a year and a half ago.
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November 2024
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What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Akamai is quite stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Akamai is scalable. Definitely, yeah.
How are customer service and support?
Akamai support is excellent. I rate them nine out of 10 because they have great debugging tools, and they're highly competent. We have their premium partnership, so their engineers are proactive and responsive whenever we have issues. It's pretty smooth.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
The company switched to Akamai before I joined, but there were two or three solutions before that. Standardization was important for them because it's a media organization. They wanted one solution, so they put everything into Akamai.
How was the initial setup?
Akamai was deployed before I joined, but we work with the Akamai product team closely. When they release a new product, we try to see if it fits. You only need a lean staff to deploy and maintain Akamai. We use three staff members to manage Akamai.
What about the implementation team?
We handle everything with our in-house team, but we work closely with Akamai engineers.
What was our ROI?
There are two things: value for the money and return on investment. We haven't calculated the return on investment, but the value for the price we are paying is definitely there.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
We've been using Akamai for the last two or three years, so we think we are getting value for the money.
What other advice do I have?
I rate Akamai eight out of 10. At end of the day there, I defer to Gartner's Magic Quadrant. They're one of the premium leaders on the OTT side, and we are a media organization. They're right on top of the Gartner report, so that's a good product.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Senior Consultant CDN at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Available worldwide with over 300,000 servers globally for content delivery
Pros and Cons
- "With 300 servers deployed worldwide, it's highly scalable and is the best web application firewall on the market."
- "Sometimes a little hard to navigate around the user console."
What is our primary use case?
Our primary use cases are for content delivery for all kinds of scenarios, video streaming, load balancing, caching, image managing, web application firewall, bot management and micro-segmentation.
What is most valuable?
We can offload a lot of traffic to Akamai and it's one of the best web application firewalls out there in the market.
What needs improvement?
The user console is quite overloaded, sometimes it's hard to find your way around.
With regards to additional features, Akamai continues to buy other companies and integrate their services into their product. It's kind of like a big bouquet of solutions and it would be good to see this continue in the future. From experience, sometimes you have different user consoles from the same supplier and that makes it hard to keep an overview and have reporting of everything in one place.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working with Akamai for approximately 20 years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Akamai has been providing this service for 20 years and they have never had a substantial outage, they even have some products that have an uptime of over 20 years, the stability is very good.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The Akamai content delivery service is available worldwide with over 300,000 servers globally, it's a very scalable solution.
How are customer service and support?
The Akamai technical support is pretty fast and support is knowledgeable.
How was the initial setup?
With regards to the setup of the product, depending on which use case it can be easy or a little more complex. Setting up caching and DNS is very straightforward, but Bot manager is more complicated.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
As this is a high end product, it's quite high in price, but it's at a similar level to competitors, Amazon and Google.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
The main competitor at this moment in time is CloudFlare. CloudFlare is focusing on small businesses and has an aggressive pricing structure. But for larger enterprises, Akamai is our preference and we have been very successful in reselling the product.
What other advice do I have?
For companies who wish to implement Akamai I would advise doing this through a partner like us, we have the expertise and knowledge of different solutions and setup's, and have compared other similar solutions. Some solutions could use different products like CloudFlare, so a client should look for an independent integrator instead of going direct with a vendor.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
Buyer's Guide
Akamai
November 2024
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816,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.
An overall stable product that supports WAF and CDN
Pros and Cons
- "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."
- "Caching strategy is an area with certain shortcomings in the solution where improvements are required."
What is our primary use case?
CDN and WAF are the main hardcore features in Akamai that we use in our company.
What is most valuable?
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.
What needs improvement?
If you ask about Akamai as a whole, then I would say that there are a lot of areas where improvements are required. In general, there are a few areas where I really think that Akamai's services need improvement. In Akamai, as far as CDN is concerned, I feel that its features are an area where some improvements or upgrades are required. Caching strategy is an area with certain shortcomings in the solution where improvements are required. Suppose you are using a feature called cache tags, which are basically a set of tags that are used to represent certain elements in the URL. When you use cache tags, you can flush out cache or parts of it or all the URLs that are associated with that tag. Akamai doesn't have a feature to cache the tag, as it currently has the feature to purge the cache in the tag. Akamai currently doesn't have a feature with which you can get all the URLs based on the tag and then apply some caching on top of it, making it a feature that Akamai lacks.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Akamai for four years. I am a customer of Akamai.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It is a stable solution. Though there are some minor issues with Akamai, it is an overall stable product.
How are customer service and support?
I have worked with Akamai in two organizations to date. Considering the current organization where I work, we have the best possible support from Akamai, owing to which I don't have any flaws about them to discuss. In my previous organization, I used a standard for generic support from Akamai, which diligently followed the set protocol of Akamai, which is to reply to any queries from users within 24 hours.
I rate the technical support an eight out of ten.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
How was the initial setup?
The product's initial setup will be difficult for someone who has never dealt with CDN. For me, the product's initial setup was easy since I have been associated with CDN for quite some time now. With Akamai, I have always found its initial setup phase easy since everything is UI-oriented in the tool, making it an easy process.
The solution is deployed on the cloud services offered by Akamai.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Price-wise, I find Akamai's pricing model's inclination to be more towards the expensive side of the spectrum, though I can't say that it is a very expensive product. Akamai's pricing model makes it fall under a premium category.
What other advice do I have?
I would absolutely recommend Akamai to those who plan to use it. Based on my experience with three CDNs that I have worked with, I found Akamai to be the best, a reason why I have been using Akamai for the past three to four years.
I rate the overall product an eight and a half out of ten.
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Other
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Head of Information at a leisure / travel company with 51-200 employees
Simple integration, excellent support, and suitable for any organization
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable feature of Akamai is its ease of use and simple integration. Additionally, the solution has new aspects added to it regularly."
- "Akamai could improve by providing its own cloud services. We have to use third-party cloud services at this time, such as Amazon AWS. The offering becomes a lot easier for an SMB if everything was in one single platform to be used for the services."
What is our primary use case?
Our website is very high in content, and for faster delivery to the end user, we are using their Akamai. The largest network is owned by them. Akamai runs on any company's cloud infrastructure.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable feature of Akamai is its ease of use and simple integration. Additionally, the solution has new aspects added to it regularly.
What needs improvement?
Akamai could improve by providing its own cloud services. We have to use third-party cloud services at this time, such as Amazon AWS. The offering becomes a lot easier for an SMB if everything was in one single platform to be used for the services.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Akamai for approximately three years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Akamai is stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The scalability of Akamai is good.
The solution is suitable for any sized organization.
How are customer service and support?
The support from Akamai is fantastic. They have one of the best supports available. You have assigned engineers targeting specific issues. The use of the support services is very easy.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
How was the initial setup?
Akamai was simple to implement and set up.
The solution is not user-based. It's content-based. The number of GBs of transaction.
I rate the initial setup of Akamai a four out of five.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The price of Akamai could be less expensive.
I rate the price of Akamai a two out of five.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
When comparing Akamai to other solutions they have a lot of bundled solutions. If you go to their competition, such as Amazon AWS, it would have a WAF, but it will not have a bot manager. If you use Cloudflare, the ease of integration is not as good as Akamai's. I have found most features are better in Akamai.
What other advice do I have?
Akamai is the market leader in its field of consultation and productivity.
I rate Akamai a nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Security Architect at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
Enhanced security with an easy setup and good scalability
Pros and Cons
- "The initial setup is simple, especially for SaaS solutions."
- "Costing-wise and integration with other tools need improvement, especially API security."
What is our primary use case?
We monitor all the traffic which is coming from the Internet to our environment through the Akamai CDN.
How has it helped my organization?
It provides good security.
What is most valuable?
I cannot disclose specific features, but overall, it's a good product.
What needs improvement?
Costing-wise and integration with other tools need improvement, especially API security.
For how long have I used the solution?
We have used the solution for a long time.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I rate the stability at seven out of ten. There are occasional downtimes, but not very frequent.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I rate the scalability at eight out of ten. It's very good.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup is simple, especially for SaaS solutions. We use a hybrid model with both on-premises and SaaS.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
What other advice do I have?
I recommend the product to other users.
I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Hybrid Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Other
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Last updated: Oct 2, 2024
Flag as inappropriateRegional account manager at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Useful for web content delivery in business because it helps improve speed, reliability, and security
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable feature in managing web traffic has been the ability to handle vertical scaling effectively."
- "One area for improvement with Akamai could be pricing."
What is our primary use case?
Akamai is useful for web content delivery in business because it helps improve speed, reliability, and security. Caching content closer to users reduces latency and improves load times. This is especially important for businesses like Azure, as it enhances the user experience and ensures content is delivered efficiently. Additionally, Akamai's security solutions help protect against cyber threats like DDoS attacks.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable feature in managing web traffic has been the ability to handle vertical scaling effectively. I appreciate the integration with Oracle business, but what stands out are the new capabilities and possibilities within Akamai's products. These enhancements are what I like the most.
What needs improvement?
One area for improvement with Akamai could be pricing.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Smaller companies may find Akamai less sustainable and scalable compared to larger enterprises.
How was the initial setup?
Deploying Akamai can vary in ease depending on the technical requirements. While it is generally straightforward, some cases may encounter technical difficulties, particularly in complex security setups. The difficulty lies in integrating Akamai's solutions with the specific security needs of the organization.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Companies need to pay for an Akamai license, which can be yearly or monthly. It is not overly expensive but not the cheapest option available.
What other advice do I have?
My experience with Akamai in improving website security has been good. They are well-regarded for their technology, especially in their main area of expertise. However, expanding into other areas is a bit tough because people mainly know them for what they are already famous for. We're working on showing that they are effective in other technologies too.
Akamai's cloud security solutions have positively impacted our organization. While the market perception might not fully reflect their effectiveness, their products are highly regarded. This perception challenge may stem from Akamai's historical approach and the market's existing knowledge about the company.
Akamai is stable, reliable, and user-friendly, typically delivering optimal performance. However, smaller companies might struggle to grasp the full value, particularly in complex security aspects like micro-segmentation.
For those considering using Akamai, my advice is to engage with others who have experience with the platform. While Akamai is a well-known brand, it is important to recognize that its expertise lies in complex security areas more suited for enterprise-level companies. For smaller businesses entering this market, it is essential to establish Akamai as a trusted name through effective communication and understanding of their specific needs.
The value and benefits of working with Akamai lie in their ability to provide real solutions to the problems they address. They are a strong company with robust products, capable of resolving the specific needs their customers face.
Overall, I would rate Akamai as an eight out of ten.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Reseller
Last updated: Apr 1, 2024
Flag as inappropriateProject Manager at Grupo Telecom
The worldwide reach of the CDN is one of its key values
Pros and Cons
- "The worldwide reach of the Akamai CDN is one of the key values of this CDN and the agreements worldwide that they keep running."
- "Local connectivity would be great linked to our own telecom/Cablevision CDN."
What is our primary use case?
We use Akamai services to handle the overflow of our own CDN on international deliveries of our own content.
How has it helped my organization?
It is complementary used because the reach of our company is solely accountable for the Southern Cone, and a node in the US.
What is most valuable?
The worldwide reach of the Akamai CDN is one of the key values of this CDN and the agreements worldwide that they keep running.
What needs improvement?
Local connectivity would be great linked to our own telecom/Cablevision CDN, as we are a key player for Internet access in Argentina for final users of mobile, DSL, cable, and FTTH users.
For how long have I used the solution?
One to three years.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Security Engineer at Mavisco Resources Sdn Bhd
The setup is simple but needs to enhance the integrations
Pros and Cons
- "Akamai's scalability is good."
- "Akamai should improve its integrations."
What needs improvement?
Akamai should improve its integrations.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working with the solution for a couple of months.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I rate the stability of the solution a ten out of ten.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Akamai's scalability is good.
How was the initial setup?
The solution's installation is straightforward and takes less than 30 minutes.
What about the implementation team?
I did the deployment myself because it was simple. Any first-level engineer can do it.
What other advice do I have?
I rate the product a ten out of ten.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
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