A10 Networks Thunder SSLi vs F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) comparison

The compared A10 Networks and F5 solutions aren't in the same category. A10 Networks is ranked #3 in STD , and holds a 29.5% mindshare in the category. F5 is ranked #2 in ADC , with an average rating of 8.5, and holds a 15.1% mindshare. Additionally, 75% of A10 Networks users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 83% of F5 users who would recommend it.

A10 Networks Thunder SSLi

Read 3 A10 Networks Thunder SSLi reviews

206 Views
95 Comparison Views

75% willing to recommend

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Man...

Read 120 F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) reviews

7,898 Views
6,521 Comparison Views

83% willing to recommend

A10 Networks Thunder SSLi

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Man...

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between A10 Networks Thunder SSLi and F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Broadcom, Fidelis Security, A10 Networks and others in SSL/TLS Decryption.

To learn more, read our detailed SSL/TLS Decryption Report (Updated: November 2024).

Buyer's Guide

SSL/TLS Decryption

November 2024

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Categories and Ranking

A10 Networks Thunder SSLi

Average Rating

9.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

SSL/TLS Decryption (3rd)

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Man...

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

120

Ranking in other categories

Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) (2nd)

Mindshare comparison

A10 Networks Thunder SSLi and F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. A10 Networks Thunder SSLi is designed for SSL/TLS Decryption and holds a mindshare of 29.5%, down 31.3% compared to last year.
F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM), on the other hand, focuses on Application Delivery Controllers (ADC), holds 15.1% mindshare, down 16.0% since last year.

SSL/TLS Decryption

Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)

Featured Reviews

Kenneth Murray

Data Center Network Engineer at BRIDGETON PUBLIC SCHOOLS

Enables our content filter to do its job without any noticeable delay

Its most valuable feature is its ability to do its job accurately, effectively, and very quickly. The amount of traffic that we have going through our system is astounding. We have 6,900 students and about 1,100 staff members. Most of our teachers and staff are connecting through our system. You add to that all the cell phones, the iPads, and all the computers, and then each individual website's connection, that's a lot of traffic in a period of one second. The delay with the SSL decryption turned on is almost unnoticeable. That is great because most SSL decryption solutions — a couple of competitors we did try — their devices crashed as soon as we turned decryption on.

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Richard Polyak

Sr. Architect at NBC Universal

Reduces maintenance downtime and has a strong user community

The advice I would give to others who are looking to implement F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager is this: look at their user knowledge base first to see if the solution truly fits what you need. On a scale of one to 10, I would give F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager a nine.

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Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"With the Thunder SSLi, we're better protected. We can stop use of VPN and proxies. We are better protected against dirty traffic coming back to our schools. Having a secure decrypt zone with the equipment lowers the chances that our security infrastructure could possibly miss an attack."

"Its most valuable feature is its ability to do its job accurately, effectively, and very quickly. The amount of traffic that we have going through our system is astounding... The delay with the SSL decryption turned on is almost unnoticeable."

"We have several proxies in our environment, so we localized internet traffic between these proxies. Instead of getting a really huge proxy box, according to our size, we can use three boxes and share the traffic with A10's load-balancer feature."

"F5 BIG-IP is used with good applications and functions as an application firewall with additional features. We will not use any feature or any service unless there is a business case and there is a need for implementation."

"The most valuable features of the solution are in the area of DDoS and WAF."

"Initial setup is easy and pretty standard."

"The most valuable feature is customization."

"We plan to create packages of services from which it will be possible to build comprehensive tailor-made solutions."

"Tech support has been very quick to respond to all of the needs that we've had. If you want ad-hoc support. They also provide professional services that you can purchase as well."

"Secure and scalable traffic management solution for applications. Good for bigger environments."

"There were a lot of good features. The most beneficial for maintaining server health included the algorithms for the virtual IP, which segment traffic between servers, authentication profiles, and many other things."

More F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) pros

Cons

"I would like them to have a better UI (better universal design)."

"There is one thing I would like to see changed. In their features for setting things up, there is a templating system that would normally assist clients. However, we had a better time setting up the device either through the command line or through the interface and not using the templates that were pre-installed. So there is room for improvement to the templates for initial installation."

"It would be great if it supported SSL operations according to Active Directory users. For example, if we want to bypass one of the servers or a client's internet access for SSL interception, we have to do it according to the IP address. It would be better if we could do it according to the Active Directory username. A10 says they kind of support that but we haven't tested it."

"I used GitHub for autoscaling CloudFormation, and I found two bugs and I submitted them. Their implementation in GitHub could be cleaner and allow for a bit more customization."

"We would like to have integration into encryption and PKI integration with SafeNet. That is probably the key component in using External PKIs, letting people bring their PKIs with them."

"Performance: Using the product, applications are jittery."

"The pricing could always be better. It's a bit expensive."

"I would like them to have more flexible models."

"Technical support is somewhat slow and could be improved."

"A more intuitive interface would be helpful."

"In terms of pricing, it could be more competitive."

More F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Our licensing costs, yearly, are just under $15,000. Your initial cost of acquisition is obviously going to be more than $15,000..."

"We always pay for support. Any organization of our size who doesn't is asking for problems."

"When you purchase the equipment, you purchase the licensing and warranty. It's all fairly standard. We haven't been caught with anything surprising."

"The licensing model of F5 BIG-IP LTM is highly complex. The operation cost of the solution is high. The overall cost is high."

"This solution comes with a standard license, and there are also extra licenses that can be obtained. The licenses are purchasable for durations of one, two, three, and five years. The hardware is something to consider when purchasing"

"The licensing pricing seems relatively easy enough to get your head around. I would advise anyone to ensure that you have a conversation with an F5 consultant before purchasing, as you would with most products."

"Check other vendors like Cisco, Citrix or A10 Networks. There are plenty in the market with which you can achieve same thing."

"It could be priced a little less, especially on the virtual side. It gets a bit expensive, but you get what you pay."

"They are expensive."

"Take a look at the modules that you are going to use. Look into the best bundles for them."

"This product is costly from a licensing perspective considering its competitors."

More F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

20%

Government

12%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

17%

Computer Software Company

14%

Government

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

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What needs improvement with F5 BIG-IP?

There are no specific areas for improvement as it is already well-resolved and doesn't require further enhancements.

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What is your primary use case for F5 BIG-IP?

The primary use case includes load balancing to serve application servers and basic web application firewall solutions. Our customers use it for that purpose.

See all answers

What do you like most about F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)?

The solution is robust and reliable.

See all answers

Comparisons

Symantec SSL Visibility Appliance vs A10 Networks Thunder SSLi

Compared 60% of the time

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Fortinet FortiADC vs F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)

Compared 18% of the time

NetScaler vs F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)

Compared 12% of the time

Microsoft Azure Application Gateway vs F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)

Compared 8% of the time

VMWare Avi Load Balancer vs F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)

Compared 7% of the time

HAProxy vs F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)

Compared 6% of the time

More F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

A10 Networks Thunder SSLi

December 2024

Download A10 Networks Thunder SSLi product report

Buyer's Guide

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM)

December 2024

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) report

Download F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) product report

Also Known As

Thunder SSLi

F5 BIG-IP, BIG-IP LTM, F5 ASM, Viprion, F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition , Crescendo Networks Application Delivery Controller, BIG IP

Learn More

A10 Networks

Overview

SSL encrypted traffic is growing, rendering most security devices ineffective.
Gain visibility into encrypted traffic with SSL Insight and stop potential threats.

F5 BIG-IP LTM optimizes the speed and reliability of your apps via both network and application layers. Using real-time protocol and traffic management decisions based on app and server and connection management conditions, and TCP and content offloading, BIG-IP LTM dramatically improves application and infrastructure responsiveness. BIG-IP LTM's architecture includes protocol awareness to control traffic for the most important applications. BIG-IP LTM tracks the dynamic performance levels of servers and delivers SSL performance and visibility for inbound and outbound traffic, to protect the user experience by encrypting everything from the client to the server.

BIG-IP LTM provides enterprise-class Application Delivery Controller (ADC). You get granular layer 7 control, SSL offloading and acceleration capabilities, and advanced scaling technologies that deliver performance and reliability on-demand. The highly optimized TCP/IP stack combines TCP/IP techniques and improvements in the latest RFCs with extensions to minimize the effect of congestion and packet loss and recovery. Independent testing tools and customer experiences show LTM's TCP stack delivers up to a 2x performance gain for users and a 4x increase in bandwidth efficiency.

Sample Customers

Klein Independent School District

Riken, TransUnion, Tepco Systems Administration, Daejeon University, G&T Bank, Danamon, CyberAgent Inc.

Find out what your peers are saying about Broadcom, Fidelis Security, A10 Networks and others in SSL/TLS Decryption. Updated: November 2024.

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We monitor all SSL/TLS Decryption 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.