AWS Shield vs Akamai App and API Protector comparison

Akamai and Amazon Web Services (AWS) are both solutions in the Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) Protection category. Akamai is ranked #4 with an average rating of 8.7, while Amazon Web Services (AWS) is ranked #6 with an average rating of 8.8. Akamai holds a 4.3% mindshare in DDOS, compared to Amazon Web Services (AWS)’s 5.8% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Akamai users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Amazon Web Services (AWS) users who would recommend it.

Akamai App and API Protector

Read 28 Akamai App and API Protector reviews

2,145 Views
1,559 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

AWS Shield

Read 6 AWS Shield reviews

3,030 Views
2,557 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Akamai App and API Protector

AWS Shield

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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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: October 2024).

Buyer's Guide

AWS Shield vs. Akamai App and API Protector

October 2024

Download the complete report

Helped 814,649 peers since 2012

Categories and Ranking

Akamai App and API Protector

Ranking in Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) Protection

4th

Average Rating

8.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Web Application Firewall (WAF) (8th), Cloud and Data Center Security (10th)

AWS Shield

Ranking in Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) Protection

6th

Average Rating

8.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2024, in the Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) Protection category, the mindshare of Akamai App and API Protector is 4.3%, down from 5.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of AWS Shield is 5.8%, up from 5.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) Protection

Featured Reviews

Deepesh Singh

Senior Engineering Manager Cybersecurity at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Jul 9, 2024

Bot Manager and different features to manage threats

As a product, it has good capabilities, including professional support. However, it's risky for us to rely on AI for real-time traffic management. We use in-house analytics but avoid automatic actions due to their high impact. For example, I live in a developing country. Everyone has different types of phones, apps, and everything else. So, if someone is using a legacy phone, that is still a use case here. If AI decides that this is an end-of-life phone or end-of-life Android operating system, it starts blocking that traffic. We may potentially lose millions or probably thousands and hundreds of thousands of hits per second. Everything is all about how well we serve payments because we're into payments. So, AI is used for analytics but not for real-time decisions. We can't afford to block traffic based on AI models due to the variety of devices and operating systems our users have.

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SteveNg

Head of Strategic Alliances at Quantum Security

Jan 23, 2023

The solution automatically scales according to traffic, only takes minutes to deploy, and is maintenance-free

The primary use case of the solution is firewall protection. Having a firewall is important for protecting our website from DDoS attacks. Just in case our services are running and we do get attacked, having a firewall can help keep our website alive The solution gives us a better sense of…

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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

"Akamai Web Application Protector is a good solution that provides basic web application protection."

"The product has a good user interface."

"It enables us to move faster with new products because we have this layer of protection set up in our infrastructure."

"The most valuable feature is the DDoS protection, which is the main reason we got it."

"It is scalable for DDoS."

"The product has a good UI."

"Everything will be handled by Akamai's system before it reaches our infrastructure."

"They have a fantastic tool for analyzing and viewing your traffic."

More Akamai App and API Protector pros

"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."

"The product is easy to use."

"I am impressed with the product's multiple features like security."

Cons

"They are already very flexible, but room for improvement is there. Reports generation could be better and should be improved."

"Customer support has room for improvement."

"It could have better analytics and reporting visibility in the OEM console."

"The custom rules must be improved."

"It's fine for a simple tool, but as I recall, if you encounter a lot of bots, scrapers, and other things, you'll need this tool bot and this other thing they offer called Bot Manager."

"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."

"Akamai App and API Protector is very new to me, so I do not have any insights on improvement areas for the product. However, when we ask for some help, it can take some time. We understand that the job is done by professionals, but if that time can be reduced, it would be great."

"The WAF features definitely have a lot of room for improvement. A lot of the WAF is really basic. For some products or some of our solutions, we need to run a second layer of more advanced WAF. If it had better layer seven protection then we would not need a second WAF."

More Akamai App and API Protector cons

"The product should give users more flexibility to customize their security policies according to their requirements."

"The product needs to improve its logs and reports to make it read better."

"The product is expensive."

"The time taken to detect anomalies must be reduced."

"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."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product’s price is high."

"Akamai is very expensive."

"Based on the billing discussions in the DevOps team, Akamai's cost does not seem to be a major thing. However, LOE is an issue. When it comes to support, we know that even all the competitors do this. For a 30-minute issue, they give us a LOE of one or two hours. That is a basic practice, but that is something we worry about."

"Price-wise, I would say Akamai's pricing is competitive."

"The solution is not expensive."

"If you want quality, you have to pay the price. Its price is fair. Their account managers are also very helpful. They help you a lot with pricing even though they are working with Akamai."

"It's more expensive than others, but the ROI is good for large-scale infrastructure."

"Akamai Web Application Protector is an expensive product."

More Akamai App and API Protector pricing and cost advice

"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."

"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 tool is cheap."

"The tool's pricing is good."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

28%

Computer Software Company

14%

Manufacturing Company

Insurance Company

Financial Services Firm

17%

Computer Software Company

16%

Insurance Company

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Akamai Web Application Protector?

The product is user-friendly.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Akamai Web Application Protector?

The price is higher than others. It could be about 80% to 70% more expensive than other tools. So, it’s not just a slight difference.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Akamai Web Application Protector?

It could have better analytics and reporting visibility in the OEM console.

See all answers

What do you like most about AWS Shield?

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, whi...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AWS Shield?

The tool is cheap.

See all answers

What needs improvement with AWS Shield?

The time taken to detect anomalies must be reduced. The tool has a few parameters based on which it tries to understand anomalies. It would be better if the anomalies were identified quickly.

See all answers

Comparisons

Cloudflare Web Application Firewall vs Akamai App and API Protector

Compared 19% of the time

Microsoft Azure Application Gateway vs Akamai App and API Protector

Compared 14% of the time

AWS WAF vs Akamai App and API Protector

Compared 12% of the time

Prolexic vs Akamai App and API Protector

Compared 7% of the time

F5 Shape Security vs Akamai App and API Protector

Compared 3% of the time

More Akamai App and API Protector Competitors

Cloudflare vs AWS Shield

Compared 28% of the time

Cloudflare SASE & SSE Platform vs AWS Shield

Compared 27% of the time

Azure DDoS Protection vs AWS Shield

Compared 25% of the time

Arbor DDoS vs AWS Shield

Compared 3% of the time

Imperva DDoS vs AWS Shield

Compared 3% of the time

More AWS Shield Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Akamai App and API Protector

November 2024

Download Akamai App and API Protector product report

Buyer's Guide

AWS Shield

November 2024

Download AWS Shield product report

Also Known As

Akamai Web Application Protector, Akamai Kona Site Defender, Akamai Kona DDoS Defender

No data available

Learn More

Akamai

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Overview

Akamai App and API Protector provides website security by preventing DDoS attacks, acting as an application firewall, managing content delivery, and monitoring APIs. It adapts to threat profiles and is used for fast media delivery and identifying malicious activities.

Akamai App and API Protector offers strong protection, adaptable security features, and efficient traffic management. Its WAF blocks IP addresses and country-specific threats while preventing SQL injections. Companies utilize it for scalable CDN services and comprehensive traffic analysis. Known for its cost-effectiveness and user-friendly dashboard, this protector stands out for its customizable rules and technical support. Users also highlight the ease of integration and detailed attack insights available through its advanced dashboard.

What are the key features of Akamai App and API Protector?

DDoS Protection: Strong defense against Distributed Denial of Service attacks.
Scalable CDN: Manages content delivery efficiently under high traffic loads.
WAF Capabilities: Blocks specific IPs and countries, prevents SQL injections.
Traffic Filtering: Analyzes and controls incoming requests to maintain security.
Adaptive Stream Delivery: Adjusts content delivery to meet bandwidth needs.

What benefits should users expect?

Cost-Effectiveness: Provides robust security tools at a competitive price.
Enhanced Security: Comprehensive protection against cyber threats.
Scalability: Easily handles increasing traffic and data loads.
Ease of Integration: Simple integration with existing systems.
Insightful Analytics: Offers data-driven insights into traffic and attack patterns.

In media, Akamai App and API Protector ensures smooth streaming by handling high bandwidth demands. E-commerce companies use it to guard against fraud and data breaches. Financial sectors rely on its ability to protect sensitive transactions. Implementations in healthcare focus on safeguarding patient data while maintaining compliance with regulations.

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

Buyer's Guide

AWS Shield vs. Akamai App and API Protector

October 2024

Free Report: AWS Shield vs. Akamai App and API Protector

Find out what your peers are saying about AWS Shield vs. Akamai App and API Protector and other solutions. Updated: October 2024.

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814,649 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our AWS Shield vs. Akamai App and API Protector report.

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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.