Azure Front Door vs Uplynk comparison

Microsoft and Uplynk are both solutions in the CDN category. Microsoft is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.9, while Uplynk is ranked #9 with an average rating of 8.0. Microsoft holds a 13.1% mindshare in CDN, compared to Uplynk’s 4.3% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Microsoft users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Uplynk users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 14, 2025

Uplynk and Azure Front Door are competing products in the content delivery network space. Azure Front Door edges out Uplynk with its robust features and overall value proposition, making it an attractive choice for complex, scalable needs.

Features: Uplynk offers straightforward video streaming with effective DRM protection, while Azure Front Door provides global load balancing, application acceleration, and advanced security options. Its advanced integration capabilities stand out as a key advantage.

Room for Improvement: Uplynk could enhance its feature set with more advanced capabilities like global load balancing and application acceleration. Azure Front Door might improve by simplifying its initial setup process and making it more user-friendly for rapid deployment.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Uplynk is noted for its simplicity and quick setup, appealing to organizations seeking rapid deployment. Azure Front Door offers more in terms of service scope but may require more time in initial setup. Both provide strong support, with Azure possibly offering more comprehensive service integrations.

Pricing and ROI: Uplynk's pricing model is attractive for cost-effective solutions with a focus on basic streaming needs, offering quick setup and positive ROI. Azure Front Door justifies its higher initial expenditure with long-term performance efficiencies and scalability, aligning better with enterprises seeking a powerful solution.

To learn more, read our detailed Azure Front Door vs. Uplynk Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Azure Front Door vs. Uplynk

December 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

Cloudflare

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2025, in the CDN category, the mindshare of Cloudflare is 20.0%, down from 21.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Azure Front Door is 13.1%, down from 20.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Uplynk is 4.3%, up from 2.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

CDN Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Cloudflare	20.0%
Azure Front Door	13.1%
Uplynk	4.3%
Other	62.6%

CDN

Featured Reviews

Herb Angle

Owner at Hga consulting

Has helped manage client domains with streamlined access control and threat visibility

I don't know what areas could be improved with Cloudflare WAF; Cloudflare is constantly improving and adding features to their feature set. They're doing a good job, and as far as DNS and support for any domains that I create or my clients create, it's mandatory for me to make sure that they have Cloudflare as their DNS provider. The Cloudflare load balancing capability hasn't really helped in enhancing my website's uptime and resiliency because we don't really get that much traffic; it's mostly remote users, and web hosting is done by a web hosting service. It doesn't pay to try to host your own website.

Read full review

reviewer2226693

Architect at a tech vendor with 5,001-10,000 employees

Optimizing global application performance with robust security measures and advanced traffic management

DDoS capabilities in Azure Front Door could certainly be improved. Although Microsoft states it comes with basic DDoS protections out of the box, I find it often ineffectual in mitigating thousands of requests from a single source in a short span of time. User then have to rely on the WAF module where users must configure rate-limiting rules, as it does not automatically sense malicious spikes in traffic. I believe Front Door should have an out-of-the-box premium DDoS protection that can automatically detect and block malicious traffic. I would appreciate improvements in the turnaround time for support, especially since issues with Azure Front Door are usually critical for businesses. If there is an issue, it often results in downtime for line of business applications. I have faced this situation multiple times as one of the largest financial institutions in India is hosted there, adhering to strict SLAs that require prompt responses.

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Joe Hernandez

Senior Software Engineer at OmniTier Inc

Improved mobile app development and user experience through optimization and security

The most valuable aspects include the optimization of application performance by optimizing API calls for a smoother user experience and faster load times. Furthermore, I restructured our code base to establish a more efficient development workflow. During my tenure, I integrated various security features for mobile applications, such as JWT tokens for secure authentication and data encryption using AES algorithms. I also focused on secure storage options, secure coding practices, and platform-specific security compliance, like Android's SafeNet and iOS Secure Enclave.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"What I like best about Cloudflare is that my company can use it to trace and manage applications and monitor traffic. The solution tells you if there's a spike in traffic. Cloudflare also sends you a link to check your equipment and deployment and track it through peering, so it's a valuable tool."

"From what I've seen so far, there are no negatives to report as of yet"

"The web application firewall brought us good security and a view of the accesses/blocks of the entire domain and subdomain that were accessed both by region (country) and IPs."

"Cloudflare has many features."

"The solution is very good at mitigating threats."

"Cloudflare DNS is widely used, and it's good for websites. If we use Cloudflare DNS and update one record, it updates in their office instantly."

"I rate its stability a ten out of ten."

"Cloudflare is a security SaaS provider that provides security and protects us from any application layer attack."

More Cloudflare pros

"Azure Front Door's advanced routing rules for traffic management are highly effective, allowing you to configure HTTP tags, change different header or header response values, configure origin domains, and add security to your Layer 7 using these routing rules."

"The web application firewall is a great feature."

"The tool is easy to use for beginners."

"I am impressed with the tool's integrations."

"The most valuable feature is that I can have CDN and load-balancing capabilities in a single service instead of managing two separate tools."

"You can assign as many web application firewall policies as you want to the same instance of Front Door."

"I particularly appreciate its load-balancing capabilities as it allows us to manage multiple instances and support a global presence effectively."

"It inspects the traffic at the network level before it comes into Azure. We can do SSL offloading, and it can detect abnormalities before the traffic comes into the application. It can be used globally and is easy to set up. It is also quite stable and scalable."

More Azure Front Door pros

"The Rules Engine V4 is the most valuable feature."

"The customer support and service responsiveness were excellent."

"The product is easy to use and easy to implement."

"It's super easy to use and integrate with."

"The tool's most valuable feature is the Uplynk platform for streaming purposes."

Cons

"We have noticed multiple instances where Cloudflare falsely indicates that our servers are down, even when there is no actual load on them. This makes it challenging for us to identify the exact issue."

"Cloudflare's free plan is limited to 5,000 records for their free plan. They should increase that. For example, if I create a domain called abc.com and a subdomain called a.abc.com, my record count will be two. I can make a maximum of 5,000 subdomains. However, if we use our own DNS hosted on another provider, there is no limit. Their free plan also lacks name server customization."

"They lack a good way to manage DNS as a company, since everything is relegated to single account logins until you get to the higher levels. They have come out with a paid feature to remedy this, but I have not had a chance to fully review it yet to know if it fixes the access problem."

"There could be more courses with engineers. I like e-learning, however, having a specialist in a classroom is more comfortable for me."

"Areas like how assessment, discovery, and payload are dealt with and how it all comes into your organization can be considered when trying to make suggestions to Cloudflare for improvements."

"Although I think it's quite good, it doesn't provide me with all the features I would expect to have if I were using Imperva."

"One area of improvement is in the Access Rules. Hypothetically, if we wanted to block or challenge traffic outside of the United States, the only way to currently do that (as far as I know) is to enter every single country outside of the United States. That could be a labor intensive job. A solution could be to enable users to create a rule where traffic is only allowed within a certain country."

"There should be a specific price list for enterprise-level customers."

More Cloudflare cons

"This is a relatively expensive solution."

"I dislike the URL set parameters."

"My suggestion for improvement would be to enhance the Data Export feature to include specific tables, particularly the Azure Diagnostics table."

"There could be improvements regarding its pricing for large-scale projects."

"The product's features are limited compared to Cloudflare. The tool also doesn't work well in a hybrid environment. I would like to see a way to add personalized APIs in the system."

"The tool should improve its cost."

"The user interface needs improvement as it is difficult to create the mapping to link the problem with your private address sources."

"In the tool, there needs to be a good amount of monitoring in the area of health probes to capture in front of what is happening."

More Azure Front Door cons

"The tool needs to resolve its lack of innovation."

"The web interface of the Verizon Edgecast portal is very old. It's not user-friendly, slow, and it is missing some valuable features like the ability to make bulk changes."

"We could not create more than 15 custom rules."

"In the next release, I would like to see more global endpoints for their CDN and a lower price."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost primarily depends on the size of the organization."

"When you compare Cloudflare DNS to other solutions, such as Akamai, the price is reasonable."

"The product's pricing is minimal compared to other products."

"We are using the free version."

"A free version of the solution is available."

"We don't have any issues with the price."

"There are no additional costs beyond the standard licensing fees."

"The price of the solution is expensive."

More Cloudflare pricing and cost advice

"The pricing of the solution is good."

"Considering the standard licensing of the tool, even though we have not checked the billing as of now, it might not be very costly."

"The solution is a bit expensive."

"It is on a pay-as-you-go basis."

"The transition to the premium tier has led to increased costs, making it more expensive than the classic tier."

"The product is expensive."

"Be careful about the options because to have all the features can be very expensive."

"When I modeled it out, we are spending somewhere between $600 to $800 a month with Verizon EdgeCast."

"The product is cheaper compared to other solutions."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

14%

Financial Services Firm

13%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Comms Service Provider

13%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Computer Software Company

10%

Outsourcing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	46
Midsize Enterprise	8
Large Enterprise	25

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	9

No data available

Questions from the Community

Which is the best DDoS protection solution for a big ISP for monitoring and mitigating?

Cloudflare. We are moving from Akamai prolexic to Cloudflare. Cloudflare anycast network outperforms Akamai static GR...

See all answers

Which would you choose - Cloudflare DNS or Quad9?

Cloudflare DNS is a very fast, very reliable public DNS resolver. It is an enterprise-grade authoritative DNS service...

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What do you like most about Cloudflare?

Cloudflare offers CDN and DDoS protection. We have the front end, API, and database in how you structure applications.

See all answers

What's the difference between Azure Front Door and Application Gateway?

We found Azure Front Door to be easily scaled and very stable. The implementation is very fast and Microsoft provides...

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What do you like most about Azure Front Door?

Rules Engine is a valuable feature.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Front Door?

I am not sure about the pricing but believe Azure Front Door might require a higher cost due to its entry point nature.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Edgio Global CDN?

The pricing was initially very expensive. However, after improving and restructuring the application, it became more ...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Edgio Global CDN?

Regarding improvements, I focused on testing and compatibility to ensure reliability across various mobile devices. B...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Edgio Global CDN?

I usually use the product for mobile development. At my last company, OmniTier, I worked as a senior principal softwa...

See all answers

Comparisons

Quad9 vs Cloudflare

Compared 52% of the time

Akamai vs Cloudflare

Compared 4% of the time

Imperva Application Security Platform vs Cloudflare

Compared 3% of the time

Azure DNS vs Cloudflare

Compared 2% of the time

Radware DDoS vs Cloudflare

Compared 2% of the time

More Cloudflare Competitors

Amazon CloudFront vs Azure Front Door

Compared 14% of the time

Akamai vs Azure Front Door

Compared 11% of the time

AWS Global Accelerator vs Azure Front Door

Compared 8% of the time

Imperva Application Security Platform vs Azure Front Door

Compared 5% of the time

NGINX App Protect vs Azure Front Door

Compared 3% of the time

More Azure Front Door Competitors

Akamai vs Uplynk

Compared 13% of the time

Windows Azure CDN vs Uplynk

Compared 8% of the time

Fastly vs Uplynk

Compared 7% of the time

Amazon CloudFront vs Uplynk

Compared 5% of the time

Lumen Content Delivery Network vs Uplynk

Compared 5% of the time

More Uplynk Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cloudflare

December 2025

Download Cloudflare product report

Buyer's Guide

Azure Front Door

December 2025

Download Azure Front Door product report

Buyer's Guide

Data Replication

November 2025

Download Uplynk product report

Also Known As

Cloudflare DNS

Azure Front-Door

Edgio, Limelight Content Delivery, Limelight Orchestrate Delivery, Limelight Origin Storage, Global CDN, Verizon EdgeCast

Overview

Cloudflare enhances web performance and security with features like CDN caching and DDoS mitigation while providing easy DNS management and intuitive setup through its user-friendly dashboard.

Cloudflare is recognized for its comprehensive web security and performance solutions. Speed improvements are achieved through caching mechanisms and DDoS protection, combining ease of DNS management with flexible page rules. The robust analytics and threat insight tools provide valuable data, assisted by a user-friendly dashboard allowing quick setup and configuration. An API offers dynamic DNS settings ensuring low latency and high performance across the globe.

What are Cloudflare's key features?

CDN Caching: Enhances website speed through content delivery network caching.
Web Application Firewall: Protects websites from online threats.
DDoS Mitigation: Shields against distributed denial-of-service attacks.
DNS Management: Offers easy-to-use and flexible domain management.
SSL Certificates: Ensures secure connections between users and servers.
Analytics: Provides insights with robust analytics tools.

What benefits and ROI should users evaluate?

Enhanced Security: Strengthening web security with DDoS and firewall protection.
Speed Improvement: Faster content delivery with CDN caching.
Operational Simplicity: Simplifies website optimization through a user-friendly interface.
Scalable Solutions: Scales with global reach, lowering latency for improved performance.
Cost Efficiency: Offers layers of valuable functionality with pricing options.

Cloudflare finds utility across industries for DNS management and defense mechanisms. Its content delivery network assures fast content distribution and fortified security. Businesses integrate features like web application firewalls, load balancing, end-to-end SSL, and zero trust to protect websites from cyber threats while ensuring resilience and reliable performance.

Cloudflare

Azure Front Door enhances web application performance and security by leveraging traffic inspection, SSL offloading, and a web application firewall. It enables intelligent routing, load balancing, and global resource deployment while providing essential features for online application security.

Azure Front Door integrates GitOps for seamless deployment, offering significant capabilities in giant networks like CDN functionalities and DDoS protection. Its advanced configurations include traffic analytics and transit layer security. Despite its affordability and scalability, users see room for improvement in global load balancing and private IP address support, citing integration challenges with other cloud vendors. The interface may appear complex, and some users desire more transparent pricing, better DDoS defenses, and enhanced monitoring. This platform is especially beneficial for securing external traffic and optimizing content delivery, providing DNS integration and disaster recovery mechanisms.

What are the key features of Azure Front Door?

Traffic Inspection: Enhances security with comprehensive traffic analysis at the network level.
SSL Offloading: Streamlines SSL certificate management and encryption processes.
Web Application Firewall: Offers protection against web vulnerabilities and threats.
Global Resource Implementation: Facilitates deployment across multiple regions.
Intelligent Routing and Load Balancing: Optimizes traffic distribution for efficient performance.
Bot and DDoS Protection: Shields applications from malicious traffic and attacks.
CDN Capabilities: Accelerates content delivery with local caching and optimized routing.

What benefits and ROI should users expect?

Affordability: Provides robust features at competitive pricing.
Scalability: Adapts easily to growing traffic demands and business needs.
Security: Delivers comprehensive defenses against cyber threats.
Performance Optimization: Enhances application responsiveness and delivery speed.
Global Reach: Supports globally distributed applications with ease.

In industries focusing on online presence and global user engagement, Azure Front Door is invaluable for optimizing web application performance. E-commerce platforms deploy it to secure transactions and enhance load times. Media companies leverage its CDN and security features to ensure seamless content delivery. Enterprises with international operations find it crucial for reliable and secure data access across regions.

Microsoft

Uplynk is a robust platform providing CDN integration and optimized streaming services, improving user experience and application performance. It offers control over CDN caching, redirects, and asset transformations, supporting seamless asset management and mobile security.

Uplynk enhances application performance through efficient API calls, optimized web server loads, and robust CDN configurations. It ensures high availability and performance by leveraging Verizon EdgeCast CDN, crucial for managing high-volume traffic on e-commerce platforms. Though Uplynk excels in asset caching and mobile security with JWT tokens and AES encryption, some users note its global reach needs improvement, and its interface lacks modern user-friendliness. Deployment of new rules can be slower compared to competitors, while documentation and rate limiting features require enhancement. Despite this, Uplynk remains a preferred choice for organizations seeking streamlined web server load optimization and enhanced application performance.

What are Uplynk's key features?

Rules Engine V4: Manages CDN caching, redirects, and asset transformations.
Seamless Integration: Easily integrates with Verizon's existing offerings.
Efficient API Calls: Enhances streaming and application performance.
Staging Support: Testing in staging environments without impacting production.
Mobile Security: Includes JWT tokens and AES encryption.

What benefits should users expect in reviews?

Improved Load Times: Efficient CDN configurations enhance site speed.
Enhanced User Navigation: Optimized performance for high-volume traffic.
DDoS Protection: Layer 3, 4, and 7 protection for comprehensive security.
Performance Optimization: Mobile development and streamlined caching.

Organizations deploy Uplynk to optimize web server load, enhance streaming service performance and support high-traffic volume management, especially in e-commerce. Its security measures, combined with Verizon EdgeCast CDN, ensure high availability and reliable performance, enhancing mobile engagement through specialized frameworks.

Uplynk

Sample Customers

Trusted by over 9,000,000 Internet Applications and APIs, including Nasdaq, Zendesk, Crunchbase, Steve Madden, OkCupid, Cisco, Quizlet, Discord and more.

Information Not Available

TD Ameritrade, Plus500, Solvay Bank, Yahoo, Deckers Brands, and Coach

Buyer's Guide

Azure Front Door vs. Uplynk

December 2025

Free Report: Azure Front Door vs. Uplynk

Find out what your peers are saying about Azure Front Door vs. Uplynk and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.

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