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Barracuda WAF-as-a-Service vs Cloudflare Web Application Firewall comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 1, 2025

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

Barracuda WAF-as-a-Service
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
35th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
8.4
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Cloudflare Web Application ...
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
6th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
25
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Web Application Firewall (WAF) category, the mindshare of Barracuda WAF-as-a-Service is 0.8%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall is 5.8%, down from 6.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Web Application Firewall (WAF) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Cloudflare Web Application Firewall5.8%
Barracuda WAF-as-a-Service0.8%
Other93.4%
Web Application Firewall (WAF)
 

Featured Reviews

Tarandeep Kaur - PeerSpot reviewer
DevOps Manager at Flash.co
Security management has reduced ransomware risk and now protects cloud workloads efficiently
The best features that Barracuda WAF-as-a-Service offers are an intuitive centralized dashboard, allowing us to manage policies, Internet protocol servers, antiviruses, anti-DDoS attacks, and traffic shaping across multiple sites. This feature enables seamless scaling of our environments, especially as we work within Amazon Web Services. Additionally, real-time threat intelligence helps us to detect threats in real-time. Another major feature I love is application control and VPN support, providing granular visibility and protection without needing separate appliances. The centralized dashboard is helping us streamline visibility across our admin panels and provides site-to-site visibility deployed directly to our AWS environment, securing VPC traffic and ensuring the firewall is in place. The real-time threat intelligence is an advanced feature helping us track real-time attacks, such as anti-DDoS attacks, ransomware, or viruses that can compromise system integrity. Through the intuitive centralized dashboard, we can manage policies and set rules, assisting us effectively.
AU
IT Manager at Amla Commerce
Effectively protects clients from automated threats and ensures global security
I cannot say much about areas of improvement for Cloudflare Web Application Firewall because I haven't gone through deep understanding of it, as I am still learning. However, they need to improve their support because getting a response for basic requests took around 48 hours, which is too long. If I took 48 hours to answer a request at my company, it would be a tough time to see or address the issue, and it would be frustrating.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It provides an ease of policy management."
"The most valuable features of the solution are it is plug and play, has automated policies, a simple configuration, and is easy to create rules."
"The product's bot protection feature is valuable for our company."
"Barracuda WAF-as-a-Service has positively impacted our organization by reducing cyber threats like ransomware and phishing by ninety-five percent."
"I like its ability to identify known attacks, including DDOS attacks. It's valuable because software must be able to stop known attacks. Application attacks are evolving all the time. When it comes to software-as-a-service, we need to have software that knows about all the latest attacks. It should also protect against major unknown attacks."
"The solution can be used for threat prevention or as a cloud-to-cloud backup system"
"Some of the most valuable features of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall include its DNS zone setup and the zero trust policy."
"The integration of Cloudflare with Cloud Suite is its most valuable feature."
"Cloudflare has positively impacted my organization by making it easier for me to handle and set up DNS for multiple clients; I can easily go in and access their accounts, make changes they need, and it's a one-stop shop."
"The stability of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall deserves a perfect 10 out of 10."
"Cloudflare is cheaper compared to Azure WAF, which I have considered before."
"We like that there's load balancing, firewall capabilities, DDoS protection, et cetera, all covered by Cloudflare."
"The rate limiting features and customizations in terms of URL match and applying policies are valuable to me."
"The setup process is very simple for me."
 

Cons

"We found it a bit slow when accessing it through the web browser. The URL also exposed the user name and the hashed password. When I log into my Barracuda WAF user portal, I could see the username and the hashed password on the URL itself. So, it is not very secure, and it is important to take that off."
"The stability of the product is an area of concern where improvements are required."
"It's a very specific solution that is only requested for a customer's web code or their global IT policy."
"The solution can improve by bundling Security Operation Center (SOC) with the WAF-as-a-Service, it would provide a lot more value to customers."
"One significant area for improvement in Barracuda WAF-as-a-Service lies in its market positioning and pricing strategy."
"We have noticed some latency when the call goes through the firewall. That could be improved."
"It would be ideal if the solution offered better log integration and more integration with different platforms."
"Their documentation could be better. They don't have documentation that explains everything well. They have documentation for everything you're looking for, but they lack a single piece of documentation to tie everything together. As a new user or beginner, it took us a little bit of time to figure out how to put all these things in place."
"The product can improve by having more multitenancy capability, which is currently not available."
"They have some limitations with third-party integrations."
"They need to improve their support because getting a response for basic requests took around 48 hours, which is too long."
"Its stability could be better."
"The dashboard could be more user-friendly."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's very difficult for me to give an estimate of the cost. All I know is that we sell the box itself as a service."
"I rate the product's price a five on a scale of one to ten, where one is low, and ten is high. There are no additional costs to be paid apart from the standard licensing fees attached to the solution."
"The product is expensive but it offers flexible pricing. It could be affordable."
"The solution is expensive."
"What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing? I believe the pricing is not the best, but it's reasonable and acceptable. We also use the McAfee system in parallel. In terms of pricing, its okay - not great, but not bad either. It falls in the middle, which is acceptable. In terms of support licensing, last time, we were searching for a solution, and we considered products from resellers rather than directly from the cloud provider. However, the pricing we encountered was exceptionally high. As a result, we are inclined to select support from the reseller."
"It starts at $20 and can easily go up to $200 monthly"
"Cloudflare Web Application Firewall is more affordable than other solutions."
"The solution's pricing option needs to be more transparent for enterprise clients."
"The pricing model is very straightforward compared to the competition. You just pay per month for the product and usage."
"It is not too pricey."
"The annual licensing fee is $10,000 USD."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Government
15%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Insurance Company
7%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business15
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise6
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Barracuda WAF-as-a-Service?
One significant area for improvement in Barracuda WAF-as-a-Service lies in its market positioning and pricing strategy. Additionally, it could operate in a local data center. This limitation hinder...
What is your primary use case for Barracuda WAF-as-a-Service?
We use the product for securing email systems, protecting websites, and safeguarding web-based applications and portals.
What do you like most about Cloudflare Web Application Firewall?
The product has a valuable security control functionality.
What needs improvement with Cloudflare Web Application Firewall?
I don't really use the rule-based logic feature or utilize the WAF's ability to scale as a cloud-based service. I don't have specific areas that could be improved with Cloudflare Web Application Fi...
 

Also Known As

Barracuda WAF as a Service
Cloudflare WAF
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Salvation Army
crunchbase, udacity, marketo, okcupid, zendesk
Find out what your peers are saying about Barracuda WAF-as-a-Service vs. Cloudflare Web Application Firewall and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
880,481 professionals have used our research since 2012.