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Barracuda Web Application Firewall vs F5 Advanced WAF comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

Barracuda Web Application F...
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
15th
Average Rating
8.2
Number of Reviews
40
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
F5 Advanced WAF
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
3rd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
60
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2024, in the Web Application Firewall (WAF) category, the mindshare of Barracuda Web Application Firewall is 2.0%, down from 2.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of F5 Advanced WAF is 12.0%, up from 10.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Web Application Firewall (WAF)
 

Featured Reviews

Carlo Bertini - PeerSpot reviewer
Sep 8, 2023
Provides strong issue discovery capabilities; enhance the security parameters of web applications and suitable for medium to large enterprises
The Barracuda support depends. Sometimes, they solve the issue promptly, but normally, they are not so fast and are not entirely focused on the problem. For example, sometimes I write many requests on the tickets, asking for one, two, three, or four steps and asking for one to three resolutions. Often, they respond with only one or two. So, I need to push again and again. In other cases, I ask questions and get positive feedback immediately, depending on who the technician is. Barracuda has engineers in the USA, UK, and other countries, so it depends on the technician's location and expertise. So, I am not completely satisfied, but sometimes it is okay, and sometimes it is not okay. So, depending on the region and depending on the person who actually receives these tickets, the technical support could be more knowledgeable. So they may need some training or education for the entire staff to respond immediately without any delays. Often, it happens that they respond because they need to, not because they understand the technology I'm using. So they respond just because it's required by the service level agreement, which specifies a response time within four hours. But this is just a response, not a resolution of the case. Sometimes, the response is within the agreed time, but the solution takes much longer.
YUSUF  TAIWO - PeerSpot reviewer
Oct 26, 2023
Ensures a robust and unified security approach for our clients
My clients often seek a comprehensive security solution for their hybrid environments, with both cloud and on-premise web applications. To address this, I recommend combining F5 Advanced WAF for web application security with Fortinet solutions, including FortiGate, FortiSign, and FortiAnalyzer, for…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature is the automatic content filtering."
"The volumetric DDoS defense is very good because I had a problem with a lot of volumetric DDoS attacks on my servers. After using Barracuda, those attacks have stopped and all the traffic is going smoothly to my servers and the system is working really well."
"If an attack is coming continuously, you can ask the device to block it temporarily for two to three minutes. F5 has not provided us with an option to block certain IPs for some time. Barracuda can help you block someone if the source is from a different IP. You can apply the rule to the device and block it for whatsoever time you want. The solution will unblock the IP after the prescribed time as well."
"The product's advanced bot and threat protection capabilities are valuable."
"The solution offers multiple security features. There are machine learning features and great URL encryption. It also offers multi-protocol support against DDoS attacks."
"We only need one subscription to be protected against both active DDoS and offline DDoS attacks."
"Its recommendation about the probabilities on the website is great. It also has free probability managers for the website, which is really helpful. The protection engine, signature-based protection behavior, and analysis features are also great. It also has an ATP module for sandbox scanning and behavior analysis for file uploads."
"We run it with no downtime, because it has good support."
"It protects and mitigates damage in the network."
"The most valuable feature is that it is secure."
"My favorite feature of F5 is the ability to play around with the ciphers. I also like the ability to have an immediate display of the support IDs when a real blockage occurs. The protection offered is great."
"The solution is easily accessible on mobile and laptop devices."
"I like the security features, especially against SQL injection."
"Web attack signatures are very important for detecting web attacks."
"The most valuable feature is artificial intelligence and to get extra internal access."
"Identification, ease of use, and ease of modifying it to most of our needs are valuable."
 

Cons

"The reporting aspect of the solution needs improvement. I don't find that it's very good. They could do some work on it to make it much better. It's not that the reporting isn't secure. It's just that I would prefer to store my reports for an extended period of time. Right now, that's not possible and I'd prefer it if that could change. I also would say that the reports themselves are expensive."
"We get false positives about phishing emails."
"They should improve their features, so they easily compare to the competition."
"In the Barracuda Web Application Firewall, there should be more affordable options for WAF as a service."
"Barracuda Web Application Firewall’s scalability needs improvement."
"There are issues when upgrading firewalls and we experience different issues across customers."
"I have to go to an individual obligation, make changes, and come out, and go to the next obligation and make the same changes. There is no grouping option."
"The documentation is lacking. It's not like what you'd get if you were using Juniper or Cisco. They need to expand on it and make it more useful."
"This solution can be made more user-friendly."
"The BIG-IQ is supposed to centralize the management for all of the boxes but it's not very effective."
"While F5 Advanced WAF does limit the number of partners in certain regions to ensure successful business transactions, they could also benefit from expanding their partnerships and making it easier for more people to learn about and become experts in F5 Advanced WAF. By doing so, they could increase the reach and exposure of their solution, similar to how Cisco has become widely recognized in the security industry."
"Its price should be better. It is expensive."
"F5 Advanced WAF could improve the precision of the scanning. There are many false positives. They should improve their threat database."
"More legacy protocols should be added to the solution."
"The reporting portion of F5 Advance WAF is not great. They need to work out something better, as it is very basic. You only see the top IPs, I think there is more they can offer."
"F5 Advanced needs to improve its bot protection. The solution needs to have machine learning to learn the behavior of the customer to recognize the human versus the bot. This is a difficult feature to explain to our customers. I would like documentation about the bot feature to make it easier for the customer to understand."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of this solution is okay."
"The product pricing was competitive for the value it offers regarding security features."
"The pricing is reasonable."
"While I would have to check on the price of the solution, I feel it to be okay and it matches the market price."
"The product is expensive."
"The price is reasonable, more so than other products."
"In my opinion, the product is fairly priced."
"Barracuda costs us $8,000 per year. Barracuda costs $20,000 for a full subscription, when you try to protect multi-site infrastructure, in different geographical zones and for different data centers. If you have only one site, Barracuda will be cheaper."
"F5 Advanced WAF pricing structure should be adjusted to meet the need of small to medium-sized companies."
"I am not sure about pricing but licenses are available on Google."
"The solution is very expensive so should only be used in the right environment."
"F5 Advanced WAF's pricing is high."
"I think the price is very high."
"The pricing for F5 Advanced WAF is comparable to a Rolls-Royce. Its price is a bit high when you compare it with other vendors. F5 Advanced WAF is a bit expensive. The customer was on a three-year plan and it was around $560,000."
"It is a little bit costly, but it has all the features that are required."
"There is a perpetual license that comes with your hardware. There is also an additional fee for support."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
20%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Educational Organization
9%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Barracuda Web Application Firewall?
It significantly improved our overall web security posture, addressing intrusions and enhancing control over web URLs in our environment.
What is your primary use case for Barracuda Web Application Firewall?
I use the solution in my company to protect our website.
What do you like most about F5 Advanced WAF?
It's a fairly easy-to-use and user-friendly tool. My administrators and team also like its ability to customize the rules per the requirements.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for F5 Advanced WAF?
I would rate the pricing as seven out of ten. Sometimes, for specific models, additional licenses over the standard one need to be purchased. F5 Advanced WAF doesn't offer a single license that fit...
What needs improvement with F5 Advanced WAF?
More legacy protocols should be added to the solution. The aforementioned protocols are generally less used and might have been phased out from multiple solutions. But some of the large corporation...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Oracle, CBS, Pioneer, Hyundai, Publix, Barnes Noble, Calzedonia, Nordstrom, Samsung, Nascar
MAXIMUS, Vivo, American Systems, Bangladesh Post Office, City Bank
Find out what your peers are saying about Barracuda Web Application Firewall vs. F5 Advanced WAF and other solutions. Updated: October 2024.
814,649 professionals have used our research since 2012.