Cisco IOS SSL VPN vs F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) comparison

Cisco and F5 are both solutions in the SSL VPN category. Cisco is ranked #3 with an average rating of 8.7, while F5 is ranked #5 with an average rating of 8.1. Cisco holds a 8.1% mindshare in SV, compared to F5’s 14.6% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Cisco users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 87% of F5 users who would recommend it.

Cisco IOS SSL VPN

Read 47 Cisco IOS SSL VPN reviews

652 Views
395 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Man...

Read 15 F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) reviews

742 Views
605 Comparison Views

87% willing to recommend

Cisco IOS SSL VPN

F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Man...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 12, 2025

Cisco IOS SSL VPN and F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) are major competitors in the secure remote access market. Cisco IOS SSL VPN holds an advantage in ease of use and scalability, whereas F5 BIG-IP APM is often preferred for its comprehensive features and advanced customization capabilities.

Features: Cisco IOS SSL VPN is recognized for its simple user-based authentication, robust encryption, and high scalability, making it reliable and straightforward for quick configuration creation. F5 BIG-IP APM shines with advanced network integration abilities, offering customizable user portals and solid performance, favorable in large enterprise settings for managing complex networking challenges.

Room for Improvement: Cisco IOS SSL VPN could improve its pricing, support for multi-layered networks, and integration with newer technologies, as its graphical interface is seen as outdated. F5 BIG-IP APM faces criticism for its complex initial setup, with users seeking better reporting and operational deployment, along with enhancements in pricing, automation, and integration capabilities.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Cisco IOS SSL VPN is stable and easy to deploy, especially in hybrid and on-premises environments, with strong local and partner support. F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager provides versatile deployment choices and good customer support, though its cloud capabilities require further advancement. Both receive favorable technical support feedback, with Cisco noted for consistent and globally responsive service.

Pricing and ROI: Both Cisco IOS SSL VPN and F5 BIG-IP APM are considered expensive. Cisco’s various licensing options align with its comprehensive security features, yet users demand more flexible pricing. F5 BIG-IP APM is straightforward in licensing but perceived as costly. Users report strong ROI for each, with Cisco's bundled security features particularly validating its higher cost.

To learn more, read our detailed Cisco IOS SSL VPN vs. F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) Report (Updated: January 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Cisco IOS SSL VPN vs. F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)

January 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

Cisco IOS SSL VPN

Ranking in SSL VPN

3rd

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Enterprise Infrastructure VPN (9th)

F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Man...

Ranking in SSL VPN

5th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Secure Web Gateways (SWG) (19th), Network Access Control (NAC) (8th), Remote Access (11th), Access Management (10th)

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the SSL VPN category, the mindshare of Cisco IOS SSL VPN is 8.1%, down from 11.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) is 14.6%, down from 16.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

SSL VPN

Featured Reviews

Rupesh Kolhapurkar

Manager at Reliance Industries Ltd

Offers easy setup phase but needs to improve connectivity

For our company's remote workforce connectivity, the tool was very useful during the COVID-19 situation. In general, the VPN functionality offered by the product was very useful during the COVID-19 situation. In terms of the product's ability to secure third-party access, the tool works very well. The most valuable feature of the product in terms of network security stems from the fact that the tool provides access to the whole network, and even if users give access to some special applications, it is still really helpful. The clientless access feature is not available for clients. My company installed the product for its clients. If the product offers a clientless access feature, then it is okay and can be very helpful for our company. I recommend the product to those who plan to use it. Cisco IOS SSL VPN is a reliable product. The product is very helpful for a work-from-home setup as the tool can be used to access our company's internal network, which Falls outside the network of our organization. I rate the tool a seven to eight out of ten.

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Ashish Kumar Rai

Associate Network Engineer at a computer software company with 11-50 employees

Offers remote access control, good GUI and easy to configure

I'd suggest improved documentation integration directly within the GUI. Right now, finding comprehensive documentation often requires going to external websites like the community portal. In the APM interface itself, they could add direct hyperlinks to relevant online documentation. This would provide easy access to admin guides and other resources when working within the GUI.

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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

"The most valuable features are that it's reliable, convenient, and easy. It always works if configured well."

"A reliable and stable solution for remote network access."

"The solution is very reliable."

"The solution is very easy to work with. This is its most valuable feature. They also did a good job surrounding how you configure the devices."

"The feature I find most valuable, is the management portal."

"The platform provides value and benefits to our organization through efficient and effective communication."

"Cisco IOS SSL VPN is integrated with domain controller, SSO and MFA."

"The multicast feature is useful for us."

More Cisco IOS SSL VPN pros

"The most valuable feature is the virtual IP creation. It's our most frequently used feature."

"Our customers have never complained about the stability"

"This is a product that is easy to install and integrate, and it is simple to use."

"F5 BIG-IP APM is relatively easy to use."

"The product allows us to create customized portals for your users."

"The tool is reliable and easy to configure."

"The performance of the solution is valuable."

"Our organization is small - a college with about 3,500 students. We use F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager to protect our site, especially from the Iranian attacks we faced last year. We restrict access to only inside the country."

More F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) pros

Cons

"Multi-factor authentication in Cisco IOS SSL VPN has certain shortcomings that need improvement."

"Cisco has a history of problems with the area of web filtering, because of which my company sometimes had to change the vendor and the appliance."

"Improvements could be made in terms of connectivity for applications."

"The high price of the product is an area of concern where improvements are required."

"The flexibility of configurations could be improved."

"The configuration is critical and complex."

"It can be difficult to find service and at times we cannot connect with the internet easily."

"Cisco IOS SSL VPN should add a sensor that can authenticate with a fingerprint instead of having to type the username and password every time."

More Cisco IOS SSL VPN cons

"I'd suggest improved documentation integration directly within the GUI. Right now, finding comprehensive documentation often requires going to external websites like the community portal."

"The operational deployment is not great."

"In my opinion, the GUI side needs some improvement based on my usage. Sometimes, it doesn't work as efficiently as the CLI side."

"F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager has room for improvement in integration with other products."

"The price of this product can be improved."

"The technical support’s response time must be improved."

"I have had a lot of issues in the past few months with the agents, which was disappointing."

"The initial setup was complex."

More F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is an expensive product."

"The licensing fee is expensive."

"Cisco IOS SSL VPN is more expensive than the Aruba VPN, but it is worth the money."

"There are no pricing programs for non-profit organizations and the product is otherwise expensive by comparison."

"It stands as the priciest solution available in the market."

"The tool is expensive."

"The licensing cost of the solution is on a yearly basis, and it is expensive compared to other solutions in the market."

"FortiGate does not charge the client a licensing fee, although Cisco charges clients a couple of dollars per year for each license."

More Cisco IOS SSL VPN pricing and cost advice

"The product is very expensive."

"I rate the tool's pricing an eight out of ten."

"Recently, they have simplified the licensing"

"The tool is a little bit expensive."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

21%

Financial Services Firm

13%

Educational Organization

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

14%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Computer Software Company

11%

Government

10%

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco IOS SSL VPN?

The solution is pretty fast.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco IOS SSL VPN?

It is an expensive product.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Cisco IOS SSL VPN?

Sometimes, the product does not connect with the Wi-Fi. It usually does, but sometimes, if I'm using another Wi-Fi apart from my work Wi-Fi, it does not connect. It shows some error. If I have to w...

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What do you like most about F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)?

In my opinion, the GUI is perfect with the configuration options provided. F5 BIG-IP has given customization options and policy configuration tools in the GUI. It's good and good enough to work.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)?

I rate the tool's pricing an eight out of ten.

See all answers

What needs improvement with F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)?

Sometimes, if I erase or add a new agent in the policy, I can't go backwards, even if I haven't saved the access policy. I want the option to delete it, however, there's no option. I need to create...

See all answers

Comparisons

Ivanti Connect Secure vs Cisco IOS SSL VPN

Compared 35% of the time

Citrix Gateway vs Cisco IOS SSL VPN

Compared 14% of the time

Fortinet FortiClient vs Cisco IOS SSL VPN

Compared 12% of the time

OpenVPN Access Server vs Cisco IOS SSL VPN

Compared 11% of the time

Zyxel VPN Client vs Cisco IOS SSL VPN

Compared 11% of the time

More Cisco IOS SSL VPN Competitors

Citrix Gateway vs F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)

Compared 10% of the time

CyberArk Privileged Access Manager vs F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)

Compared 9% of the time

Ivanti Connect Secure vs F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)

Compared 9% of the time

Aruba ClearPass vs F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)

Compared 6% of the time

Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) vs F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)

Compared 6% of the time

More F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cisco IOS SSL VPN

February 2025

Download Cisco IOS SSL VPN product report

Buyer's Guide

F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)

February 2025

F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) report

Download F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) product report

Also Known As

Cisco SSL VPN

F5 Access Policy Manager

Overview

Cisco SSL VPN solutions help you easily and securely extend the network to users who have access to the Internet and a web browser. You can customize access and extend the reach of your corporate network to individuals based on their roles, including teleworker contractors and business partners.

Cisco

F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) is an access management proxy solution for managing global access to the enterprise networks, cloud providers, applications, and application programming interfaces (APIs). Through a single management interface, BIG-IP APM consolidates remote, mobile, network, virtual, and web access.

BIG-IP APM can also serve as a bridge between modern and classic authentication and authorization protocols and methods. For applications which are unable to support modern authentication and authorization protocols, like SAML and OAuth with OIDC, but which do support classic authentication methods, BIG-IP APM converts user credentials to the appropriate authentication standard supported by the application.

BIG-IP APM Benefits:

Ease of use
Flexibility
Ability to integrate with other systems
Security features
Granular access control
Responsive and helpful support team

BIG-IP APM Features:

Support for Identity Aware Proxy (IAP) enabling Zero Trust application access
Context-based authorization with dynamic L4/L7 ACLs
Integration with third-party MFA solutions
DTLS 2.0 mode for delivering and securing applications
SAML 2.0 identity federation support
Support for OAuth 2.0 authorization protocol
SSO support for classic authentication (Kerberos, header- based, etc.), credential caching, OAuth 2.0, SAML 2.0, and FIDO2 (U2F)
AAA server authentication and high-availability
Integration with leading IAM vendor products (Microsoft, Okta, Ping Identity)
BIG IP Edge Client and F5 Access integrate with VMware Horizon ONE (AirWatch), Microsoft Intune and IBM MaaS360
Risk-based access leveraging third-party UEBA and risk engines (HTTP Connector)

Reviews from Real Users

Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by BIG-IP APM users.

Mahmmoud Rabie, Senior Site Reliability Engineer, writes that BIG-IP APM is "A highly stable solution for load balancing, but the initial setup is complex."

Clyde Livingston, Senior Process Specialist at Telstra, says that BIG-IP APM is "Easy to use, useful access remotely, but lacking stability."

Chris Lam, Senior Solution Consultant at Macroview Telecom Limited, states that BIG-IP APM is "Useful for remote access VPN and VPI integration with VMware.

Sample Customers

MST Systems

City Bank, Ricacorp Properties, Miele, American Systems, Bangladesh Post Office

Buyer's Guide

Cisco IOS SSL VPN vs. F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)

January 2025

Free Report: Cisco IOS SSL VPN vs. F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)

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