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F5 Advanced WAF vs F5 Silverline Managed Services comparison

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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:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
7.6
Cloudflare WAF offers quick ROI, crucial protection for e-commerce, saves bandwidth, and balances cost with valuable free features.
Sentiment score
7.6
F5 Advanced WAF boosts ROI by enhancing security, reducing overhead, and protecting assets in sectors like finance and banking.
Sentiment score
5.1
F5 Silverline Managed Services provides cost and time savings by replacing in-house cybersecurity, achieving varied ROI for users.
My experience with the pricing or licensing of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall is that many features can be accessed for free, so the pricing is definitely reasonable.
Owner at Hga consulting
Time savings in daily operations come from the automatic learning and signature update reducing the need for constant manual rule management, allowing the security and network teams to spend significantly less time handling false positive application-related escalations.
Cyber Security Consultant at ProTechmanize
Subscription models offer clearer ROI due to a more competitive pricing scheme.
Global Channel Alliances Lead at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
The amount of attacks it protects against is immense, more than F5 Advanced WAF itself costs.
Security Solutions Architect at a consultancy with 1-10 employees
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.3
Cloudflare WAF support is mixed; responsive for some, but Indian customers face call availability and administrative issues.
Sentiment score
6.9
F5 Advanced WAF's support is professional and helpful, though response times vary based on service level and issue priority.
Sentiment score
6.2
F5 Silverline Managed Services experiences mixed reviews; some praise responsiveness, others criticize inefficiencies and slow issue resolution.
I would rate the technical support with Cloudflare as excellent every time I've had to contact them.
Owner at Hga consulting
The technical support of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall rates between five and seven at maximum.
IT Manager at Amla Commerce
Both response time and availability need to be improved.
Project Manager at IBM
If there is a bug, the support is usually understanding and resolves issues.
CEO at CyberApp
I have interacted with F5's support, and while I have no major complaints, they could improve.
Global Channel Alliances Lead at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
I think 24/7 expert support and streamlined compliance management definitely benefit my company's security efforts.
Associate Vice President at Novac Technology Solutions
Configuration problems largely arise from customer misunderstanding, leading to cases opened for configuration aspects where AI has become increasingly useful.
Network And Security Consultant at TD SYNNEX
They resolve the issues by joining me to fix them.
Design & Delivery Senior Network Security Architect at Qiddiya Investment Company
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.7
Cloudflare Web Application Firewall offers impressive scalability and automated management, but additional features may incur costs for smaller organizations.
Sentiment score
7.5
F5 Advanced WAF is adaptable, scalable, and supports diverse business needs with robust load balancing and cloud capabilities.
Sentiment score
7.4
F5 Silverline Managed Services offers scalable solutions with easy upgrades and reliability for both moderate and extensive data demands.
The scalability of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall rates between 8 to 9, as it depends upon the use cases and what exactly the client needs.
IT Manager at Amla Commerce
I can run it in HA mode or even divide the traffic volume to the number of instances that I have based on their resource sizing.
Security Solutions Architect at a consultancy with 1-10 employees
The solution is fully scalable, and I would give it a rating of ten on a scale of one to ten for scalability.
Design & Delivery Senior Network Security Architect at Qiddiya Investment Company
F5 Silverline Managed Services is not a concern due to its scalability.
Associate Vice President at Novac Technology Solutions
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.2
Cloudflare Web Application Firewall is praised for stability, high performance, effective protection, daily use, and minimal downtime.
Sentiment score
8.4
F5 Advanced WAF is praised for its stability and reliability, handling substantial workloads effectively with minimal bugs.
Sentiment score
7.4
F5 Silverline is praised for stability, reliability, high uptime, and effective support, outperforming competitors like Imperva and Akamai.
The stability of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall deserves a perfect 10 out of 10.
IT Manager at Amla Commerce
F5 Advanced WAF has been very reliable and consistent for us; in our on-premise enterprise setup, it has been stable and predictable in day-to-day operations without any unexpected crashes or WAF-related downtime in production.
Cyber Security Consultant at ProTechmanize
F5 Advanced WAF is pretty stable.
Security Solutions Architect at a consultancy with 1-10 employees
 

Room For Improvement

Cloudflare WAF needs feature enhancements, better usability, improved support, advanced DDoS protection, and solutions for latency and alerts.
F5 Advanced WAF needs a user-friendly interface, better integration, competitive pricing, and improved automation, scalability, and documentation.
F5 Silverline Managed Services needs better integration, user interface, and advanced features, with concerns over stability, pricing, and automation.
The product can improve by having more multitenancy capability, which is currently not available.
Network Architect at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
I think they're doing a good job with DNS and as support for any domains that I create or that my clients create, it's mandatory for me to ensure they have Cloudflare as their DNS provider.
Owner at Hga consulting
And maybe something similar to Pushpin that Fastly has, which is an option where you can push messages that then can be scaled globally over the network.
CTO at PlayNirvana
Deployment training for F5 Advanced WAF is lacking and restricts growth by being inaccessible and costly for partners.
Global Channel Alliances Lead at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Overall, these are not blockers, merely enhancement opportunities, and once tuned, F5 Advanced WAF is very stable and reliable; improving usability, reporting, and onboarding would make it even more effective for larger environments.
Cyber Security Consultant at ProTechmanize
There is excellent clarity in the LTM and the WAF.
Project Manager at IBM
F5 Silverline Managed Services needs to adapt compliances related to India's DPDP.
Associate Vice President at Novac Technology Solutions
Improvements could include the creation of highly optimized profiles.
Design & Delivery Senior Network Security Architect at Qiddiya Investment Company
The adaptable and flexible security can help prevent threats in learning mode, but admins need to be cautious about false positives that could affect production due to unrecognized vulnerabilities.
Network And Security Consultant at TD SYNNEX
 

Setup Cost

Cloudflare Web Application Firewall offers affordable, flexible pricing with no upfront costs, noted for competitiveness and included support services.
F5 Advanced WAF's high cost is justified by its robust features, appealing to enterprises needing comprehensive protection.
F5 Silverline Managed Services offer negotiable pricing, potentially higher than competitors, with additional costs for features like Web Application Firewall.
Licensing is capacity-driven, so you need careful planning based on traffic volume and use cases, and adding features such as Bot Protection impacts costs; once licensing is clear and sized correctly, there are no surprises.
Cyber Security Consultant at ProTechmanize
Subscription models have competitive pricing, while perpetual licenses involve an upfront higher cost.
Global Channel Alliances Lead at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
The price is affordable and satisfactory.
CEO at CyberApp
The solution is expensive
Design & Delivery Senior Network Security Architect at Qiddiya Investment Company
Regarding the pricing of F5 Silverline Managed Services, I would say it is quite affordable.
Associate Vice President at Novac Technology Solutions
 

Valuable Features

Cloudflare Web Application Firewall provides comprehensive security features, easy setup, scalability, and competitive pricing with praised performance and stability.
F5 Advanced WAF excels in detection, customization, and reporting, providing comprehensive web application security and user-friendly operation.
F5 Silverline Managed Services provides advanced security and traffic management with user-friendly features, real-time intelligence, and robust DDoS protection.
The custom rules and the geo-redundant geographical rule feature, which allows me to implement geographical rules for customers, add significant value.
Network Architect at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
The best features of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall are multiple, including the WAF, rate limiter, and bot attack protection.
IT Manager at Amla Commerce
Cloudflare Web Application Firewall's advanced reporting and analytics tools add a layer that we're able to visualize and see before it actually hits the local firewall.
Owner at Hga consulting
The Advanced Attack Signature database is very strong and regularly updated, effectively blocking SQL injections, cross-site scripting, command injections, and file inclusion attacks while allowing selective enabling or disabling of signatures to avoid blocking genuine traffic.
Cyber Security Consultant at ProTechmanize
The perpetual license, despite an initial higher cost, lacks transparency regarding support expiration.
Global Channel Alliances Lead at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
It contains the logic of both negative and positive security combined.
CEO at CyberApp
It allows for centralized management of certificates, protecting applications from top ten attacks like SQL injection and cross-site scripting.
Design & Delivery Senior Network Security Architect at Qiddiya Investment Company
One part is positive security, which allows you to know vulnerabilities in depth, and you can implement CAPTCHA and MFA for logins, while also preventing known threats with included signatures.
Network And Security Consultant at TD SYNNEX
I can also use my load balancer in F5 because they are providing and acting as a load balancer too, and they will support the volumetric and DDoS attacks and malicious attacks.
Associate Vice President at Novac Technology Solutions
 

Categories and Ranking

Cloudflare Web Application ...
Sponsored
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
7th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
26
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
F5 Advanced WAF
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
71
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
F5 Silverline Managed Services
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
21st
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
16
Ranking in other categories
Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (14th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Web Application Firewall (WAF) category, the mindshare of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall is 5.4%, down from 6.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of F5 Advanced WAF is 7.1%, down from 10.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of F5 Silverline Managed Services is 1.4%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Web Application Firewall (WAF) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
F5 Advanced WAF7.1%
Cloudflare Web Application Firewall5.4%
F5 Silverline Managed Services1.4%
Other86.1%
Web Application Firewall (WAF)
 

Featured Reviews

DB
CTO at PlayNirvana
Advanced security reporting has protected high-traffic betting platforms from constant attacks
I don't see room for improvement to Cloudflare Web Application Firewall. One thing I don't know much about because we have a dedicated IT team for that, and I'm not involved with Cloudflare much anymore. But if I were to compare them to F5, I would like to see more features that F5 offers. F5 has an option to bring the whole infrastructure, the whole WAF and all their packages, Bot Management, and everything else on your infrastructure. You need to install certain services from their side, and then you can choose if you would like requests to hit your servers immediately or if requests need to be proxied through F5 backbone. That would be a nice addition because we have 90% of the traffic as legit traffic coming from whitelisted servers. If it comes from whitelisted servers, I don't need to go every request through the backbone; I could easily just IP whitelist everything. Then I could maybe have Bot Management on my infrastructure that drastically reduces the price of Cloudflare. I would like to see Push CDN more improved in the next release of Cloudflare Web Application Firewall. And maybe something similar to Pushpin that Fastly has, which is an option where you can push messages that then can be scaled globally over the network. From our perspective, if we have a listener that listens for stock updates, I would just need to have one processor that pushes those updates to the Cloudflare API, and then Cloudflare would broadcast that message to all listeners. Cloudflare will check the order of the message, and if you, as a customer, are not connected or have some kind of network issue, when you reconnect, you will receive the latest state and missing updates.
Kallamuddin Ansari - PeerSpot reviewer
Cyber Security Consultant at ProTechmanize
Application security has protected critical banking services while policy learning minimizes false blocks
F5 Advanced WAF performs well overall, but I have noticed some points that could enhance the solution. Initially, policy tuning could be simpler, as while the learning engine is powerful, initial tuning still requires experienced engineers, which can be challenging for new teams due to the complexity of options and parameters. A more guided and simple tuning workflow would help reduce the learning curve. Additionally, tighter native integration with SIEM or SOAR tools would simplify correlation and investigations for security teams, although log exports are available. Overall, these are not blockers, merely enhancement opportunities, and once tuned, F5 Advanced WAF is very stable and reliable; improving usability, reporting, and onboarding would make it even more effective for larger environments.
Mohan Janarthanan - PeerSpot reviewer
Associate Vice President at Novac Technology Solutions
Cloud applications have gained stronger protection and real-time defense against web attacks
What really stands out for me in terms of advantages of F5 Silverline Managed Services is that in a single cloud platform, I can protect my web applications against attacks. I can also use my load balancer in F5 because they are providing and acting as a load balancer too, and they will support the volumetric and DDoS attacks and malicious attacks. Regarding the real-time threat intelligence feature, I do use this aspect in F5 Silverline Managed Services. It blocks malicious IPs or bad IPs for my server, protecting against my applications. For example, if someone is a bad actor trying to access via a malicious IP, I can block it because the threat intelligence has the capability to block the malicious IP. The adaptable and flexible security impacts threat response time positively. It is effective because it blocks my malicious traffic. Whenever I face issues related to that application, it automatically routes my traffic to act as a proxy and routes my traffic to their scrubbing center, especially in case of any volumetric attack.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Comms Service Provider
14%
Insurance Company
13%
Computer Software Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise6
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise31
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise9
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Cloudflare Web Application Firewall?
I don't see room for improvement to Cloudflare Web Application Firewall. One thing I don't know much about because we...
What is your primary use case for Cloudflare Web Application Firewall?
We are using Cloudflare Web Application Firewall's advanced reporting and analytics tools with their Zero Trust, so e...
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 r...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for F5 Advanced WAF?
The pricing for F5 Advanced WAF is a bit higher, but not that high. I would say for a good amount of revenue-generati...
What needs improvement with F5 Advanced WAF?
On the features I wish existed, Big-IP Advanced WAF is primarily an on-premises solution and in that solution, there ...
Is Citrix ADC (formerly Netscaler) the best ADC to use and if not why?
For ADC, any ADC can do a good job. But in case if you want to add WAF functionality to the same ADC hardware you hav...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for F5 Silverline Managed Services?
Regarding the pricing of F5 Silverline Managed Services, I would say it is quite affordable.
What needs improvement with F5 Silverline Managed Services?
In terms of areas for improvement, I would say that one scenario is that F5 Silverline Managed Services needs to adap...
 

Also Known As

Cloudflare WAF
No data available
F5 Silverline Web Application Firewall, F5 Silverline DDoS Protection
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

crunchbase, udacity, marketo, okcupid, zendesk
MAXIMUS, Vivo, American Systems, Bangladesh Post Office, City Bank
City Bank, Ricacorp Properties, Miele, American Systems, Bangladesh Post Office
Find out what your peers are saying about F5 Advanced WAF vs. F5 Silverline Managed Services and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
884,076 professionals have used our research since 2012.