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F5 Advanced WAF vs NSFOCUS Web Application Firewall comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

F5 Advanced WAF
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
3rd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
72
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NSFOCUS Web Application Fir...
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
45th
Average Rating
7.0
Reviews Sentiment
8.0
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Web Application Firewall (WAF) category, the mindshare of F5 Advanced WAF is 3.4%, down from 7.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NSFOCUS Web Application Firewall is 0.6%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Web Application Firewall (WAF) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
F5 Advanced WAF3.4%
NSFOCUS Web Application Firewall0.6%
Other96.0%
Web Application Firewall (WAF)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2797602 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Security Systems Engineer at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
Granular security policies have protected critical applications and ensure safe user and admin access
Improvements could be made regarding the log information from the backend CLI. There are enhancements needed; if a request gets blocked on the TCP layer, there should be traces or data to verify which source generated these requests, including the source and port information for initiation. These data are missing from F5 Advanced WAF. Besides that, another improvement could be refining the bot detection to minimize false positives; it should be able to verify more granularly between legitimate and non-legitimate clients. Overall, I find everything else good. A wish list feature I have is for the Technical Assistance Center (TAC) to respond more promptly. Their response time needs improvement; while they do not take excessive time, it can be enhanced, especially given it is a security product.
it_user933945 - PeerSpot reviewer
Desktop Engineer at eros international media ltd
Offers Application Protection Against Web Attacks
There is a need for expanded licensing terms and options. There's also a need for improved and more agile customization features. The user needs to be able to manage each policy as required; the functionality needs to empower the user. There should be a complete suite of desktop provider policies available to users. Overall, it needs to be more user-friendly.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"F5 technical support is excellent. They are experts who always provide the right solution, and they understand the problem. Their response and resolution times are good."
"The most valuable features of F5 Advanced WAF are the easy identification of events and customization. We can pinpoint our settings."
"The most valuable feature is that it is secure."
"Despite a few issues, F5 Advanced WAF is performing well for me."
"The most valuable features of F5 Advanced WAF are the overall capabilities, there is not a comparable solution on the market."
"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."
"Identification, ease of use, and ease of modifying it to most of our needs are valuable."
"The most valuable feature is artificial intelligence and to get extra internal access."
"Since we are using this tool for protection purposes we really appreciate the hybrid security abilities; the main idea here is that we powerful protection our application needs."
 

Cons

"The reporting could be clearer and embedded to include our movement data."
"My experience with the technical support from F5 is that on the technical side, we sometimes face issues with reachability and availability."
"Truthfully, they can improve a bit. Sometimes you get an engineer who is absent for two, three days and you have to call them and change engineers because the first one is not responding."
"There are opportunities for improvement in updating the user interface to a more modern look."
"F5 Advanced WAF could improve on its funding for WAF features. There is a need to be more advanced WAF features."
"We usually use a third-party tool for logging and reporting. It would be nice if we could do that right on this solution. They have one, but it's not very stable. Logging and reporting effectively would be a big enhancement."
"Nevertheless, F5 products are generally considered to be hard to deploy."
"Users would like to have an additional IP intelligence license to handle this within WAF itself without needing to engage with the SOC team."
"There is a need for expanded licensing terms and options. There's also a need for improved and more agile customization features."
"There is a need for expanded licensing terms and options. There's also a need for improved and more agile customization features. The user needs to be able to manage each policy as required; the functionality needs to empower the user. There should be a complete suite of desktop provider policies available to users. Overall, it needs to be more user-friendly."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Licensing fees for this solution are paid on a yearly basis."
"The price of the solution is reasonable when compared with other products, such as FortiWeb. I am very satisfied with the price."
"A yearly license for F5 Advanced WAF is expensive."
"F5 Advanced WAF pricing structure should be adjusted to meet the need of small to medium-sized companies."
"The way we deployed it, I would rate it a four out of five in terms of pricing."
"There is a perpetual license that comes with your hardware. There is also an additional fee for support."
"The solution is very expensive so should only be used in the right environment."
"It's more expensive than other solutions and depending on the modules, there can be additional fees."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business27
Midsize Enterprise16
Large Enterprise31
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for F5 Advanced WAF?
F5 Advanced WAF is somewhat costly compared to other vendors, but it is worth the investment due to the stability it provides to the environment and infrastructure.
What needs improvement with F5 Advanced WAF?
Improvements could be made regarding the log information from the backend CLI. There are enhancements needed; if a request gets blocked on the TCP layer, there should be traces or data to verify wh...
What is your primary use case for F5 Advanced WAF?
My main use case for F5 Advanced WAF is to protect external and internal applications from cyber attacks and to prevent malicious payloads and malicious data from reaching servers. Even if maliciou...
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Also Known As

No data available
NSFOCUS WAF, NSFOCUS Web Application Security
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

MAXIMUS, Vivo, American Systems, Bangladesh Post Office, City Bank
2016 G20 Summit
Find out what your peers are saying about Imperva, Radware, F5 and others in Web Application Firewall (WAF). Updated: October 2026.
919,088 professionals have used our research since 2012.