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F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) vs NetScaler comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 8, 2024
 

Categories and Ranking

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Man...
Ranking in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Number of Reviews
118
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NetScaler
Ranking in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Number of Reviews
106
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (4th), Web Application Firewall (WAF) (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2024, in the Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) category, the mindshare of F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) is 15.2%, down from 16.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetScaler is 16.0%, up from 13.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
 

Featured Reviews

Richard Polyak - PeerSpot reviewer
Jun 21, 2022
Reduces maintenance downtime and has a strong user community
Our primary use cases for F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager are high availability for applications and SSL offload certificates F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager helps reduce our downtime for maintenance purposes. It also offers us ease of use for the deployment of certificates onto a central…
DEMİRHAN ÇAVUŞOĞLU - PeerSpot reviewer
Feb 7, 2024
A tool for centralized management including inventory and sales tracking
Citrix ADM provides centralized management for various internal programs, including inventory and sales tracking, communication tools, and office programs such as Teams and Azure We wouldn't have comprehensive insights into our system without Citrix ADM. It provides us with essential information.…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution's stability is pretty good."
"The scalability of the solution depends on the sizing of the network. Generally, the scalability is quite good."
"The combination of ADC and WAN is good."
"The detail that you have available when setting up iRules."
"F5 has many capabilities for load balancing and web application firewall features."
"It provides first-tier firewalling, for you application. And it provides server load-balancing, it provides optimization, and it provides a proxy feature, where your users cannot directly access your server. It acts as a fully proxy architecture. It has client-side and server-side connections, both, and they're separate."
"Our experience has been very good, in terms of performance, and securing our application infrastructure."
"One of the best features of the solution is the operating system."
"The solution can be configured very granularly and has good control over security."
"Citrix Director has been great. It gives us one pane of glass to be able to monitor what's going on with the user sessions as well as to keep on top of the virtual desktops, any servers that may be offline or behaving suspiciously, or any troublesome spots like disconnections. We also use Citrix Studio for maintaining the actual servers that are hosting these applications. We use it for delivery groups in case we need to modify delivery groups in regards to which groups have access to which applications. It has been very helpful."
"The solution is extremely stable."
"Scalability is great. One of the best features of NetScaler is that it can scale out."
"The most impressive thing about Citrix ADM is that we don't encounter latency."
"Load balancing, cache redirection, content switching, all connected with traffic management."
"Just one solution can handle thousands of users... So, it is a very convenient tool to use."
"I like the monitoring ability as it enables me to identify when an internal (load-balanced) resource is having issues before it becomes a problem in production."
 

Cons

"They need to develop the reporting tools further."
"There is a need for a more modular version to concentrate on the current monolithic structure of both the virtual and hardware versions."
"They could improve the product's ease of use. There is some confusion how to operate it."
"Lacking in free training to help users understand the product more, so they would know how to correctly use it. Like other vendors and their products, becoming more proactive is an area for improvement."
"The user interface of F5 BIG-IP LTM is old and could improve."
"While the licensing is good through the AWS Marketplace, it is more expensive than what you could buy yourself."
"For integration with other AWS environments, we do some tie-ins with some autoscaling groups. This has been challenging for us. We have had issues, where when autoscaling groups scale up, there are some instances which are not showing up in the proper size. Then, those IPs would get registered with F5, but never get released. Therefore, we are ending up with a whole bunch of ghosted IPs."
"The management interface is unclear, complex, and not concise. I would like a better user interface."
"Their upgrades are not very backward compatible, and sometimes they mess up."
"The main areas for improvement would be around documentation and support. If a feature can be used in two or three ways, show that feature being used in all of those ways. Documentation seems to only cover the primary use case and leaves you to either run through trial and error or consult the user community. In terms of support, I have never actually had them solve any of my issues. I have always solved them myself and then provided the resolution to support."
"We would like the licensing model for this product to be improved, as it isn't currently very transparent. There isn't a standard package available, and each extra feature creates an additional cost."
"Too many bugs in the software and it's always difficult when you need to update."
"They can improve the scalability and the multi-tenancy feature. We recently tried to configure an authentication, and we ran into some issues while using the web-based GUI. It was very slow when you log in with your credentials in the web-based GUI. Each time we clicked on the menu, it tried to do the authentication. It works properly in the console."
"An area for improvement would be the difficulty in finding information about standard licensing costs over the internet. They should provide some reference prices on the net to be quickly referred to."
"Integration with other third party providers and third party applications could be better because it can be a bit complex at present."
"We have issues with the certificates. All authorization processes need certificates, however, every three months we needed to change certificates. This process iss complicated for us because Citrix does not have a not user-friendly interface and does not off user-friendly services. This needs a lot of improvement."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I found F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) an expensive product. The costs would depend on the appliance and infrastructure size. However, my company didn't have to pay extra to use additional features."
"Check other vendors like Cisco, Citrix or A10 Networks. There are plenty in the market with which you can achieve same thing."
"Purchasing through the AWS Marketplace was very simple. The main reason that we went this way was the simplicity of buying it there. It is maintained and upgraded for us, and this makes it easy to stay current."
"There are a few licensing options available for F5 BIG-IP LTM. You can have a perpetual license which is a lifetime license. You then only need to renew the support, if you choose to open a ticket with the support."
"It's not a cheap product, but there are no other replacements for what we do with it."
"Great product for the money. But they can get really expensive, so get what meets your needs."
"We are on an annual license to use the solution."
"This product is costly from a licensing perspective considering its competitors."
"Licensing is adequate. I wanted to have a more prominent license, but until I do they don't give enough support. The additional cost would be too much."
"It all depends on the features that will be used and the number of accesses."
"Ninety day free trial makes it easy to try out this solution."
"Costly product and complicated licensing."
"The tool is cheap."
"After deployment, Citrix Netscaler shifted to a subscription-based license scheme for support, which is slightly more expensive."
"The solution is undoubtedly very good, but it is expensive."
"The solution is expensive compared to one of its competitors."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
14%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Educational Organization
17%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with F5 BIG-IP?
Price is an area of the tool where improvements are required. I want to see CDN capabilities in the product.
What do you like most about Citrix ADC?
The most valuable feature for us is the application firewalling in Citrix NetScaler, ensuring only valid traffic enters our environment.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Citrix ADC?
After deployment, Citrix Netscaler shifted to a subscription-based license scheme for support, which is slightly more expensive.
What needs improvement with Citrix ADC?
Citrix NetScaler is a robust product, but mastering it requires significant learning and training due to its complexity. While it could be easier to manage, it is like transitioning from driving a ...
 

Also Known As

F5 BIG-IP, BIG-IP LTM, F5 ASM, Viprion, F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition , Crescendo Networks Application Delivery Controller, BIG IP
Citrix ADC, Citrix NetScaler VPX, NetScaler Console, NetScaler Web Application Firewall
 

Learn More

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Riken, TransUnion, Tepco Systems Administration, Daejeon University, G&T Bank, Danamon, CyberAgent Inc.
ABB Schweiz, Aer Lingus, AIDS Healthcare Foundation, Amnet Technology Solutions, Aramex International, Ascenty, Atos, Autodesk
Find out what your peers are saying about F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) vs. NetScaler and other solutions. Updated: October 2024.
814,325 professionals have used our research since 2012.